TOHO Investing Heavily in Trigun & Beastars Studio: What This Means for the Industry

For many anime fans, the name “TOHO” likely rings multiple bells, as the entertainment giant has a hand in many popular anime series produced by studios like TMS Entertainment, OLM, and even Studio Ghibli. Recently, TOHO acquired Science SARU, the animation studio founded by Masaaki Yuasa and Eunyoung Choi, who are best known for producing the recent smash-hit Dandadan as well as Devilman Crybaby and Ping Pong, and seem to be making even bigger moves in the anime industry as 2024 comes to a close.

On Tuesday, December 17th, it was announced that TOHO would acquire 19.7% of the animation studio Orange’s shares. Orange has rapidly grown in popularity for their unique work in adapting Land of the Lustrous, Beastars, and the recent Trigun reboot, Trigun Stampede. While neither company announced what the acquisition cost actually was, they did state publicly that both Orange and TOHO would be working together to improve the quality of their work, expand studio Orange, and improve human resources both inside and outside Japan.

TOHO and Studio Orange are far from strangers and have collaborated several times in the past on a number of the animation studio’s projects, including the previously mentioned Trigun Stampede and Land of the Lustrous, as well as having collaborated on Beastars and Godzilla Singular Point.

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TOHO Animation’s Rapid Expansion Could Indicate the Anime Industry’s Future

TOHO Animation has been non-stop with their recent acquisitions within the anime industry. In addition to buying such a large chunk of Studio Orange’s shares and fully acquiring Science SARU in July, TOHO also acquired 6.09% of CoMix Wave Film’s stock, specifically looking to be more involved in the management, production, and distribution of anime projects made by the studio in an effort to increase the quality of these projects, as well as expanding the types of projects that the studio will take on. TOHO’s reach isn’t stopping with companies based in Japan, either. The entertainment giant also acquired GKIDS, a major anime distributor in the United States that has worked to distribute a number of Makoto Shinkai films and Masaaki Yuasa works.

While TOHO has ensured that these acquisitions won’t affect the members of staff on any of these projects, fans are concerned about what this could mean for the future of the anime industry. Notably, it’s important to note how, over the years, TOHO has had a poor reputation among fans for their strict copyright rules for certain properties – especially the Godzilla franchise – and their harsh licensing rules. Not to mention, with TOHO now owning GKIDS, there are only four independent anime licensors actively working in North America: AnimEigo, Discotek, Media Blasters, and Ascendant Animation.

H/T Anime News Network