Anime on Hulu

[Sapphire]

What does everyone think about the anime selection on Hulu, or any other mainstream streaming sites?

I was browsing the recently added section, and to my shock, the first 26 episodes of Soul Eater were already on there. Not only does Hulu have popular anime like FMA: Brotherhood, Bleach, and Inuyasha, but they even had some selections that I would consider at least mildly underground like Ikkitousen and Ergo Proxy. I am impressed with every new title they bring in, and it seems that Hulu is only increasing in momentum. The subs are still ugly of course, but they seem to be at least somewhat attuned to the desired titles of their audience.

These people seem to be on top of things. Is this a representation of how anime is increasing in popularity, or has the streaming industry just now caught on to a simmering market of anime and otakuness that no one else bothered tapping in to?

What does everyone think?

[Kraco]

but they even had some selections that I would consider at least mildly underground like Ikkitousen and Ergo Proxy.

They seem to be selling Ergo Proxy dvds even here, which makes me think it's hardly underground. After all, what comes to anime, this home country of mine is quite backward indeed.

[Archangel]

Restricted to the USA so yah know... fuck that shit

[Penner]

Restricted to the USA so yah know... fuck that shit

Word .

[itadakimasu]

I really like it. It's easy, good quality and updated often.

I've been watching inuyasha on there. I watched one of the most recent shippuden eps too and it looked like they have alot of the episodes up.

Would love to support all the cool subbing groups out there, but if companies like Viz are smart enough to realize that people in america aren't going to wait for a dub... I'm gonna have to give them a thumps up.

[KrayZ33]

Restricted to the USA so yah know... fuck that shit

ya... RACISTS!

[poopdeville]

Hulu has to respect international licensing agreements. Blame the Japanese (by which I mean the anime producers), who want to license anime to Hulu, and every other country's equivalent.

Same deal as region coded dvds and PS3 games that don't play in Europe and America.

[masamuneehs]

i don't get to use hulu or crunchyroll or any of those. in fact, aside from the video rental stores (which are quite pricey, $5USD or more for three days with a DVD that only has four or five episodes on it...) the only option is live TV. of course, most anime isn't on the standard channels, and what is is on at hard to access times.

[Yukimura]

Ikkitousen and Ergo Proxy aren't so much underground as they are overshadowed by stuff like Naruto and FMA. If you walk into a Suncoast or Best Buy anime section and look at the titles available you're likely to see lots of copies of several titles that don't get any advertisement outside of conventions or the internet (Darker than Black for instance).

Hulu has deals with some of the English publishers like Funimation (FMA, Ikkitousen, Kiddy Grade), Viz (Naruto, Bleach, Kekkaishi), and Gong (Ergo Proxy, Hellsing). The impression I get about the nature of the relationship though is that the distributors are the ones deciding what they will allow Hulu to stream from their libraries, not the other way around. The publishers know what has sold well and what hasn't and should have a lot more experience picking anime that American fans will want to see than the Hulu people would.

[Paulyboy]

The best streaming site in my mind would have to be www.animeftw.tv So many episodes!! I even caught up on some old ones like Noein. But they have over 100+ series and the quality isn't bad either. The site went through alot of upgrades and made alot of donations. The signup is free in order to watch the videos but its really easy. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.