If you've
ever wondered why each season seems saturated with stories where an ordinary
guy dies and reincarnates in another world as an invincible being, the answer
lies not in the lack of imagination of the creators, but in the wallets of
international audiences. Veteran producer Yusuke Onuki, president
of Bushiroad Move, decided to bluntly explain the cold financial
math that currently dominates the anime industry.
According
to Onuki, producing a standard twelve-episode series for late-night television
today requires an investment of approximately 350 million yen, which is
equivalent to about 2.3 million dollars. What's shocking is that nearly ninety
percent of the money needed to recoup that initial investment comes directly
from international streaming platforms. The domestic market in Japan, which
previously depended on the sale of records and physical merchandise, took a
back seat in the financial balance.
This
overwhelming dependence on foreign capital completely changed the planning
meetings in the studios. The million-dollar question is no longer whether
Japanese audiences will like a story, but how high the guaranteed offer from an
international platform will be before the premiere. Under this low-risk
investment logic, light novels of reincarnation and parallel universes became
the star product, since their premise does not require complex cultural
explanations and their previous reading numbers give certainty to investors
that the series will work across borders.
However,
the producer warned that this business model is beginning to show cracks. The
supply of reincarnation novels with guaranteed success is being depleted by
leaps and bounds after years of adapting the same repetitive concepts. For
Onuki, the current saturation is not a creative failure of the authors or a
whim of the public, but the logical consequence of a system where nine out of
ten yen invested come from outside Japan.
With more
than sixty credits as a producer in television series throughout his
career, Yusuke Onuki is one of the most authoritative voices
in the corporate section of Japanese entertainment. As president of Bushiroad
Move, he has been at the forefront of the production of multiple commercially
successful isekai series. In addition to his executive work, Onuki
recently published a book dedicated to the analysis of the economic model of
anime, explaining in detail the structure of production committees and the
money flows that decide which projects reach the screen.
Knowing
that ninety percent of the budget of your favorite series is paid by
international streaming platforms
