Modern Anime Production is a Prisoner’s Dilemma
The structure of the anime industry incentivizes an unsustainable landscape.
The Japanese animation industry produces more and more anime series each year, to varying quality and success. But there are multiple reasons publishers and animation studios are incentivized to prioritize quantity over quality.
But first… - Miles A.
Chart of the Week
The 2025 Crunchyroll Anime Awards were a historic sweep for Solo Leveling’s first season, causing a great deal of controversy about the integrity of the awards in the overseas anime community. Many fans and industry experts have been questioning the judging procedure, voting methodology, and timing of audience voting so close to new seasons of series that should not be factoring into decisions for 2024 titles. (For example, Solo Leveling was top of mind in voters’ minds during the voting period, because its second season, which was not up for awards, was airing at the time.) While some are claiming this was simply a popularity contest, it’s more of a numbers game.
Comparing the viewership for each series nominated for Anime of the Year to the winner and title with the greatest viewership last year, Solo Leveling, it’s clear how much more audience support existed for the title. Dandadan only had 50% of the viewership that Solo Leveling did last year, and Frieren was only at 34% by the end of 2024 comparatively. While it’s clear that viewership isn’t perfectly correlated with winning awards, it can help explain situations like Ninja Kamui winning over fan favorite Girl’s Band Cry, as Miles explained on Bluesky.
The more viewers a show has, the more a fan or popular vote will sway results in that show's favor. I want to be clear: it isn’t bad for popular things to win awards. But the lack of transparency surrounding the award selection methodology has disillusioned anime critic and fan communities on whether quality can or will ever count for the Crunchyroll Anime Awards.
For example, if we look at the number of awards Frieren won and its comparative viewership, it won the 2nd most awards, despite having the 4th highest viewership for 2024. To me, this shows that even with fan voting, certain series can and will get recognition for specific elements that are top-of-class. However, this can’t always be guaranteed when voters cannot be held accountable to watch all series, let alone nominees, per season. I’d say there’s always next year, but unless things change, Solo Leveling season 2 will probably sweep for the 2026 awards. - Chloe C.
Entertainment At Large
70% of consumers want centrally managed video bundles, Hub study says (Stream TV Insider)
Hub Entertainment Research released “The Best Bundle” report, which polled 1,600 U.S. consumers. Their findings highlight the decline in premium SVOD service subscriptions compared to 2024, bundled deals as a leading reason for acquisition, and consumers’ increased interest in services that aggregate media across all their streaming subscriptions.
These kinds of aggregators lead to more subscriptions overall. According to Hub’s Research, individuals who subscribe to SVODs through aggregation services like Amazon Prime Video or Roku Channels have, on average, nearly twice as many streaming subscriptions. - Chloe C.
The Solo Leveling Awards | Anime Awards 2025 | BONUS QUEST (Quest for the Best)
Here’s the inside scoop postmortem of this year’s Crunchyroll Anime Awards, from Miles (one of the original CR employees who used to run the awards) and his podcast cohosts, Mother’s Basement and Glass Reflection, who are also regular CR Awards judges.
The Quest for the Best podcast did a quick bonus episode to give you an industry perspective on the controversial results of this year’s awards, which covers last year’s anime titles. - Klaudia A.
Ones to Watch
READ: Tamon's B-Side
With 7 volumes currently available in English and volume 8 on the way, Tamon’s B-Side will keep shojo rom-com fans well-fed ahead of its anime premiere this year. The characters’ charming dynamic and the “gap moe” of the distance between the roles they play publicly and privately hit the perfect notes for this slow burn romance. It’s tender and outlandish, with interesting perspectives into Japanese idol culture. - Chloe C.
WATCH: Link Click
I seriously don’t know what is going on in Chinese donghua producer Li Haoling’s brain, but this man produces almost nothing but bangers. If you’ve heard of this anime season’s runaway hit Chinese/Japanese collab To Be Hero X, you need to be watching his other ongoing original series, Link Click. It currently has 2.5 seasons released, with a third on the way (the half season is the Bridon Arc which aired at the beginning of 2025, a short but essential prequel arc.)
What if you made Puella Magi Madoka Magica into a BL suspense crime thriller? And yes, it is BL - fans of BL published in other countries are used to BL titles being more clearly gay, but those of us who are fans of Chinese BL (danmei), know how censored it often is, especially in donghua, so it’s obvious what’s going on here. (This is also the producer making the fan-favorite danmei Heaven Official’s Blessing donghua adaptation, so he’s no stranger to making BL fly under censorship).
But honestly the doomed yaoi isn’t even the biggest draw here. It’s a refreshing, original take on time travel that has you on the edge of your seat every single episode. (Li Haoling has a knack for this, since he did something similar in To Be Hero X, revitalizing my interest in tired superhero tropes even after years of MCU burnout.) - Klaudia A.
Modern Anime Production is a Prisoner’s Dilemma
More than half of all TV anime series ever made were first broadcast after 2010. Many fans think that’s too much anime being released each year. Many people who work in the anime industry also think that’s too much. It’s also more likely to get worse than better in the coming years. But why?
Incentives and the Prisoner’s Dilemma
The Prisoner’s Dilemma is a game theory concept that explains why acting in your own self-interest never results in the best overall outcome, for yourself and for others. I’m sure you could see how this applies to many current societal problems, but let’s take a look at how it’s affecting anime production.
If you pay careful attention to the opening credits of most anime series, particularly if you can cross reference the names of producers with LinkedIn profiles, you'll see that most anime production committees are led by the publishers of the source material, a TV station, or a streaming service. These stakeholders produce anime because they make money from developing a portfolio of successful IP.
Only a small percentage of manga and light novel titles published in a given year are considered for anime adaptation by publishers. In English-speaking fan communities, you'll often hear the belligerently confident assertion that most anime are produced exclusively to drive sales to the source material. While this is certainly one motivation, it's the kind of oversimplification that makes thoughtful conversation on the topic a rarity online.
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