Just how mainstream (or not mainstream) is anime?

[Triple_R]

First of all, I want to be clear about what I'm aiming for with this thread - A simple accounting of how mainstream (re: popular, widely known, widely accepted, influential, etc...) anime is. If possible, I'd like to avoid debates over whether or not the current status of anime is good, or whether we should want to be more mainstream or less mainstream. I'd just like to determine how mainstream anime is.

This is something I've been thinking about lately, because I've encountered a lot of mixed signals in the last year or two. It's also because my own personal situation (living in very rural Canada) cuts me off from the anime scene in the real world. I like to be as accurate and well-informed as possible about the things I love and am interested in, so I'd love to hear from other anime fans on their takes on this, and their own experiences as anime fans.

As for the mixed signals I'm talking about:

1. Anime sales in the most direct sense - DVD/Blu-Ray purchases - Tends to be in the 10s of thousands, at best. Respectable, but definitely cottage industry territory.

2. Nonetheless, there's perhaps nothing more commonplace on the internet today than anime character avatars. I see them everywhere. I see them on major pro sports message boards, I see them on political forums, I see them on twitter (and some of the twitter accounts with them have sizable followings). They're everywhere, on places that have nothing to do with anime, and they seem to be easily accepted. The image of anime, anyway, appears to have conquered the internet. No small feat.

3. The image of anime is everywhere on the internet, but then, it appears quite random. What I mean is that there's little pattern to it. There's no one particular anime character or show that seems to be pushing this. DBZ, Pokemon, and Sailor Moon were a mainstream trifecta in the 90s, and I don't get the sense that any of the more recent specific anime shows has hit that level of popular awareness.

4. Anime has very minimal-to-nonexistent presence in the mainstream news, like CNN and the New York Times (in sharp contrast to sports stars and actors and music celebrities, all of which tend to come up fairly frequently). But then, mainstream news itself is arguably in decline. From what I've read on it, they don't enjoy the readership or viewership that they once did. As such, I'm not sure how good a measure mainstream news coverage is of how mainstream something else is (ironic, I know )

5. Anime-based or related YouTube vids often do get very large view counts. I've lurked a bit on some of the more (in)famous modern internet spots (Reddit, the chans), and there does seem to be good anime knowledge by the people chatting there.


One thing I've begun to suspect is a generational divide of sorts. My age makes me a very late Gen Xer or a very early Millenial. I'm born right in the middle of that overlapping section that gets disputed by people who care about such things. My sense is that while anime is not mainstream with Gen Xers and Boomers, that it may well be mainstream with Millenials. Such a generational divide could, I think, account for the mixed signals I mentioned above.

So, I'm curious to know everybody's experiences here as an anime fan. Particularly if you're under the age of 30, and hence a clear-cut Millenial.

If you're attending College or University, how large are your anime clubs? Are they amongst the largest clubs on your campus, or are they relatively small?

The anime or anime-related conventions you attend - What sort of attendance figures do they pull down?

I'd like to get a better "lay of the land" so to speak. In this case, the cultural landscape.


Final question - On a scale from 1 to 10, where 1 = 1000 fans or less worldwide, and 10 = NFL in America/Soccer everywhere else, how mainstream would you say anime is today?

[GDiddy]

I would say probably about a five?

Gen Y probably would've been around the age that Gundam Wing/Sailor Moon/DBZ/Pokemon started airing on CN back in the late 90s/early 00s. Millenials would've grown up with Bleach/Naruto on CN/AS/Toonami....

Gen Xers and older wouldn't be too familar with it unless they were movie fans or if their children were into it. But I guess that depends on one's own experience....

I mean, one of my Internet friends is in his 60s and loves anime, thanks to spending time in Japan thru the military.

[Kotohono]

So, I'm curious to know everybody's experiences here as an anime fan. Particularly if you're under the age of 30, and hence a clear-cut Millenial.

A lot of people in my age range thru school, games, and stuff in general have had some left of interest in anime at least. Not everyone but a fairly decent%, and when I've worn anime stuff before getting comments from people at college or even restaurants sometimes isn't all that uncommon.

If you're attending College or University, how large are your anime clubs? Are they amongst the largest clubs on your campus, or are they relatively small?

Smaller end size but far from the smallest it had typically 30 member attendance, but had well over 100 members, and I mean there were plenty of people with anime interest outside the club. For comparison sake a larger club (LGBTQ) I was in had around 75-100 members typically attendance and pushed breaking fire code on really high end days (probably around 500-750 members), and smaller niche organization never had more than 10 members show on a given day and maybe 30 total with average of 5 of us showing. I have no idea what the largest ones were though.

The anime or anime-related conventions you attend - What sort of attendance figures do they pull down?

Around 10,000 people at the ones I've attended personally and con attendance for has been raising every year from current trends at those ones. They barely pulled 2000-3000 a decade ago, and still grow at just around 1k more per year it seems like right now.

I'd like to get a better "lay of the land" so to speak. In this case, the cultural landscape.

Other things consider that roughly 550,000 people attend Comiket twice a year in japan, Crunchyroll reported 4 months ago having 400,000 PAYING subscribers, it's small compared to netflix, and is about 10% of what hulu has. It was considered common enough to be used on the daily show in 2013 although not directly or in best way but hey it's something. And on youtube the highest viewed anime content seems to rate in at about 1/5 to 1/10 the highest count of video game related videos, which are no questions about it, video games are mainstream at this point especially with in Millenials.

Final question - On a scale from 1 to 10, where 1 = 1000 fans or less worldwide, and 10 = NFL in America/Soccer everywhere else, how mainstream would you say anime is today?

Among the whole population probably a 5, among Millenials I'd say closer to a 7 probably.

Originally Posted by GDiddy

Gen Y probably would've been around the age that Gundam Wing/Sailor Moon/DBZ/Pokemon started airing on CN back in the late 90s/early 00s. Millenials would've grown up with Bleach/Naruto on CN/AS/Toonami....

Gen Y and Millennial are the same thing .

[Draco Spirit]

I say it mostly a subtype of nerdery where I live. Most people know what Anime is in a general sense, but only the nerds have likely watch any amount. Additionally while it's nerd thing, it's not 100% coverage by a long shot.

On the Anime people watch, you find its mostly the classics and stuff that's properly translated. Plenty know Dragon Ball Z and Attack on Titian, considerably less know of Akame ga Kill!

Age wise you seem to have a bias towards younger, but that because the Pokemon / Yu-Gi-Oh! waves. There certainly a nice selection of older fans hanging about from the early 90s 'dark adult cartoon' wave and the latter but deeply inferential DBZ/Sailor Moon wave.

First anime I saw was Guyver Episode 1 way way way too young , but I latter got into it from my affection for Pokemon and Final Fantasy, before getting hooked on Bleach.. and Bleach was the first show I watched in sub (I wanted to know what happened next!)

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by GDiddy

I would say probably about a five?

Originally Posted by Konakaga

Among the whole population probably a 5, among Millenials I'd say closer to a 7 probably.

That's my impression as well, yeah.

Kona, thanks for all the info. It definitely was helpful and informative. I'm especially thankful for the Comiket and Crunchyroll statistics you provided, since they give me a more concrete sense of the size of the core anime fandom.


@Draco Spirit - "Subtype of nerdy" is probably a good way of putting it. It's a large subtype, though. Most gamers seem to be at least aware of anime, and many are big anime fans themselves. And video gaming is definitely mainstream now.

[Last Sinner]

It also depends on what degree of immersion fans are doing in relation to your criteria.

In my experiences with being involved with anime communities for over a decade now and seeing it from convention and industry perspectives in recent years, I'd say the following:


1. Attack on Titan is easily the most known/discussed/bought title of the last few years. It endlessly tops manga charts and is a major lifeline for any distributor for whoever was fortunate enough to get the license for it in their region. Sword Art Online and Madoka would be another recent titles that would be relatively ubiquitious/you couldn't go around a convention or store without seeing them cosplayed or discussed/viewed in larger numbers. Heck, I see randoms in public cosplaying Attack on Titan any time of the year for their own reasons even if nothing's on.

2. Evangelion is still 'the' title - you hold a 'best title of all time' poll for any significantly large sample of people, Evangelion will inevitably be #1. In terms of getting the West to start being part of the fandom, Cowboy Bebop will always be acknowledged as the most responsible title, even if Evangelion is the most popular one.

3. Some people are wave based - they only liked/heavily preferred what came around a certain time period. 1998, 2006 and 2011 tend to be major focal points. The pre-mid 2000s certainly had more material that had notable Western-influences and different target audiences compared to the significant shift that occured from around 2006 onwards. I wouldn't say Gen X wasn't into anime - not at all. What I would say from my experiences is that Gen X is considerably less interested in delving into anything from the last few years, from honest conversations people have told me. And I think Gen X is being catered for still somewhat with the emergence of titles from the 70s and 80s over the last few years via fresh licenses and the internet. Millenials, definitely more interested in the present overall and what lies therein.

4. The sub v dub factor - this is inevitably somewhat divisive but has to be acknowledged and it factors into popularity of titles in the West. I prefer subs 99.999% of the time but ultimately, one has to acknowledge that some people can't handle hearing something in another language, especially early on in their anime journey, as well as that some people really have issues with subtitles, be it due to dyslexia, finding reading subtitles to be exhausting, etc. When a dub is actually done well (e.g. Howl's Moving Castle and the casting of Billy Crystal as Calcifer), it can cause a title to become bigger in some places than expected.

5. Are people multi-genre/style or just one? A good deal of people ted to gravitate to shounen titles and never move on from there. Some only want moe/cute titles. Some want more mature/niche stuff. And inevitably shounen usually accounts for a significant proportion, if not a majority, of physical sales/popularity.

6. Physical vs online - in stores or in sales, things tend to gravitate more towards titles that the bigger companies have invested a lot in acquiring. Online, it tends to be a bit different - since the internet doesn't restrict itself to only what's licensed, they tend to see more and acquire more developed/detailed tastes. The notion that some places like ANN love to spin that getting something that isn't licensed anymore is a fallacy - there are a good number of great titles that have either had licenses expire and won't be renewed, or never will be due to legal issues (Macross: Do You Remember Love being a tragic legal mess).

7. Art quality/style - this inevitably factors in. It is a sticking point that a good deal of people - not necessarily a majority - use to determine whether a title is worth pursuing.

8. Access - Pre-2000, if you could get your hands on anything at all, you'd get people together and watch it because it was hard to. And as the fansub then streaming eras developed, the club era fell off because having to collate efforts to find anything wasn't necessary anymore. When someone informed you of a permanent way to find anime beyond the few you'd see on TV or in the cinemas, you'd have enough to go through for years and discuss with select friends.

9. Shifiting gender tastes - A bit more than a decade ago, it was probably heavily assumed females mainly liked shoujo only. Maybe more cutesy in recent times That definitely isn't true anymore for the overall female section of the fandom. The fujioshi factor has slowly filtered through and become a selling point. I can also say from personal experience that more intense material, particularly Elfen Lied and Tokyo Ghoul, have a signficantly high level of popularity amongst females in Australia. And while males are still heavily shounen-involved, seinen and moe have definitely become significant parts of the equation.

10. Timing. If a title is released in a period where there's less competition/popular things around, it takes off with a bigger effect. Sword Art Online did it in 2012. Attack on Titan did it in 2013. Would they have been as popular five years ago or five years in the future? Somewhat doubtful. The 'test of time'/'right time right place' is a very finnicky thing.


Went to my first convention in 2003 then started going to a club shortly after that which was having around 100 people then gradually declined as the internet became more accessible. Current convention attendance for the one in my area is around 20k. Emergence of a third distributor in the last few years has definitely offered a better variety and helped the scene more.



Overall populace awareness.....four. Gen X - six. Milennial surface level - eight. Milennial actual - six.


Peace.

[IceHism]

Not mainstream at all. I'm not concerned about anime from a western perspective so i wouldn't know but it's pretty small in japan. Of course, this does not apply to manga which sells a ton more than anime. Heck, light novels make more money than anime as well.
Though sometimes you get animes that become mega hits like Frozen or attack on titan or madoka for example.

[relentlessflame]

I think the big difference, as many have suggested, is "awareness of some anime" (as in, perhaps they've seen a few select anime shows), and an active part of anime fandom (regularly seeking out new anime as a regular hobby).

Casual awareness and limited exposure is fairly high (particularly for people who are deeply net-connected, considering anime comes up in wider Internet memes now and then; people who spend time on forums are probably higher-odds of being more deeply net-connected than average, regardless of their other hobbies/interests). Regular engagement is very low -- certainly with the latest stuff coming out of Japan. And the amount of people who invest any significant amount of money in the hobby is even lower still; only a tiny minority buy (like with F2P games or whatever).

For example, my sisters may check out anime here and there based on what's on Netflix or Hulu, and these are usually dubbed and often way after they're "old news" to us. They'll check it out because it's available and it's something to watch. But they wouldn't regularly pay attention to even something like Crunchyroll except if it's the only place to see a certain show they heard about from their friends. I suspect that's what anime is like for a lot of people -- if it's there and seems interesting they might watch it, but they're very casual about it. But there's lot of other entertainment competing for their time.

[Fizix]

This might be a bit all over the place as I'm on a tablet and multitasking. (Edit: sorry for the length, I just mind dumped and its way longer than I thought it would be). I'm slightly out of your demo and in the UK.

I don't think conventions and stuff are a good barometer if you're looking at how "mainstream" anime is, how many people have or do watch it, what their opinions are, etc. the only people who will go to a convention are people who a really into anime and are probably quite nerdy.

Without being rude (although it kind of is), I'd call myself a fan of anime but you wouldn't find me dead at a convention, doing cosplay or anything like that. It's not a good way to gauge mainstream popularity at all because even if anime made prime time TV it would not mean everyone would be visiting conventions.

I'd personally identify as a casual anime fan though. I watch quite a narrow selection of stuff and don't particularly relate to the stereotypical anime culture and stuff. I just like quite a few shows and find them charming and interesting.

Also sales figures are bad, most people probably stream either legally or illegally and if the latter it's not going to show up on sales figures.


Personally, I think it's in an odd place. Like it is in mainstream consciousness, it's had a wide exposure. It's watched too much to be called niche but it isn't watched regularly enough to really qualify as mainstream. Does that make sense?


On media coverage and exposure:

Anime can have coverage in the mainstream media but it's erratic. Like the guardian reviewed Attack on Titan. Also mainstream newspapers were going on about the GITS movie a fair bit and they were getting a lot of comments from people who enjoyed the original and lots of non anime viewers know that Scarlet is a controversial choice.

I was also surprised by the amount of people passing comments on the GITS movie on Facebook which revealed that they had seen the show (but not necessarily all of it). I think people tend to be quite low key about it until it's brought up and then people think it's OK to talk about.


Jonothan Ross is a major celebrity in the UK and is a big lover of Japanese entertainment and has discussed shows a lot. It certainly leads to discussion amongst people outside of the anime community and people do check stuff out or have seen stuff.


On sites like Digital Spy, which is one of the biggest general entertainment forums in the UK, the usual suspects frequently appear when people talk about best/iconic films and TV shows. Those TV/Magazine best film/TV show lists that are voted for by the public also contain something in the top 10 or 20. Usually Akira, Cowboy Bebop, Evangelion or GITS.

But are those even shows you should consider? as they are icons, so are kind of unique.

Shows like Spirited Away had theatrical releases in the UK and did well.


So, it's there and people do watch stuff and it's accepted as a medium which has notable content.


Talking about the people I know, few are anime fans:

- none of them think anime is exclusively for children
- none of them think it's all porn
- none of them think it's weird (although they know that there is weird stuff out there)
- lots of them have seen stuff and even if they didn't like it aren't judgemental about it

So I don't think those stereotypes really apply. I think youngsters or old people might make silly comments like that to rib people, but whether they believe it?

When I was in high school in the 90's, Akira and a few other shows were being discussed. People knew about it and some people saw them and thought they were unique and cool. This isn't the typical "clubs" either, but just in regular classes.



This doesn't mean I think people are closet anime fans though, because it doesn't. But I think it implies that exposure is far greater than it may appear at face value and many people have had some exposure to actual shows, even if they didn't like them. I don't know anyone who thinks they are all weird Japanese shows. That ship has sailed and did so a long time ago.

Lastly, it was an odd/amusing day when I was discussing hyper violent anime with my step-aunt. She brought it up, her son is into anime and she's a big fan. I have to laugh at that, you'd never expect her to watch something like that.

I hope my waffle was helpful in some way.

In case anyone has gotten this far, do people really find that they can't discuss or mention anime openly? I don't find that, but then I also don't try to get people to watch it or draw them in. Other than the Mrs but she has no choice, I have to sit through reality TV shows so... Yeah, she's watching this crap. That's a good way to broaden exposure.

[Last Sinner]

It is important to note that overall, anime will always be relatively niche.

But there are titles/points in time that buck the trend.

'The test of time' factor has been intriguing me lately. One that has really sprung up to mind is Haruhi Suzumiya - back in 2006, it was hot as anything could be. But delaying a second season to 2009, subverting that season's art style with K-ON's and mainly using Endless Eight for material really shot itself in the foot (nice going, KyoAni). Then came the Disappearance movie which showed the franchise still had juice but it seemed to indicate people wanted to see more of Yuki and less of Haruhi. Come this year, there's the spinoff centred around Yuki. The franchise itself still has value and in that sense has stood the test of time nearly a decade later. But as for the original series itself...I'm not so sure. It doesn't ring true as an obvious must-watch for the newer wave. That said, Haruhi merchandise does continue to appear in my neck of the woods.

Then take the Fate/Stay Night world. Yes, the 2006 adaptation was overall a mess, but it did make an impact. It made people who otherwise wouldn't have been aware of Type-Moon to be aware. (You could also make a claim that Tsukihime did likewise, but argh, that was so far removed from the original, it deserves to be forgotten) Garden of Sinners and Carnival Phantasm appeared a few years back. Then in recent years, Fate/Zero and presently FSN: Unlimited Blade Works arc. The first FSN adaptation is pretty much lost in the mists of time now. But as a brand/franchise, Type-Moon continues to prosper. And merchandise, particularly for Fate/Stay Night, has been a big part of it. Saber has definitely become one of the most marketable characters in the figure market.

And this do-over/branching out style of franchises - Evangelion has been the master of it. Original 26 ep series that left people wanting resolution. Movie came, people demanded it more. But by merchandise, it had brand power all the way to the start of the 4 movie do-over.


So I guess I'd say in terms of becoming more known/closer to mainstream, having something that possesses longevity, particularly with merchandise value for the long term, is important.

[RRW]

Feel like gaining more traction thanks to Internet and Toonami revival. Also japan seem begun to realize that the should try to expand the market instead catering on very small audience.

That said talking about mainstream it self. it still probably niche product to the most western country. the fanbase certainly getting bigger but comparatively small compare to game and movie industry. Thought I believe that majority of people this have at least try to watch 1-2 anime of popular one. but not less popular one.

I mean if compare it to superhero comic. most people probably have exposure of Batman, Superman and Spiderman. but not the lesser one like Daredevil or Watchmen

Originally Posted by Triple_R

4. Anime has very minimal-to-nonexistent presence in the mainstream news, like CNN and the New York Times (in sharp contrast to sports stars and actors and music celebrities, all of which tend to come up fairly frequently). But then, mainstream news itself is arguably in decline. From what I've read on it, they don't enjoy the readership or viewership that they once did. As such, I'm not sure how good a measure mainstream news coverage is of how mainstream something else is (ironic, I know )

Talking about mainstream news

[cyth]

I'm pretty much of the opinion that everybody of certain age knows what anime is, certainly everyone who considers themselves (consciously or unconsciously) a netizen.

I think anime is pretty mainstream, much like everyone else I think there's a few shows people watch. Attack on Titan popularity is probably just an offshoot of zombie apocalypse genre popularity. And anime as a whole is popular because it's considered part of the wider geek culture education. Which is a pretty terrible premise when you realize these people have no clue about anime and consider cosplay as the pinnacle of fandom activity.

I still think this popularity has a positive effect on sales, at least on manga and merchandise, not so much on home video. The 400k Crunchyroll number is probably faked, but if one fourth of that is real, which I believe it's achievable, it's still believable because we tend to neglect every other market that isn't NA or Europe.

[psycho bolt]

Hm, I wonder if it is mainstream.. I mean many people know anime and some do watch it. But do many stay as fans? My guess is that some watch it once or twice and that is pretty about it. The number of fans must be lower than the total amount of initial watchers. Reminds me of most of my friends who play more video games and watch more tv than anime.

[GDiddy]

I think it's mainstream enough to where people know at least about Attack on Titan, Bleach and Naruto....the Simpsons did a tribute about it in one of their openings last year.

[totoum]

The history of anime in france is vastly different than in the US.
I'd say pretty much anyone in France knows what anime is, though if they've watched it odds are it was a 4kids style dub of it back in the 80s and 90s which were popular, my mid 40s step mom will gladly talk about Captain Harlock or Cobra, daft punk even hired Toei and Leiji Matsumoto for Interstella 5555.

I grew up on DBZ, sailor moon, Captain tsubasa etc , those were shown in the morning national TV so I'd think any french person my age will know what they are.

Today they might get shown on smaller channels ( but still national ones) but the likes of One Piece or Fairy Tale still get shown and without the 4kids treatment, same for Attack on Titan.

So anyone with a TV will at least have stumbled into them.
Ghibli is also well known and the Wolf Children world premiere was held in France.
Back in the early 2000s french channel canal+ ( probably a rough comparison but it's somewhat like a french HBO) showed the likes of Monster, GTO, Noir.
So even if they don't watch it lots of people know what it is.
Other fun fact, I'm not even sure this ever happened in America but there was a time when a french cable channel would show ecchi and hentai in the evenings.
Other more niche channels like "nolife" will show subbed anime as well, here's a list
What hasn't caught on?moe. I'm not even talking about it being bashed, just that any shows like k-on that got licensed sold terribly in France, so you're not going to see anything like that on big channels and it's a lot less mainstream.

However I'd say the popularity of anime pales in comparison to manga. (far) behind Japan ,France is the no2 market for manga in the world (despite a lower population than the US), in 2014 1491 different manga volumes came out, that's about 4 a day and in paris even a general book store will have a manga section and there's a good number of manga shops in town.

Japan expo got 240k visitors last year, that's huge but the con is about japanese pop culture in general, not just anime, and even less about late night anime.
A con like Epitanim in Paris that's anime centric (and where you're more likely to meat someone who knows who Harushi and Madoka are) gets between 6-8k visitors.

[RichardFromMarple]

Originally Posted by totoum

The history of anime in france is vastly than in the US.
I'd say pretty much anyone in France knows what anime is, though if they've watched it odds are it was a 4kids style dub of it back in the 80s and 90s which were popular, my mid 40s step mom will gladly talk about Captain Harlock or Cobra, daft punk even hired Toei and Leiji Matsumoto for Interstella 5555.

I grew up on DBZ, sailor moon, Captain tsubasa etc , those were shown in the morning national TV so I'd think any french person my age will know what they are.

Today they might get shown on smaller channels ( but still national ones) but the likes of One Piece or Fairy Tale still get shown and without the 4kids treatment, same for Attack on Titan.

So anyone with a TV will at least have stumbled into them.
Ghibli is also well known and the Wolf Children world premiere was held in France.
Back in the early 2000s french channel canal+ ( probably a rough comparison but it's somewhat like a french HBO) showed the likes of Monster, GTO, Noir.
So even if they don't watch it lots of people know what it is.
Other fun fact, I'm not even sure this ever happened in America but there was a time when a french cable channel would show ecchi and hentai in the evenings.
Other more niche channels like "nolife" will show subbed anime as well, here's a list
What hasn't caught on?moe. I'm not even talking about it being bashed, just that any shows like k-on that got licensed sold terribly in France, so you're not going to see anything like that on big channels and it's a lot less mainstream.

However I'd say the popularity of anime pales in comparison to manga. (far) behind Japan ,France is the no2 market for manga in the world (despite a lower population than the US), in 2014 1491 different manga volumes came out, that's about 4 a day and in paris even a general book store will have a manga section and there's a good number of manga shops in town.

Japan expo got 240k visitors last year, that's huge but the con is about japanese pop culture in general, not just anime, and even less about late night anime.
A con like Epitanim in Paris that's anime centric (and where you're more likely to meat someone who knows who Harushi and Madoka are) gets between 6-8k visitors.

According to TV Tropes a lot of old school Magical Girl animes (ie pre-Sailor Moon) were popular in France, along with Italy & sometimes caught on in Spain as well.

[totoum]

Originally Posted by RichardFromMarple

According to TV Tropes a lot of old school Magical Girl animes (ie pre-Sailor Moon) were popular in France, along with Italy & sometimes caught on in Spain as well.

Yes, Gigi (aka minky momo) would be a good example of that.

[Gintokifan22]

Well, I know 90s Anime is well known among even none Anime lovers. For example, Pokemon was big back in the 90s and was advertised all over the place. Every one who's seen any thing Pokemon related know Ash and Pikacu.

Dragon Ball Z is another major known Anime. Every generation since the 90s should know of these two Anime.

Now Naruto is big but none Anime people I don't see knowing about this series.

[Moroboshi-kun]

I would divide the question in two parts: kids shows and non-kids shows.

Kids shows continue to draw reasonable TV-ratings in Japan and they regularly appear among top-selling movies in Japan as well. It is fair to say that they are quite mainstream even today, perhaps less so than decades back but still fairly strong.

Non-kids shows are completely another story. Japanese anime industry tends to say that show with disc sales of 10'000 is a hit which in a country of 130 million people is almost laughable - and in Japanese music industry the threshold for gold record of 100'000. Therefore non-kids shows are extremely niche business which is also reflected in the fact that successful/unsuccessful genres can be very different in non-kids anime than in other non-kids mainstream entertainment.

[itisjustme]

Originally Posted by cyth

The 400k Crunchyroll number is probably faked, but if one fourth of that is real, which I believe it's achievable, it's still believable because we tend to neglect every other market that isn't NA or Europe.

Why would 400k be fake..? In comparison Netflix has 60 millions subscribers.

It's only 7 dollars a month compared to the 400 dollars with shipping you're forking if you're buying BDs of a single series, I don't see anything surprising.