Toonami and the Future of American Anime

As all you insomniacs might have noticed, last night was the re-release of the anime block known as Toonami. While I, unfortunately,could not watch, I am sure a lot of anime fans did to see the English premier of Casshern Sins and Deadman Wonderland, along with the return of anime such as Bleach and Cowboy Bebop. So, what does this mean for the future of anime in America, with the return of a well known anime block?

I say it is the return of big time anime in America. I remember when Naruto and Bleach and all the other anime that used to air on Toonami used to be all over stores such as Hot Topic and FYE, but they slowly gave way to crap like Twilight, and worse yet, Justin Beiber. Once the demand for merchandise catches on, I think stores will cater to the otaku more, rather than just pushing all of the anime merchandise in the corner of a store. (I'm looking at you FYE) Hopefully, they will sell more items corresponding to anime, such as keychains, cell phone charms and perhaps even cosplay.

Also, I say that this could lead to a wider of variety of anime being dubbed over and aired on T.V. True, even after Toonami went off the first time, anime were still being licensed every season by the masses by different companies such as Funimation and Sentai works, but I think now there will be reason for companies to get hold of these anime and dub them. It might be an incentive for companies to make better dubs as well, because let's be honest here, most dubs suck because the actors can't act and some of them are monotone. This also might bring back the need to release DVDs for anime after release on TV, similar to what they do in Japan, due to the fact the companies would not feel the need to batch up the releases in series sets like they have been coming lately. In other words, they could release multiple DVDs and just have four or five episodes a piece and still make a lot of money.

Honestly,I just hope that this can bring back anime to the main stream culture. True, anime has gained a lot of popularity due to fan subs and streaming, but usually the only people who were able to find these anime were those who were looking. With the addition of an anime airing block, other than the infamous Adult Swim, hopefully anime will catch on to the other channels, and hopefully, more varieties of anime will be aired on T.V. While the dark psychological thrillers like Death Note and Code Geass and Deadman Wonder land along with the shounen anime such as Bleach, Naruto, and Full Metal Alchemist are good,I think they should air more comedy and maybe ecchi(yeah right) stuff along with it.

Toonami has brought people together for anime once again. With the return of the famous airing block, I'm honestly hoping that this could make the anime culture in America stronger and perhaps bring back the love for anime like it once was.