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movies/tv Why exactly was Toonami moved to saturday nights in 2004?


TheMisterManGuy

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In 2004, Cartoon Network moved its flagship Toonami lineup to saturday nights. This change came as a supprise to many fans, but why exactly did this happen though? Well, through reading various old toonami related topics on Toonzone from 2003-2004. I have 3 possiblilities as to why this happened. 

 

1. Starting around 2003, Cartoon Network was apparently trying to target Toonami at a much younger audience than the average Toonami viewer which Sean Akins more or less said in an interview, was roughly 12-14 years old. Thus came things like SD Gundam, He Man, and Transformers Armada to appeal to that 6-11 year old demographic. The 9-16 year old audience, Toonami's actual target audience at the time, and older viewers were annoyed at the new programing, and although they still tuned in, CN wanted squarely 6-11.

 

2. Toonami's lineup in mid-late 2003 basicaly sucked. Half of it was Dragon Ball and DBZ, and the other half was the aforementioned younger skewing shows. Shows that would've otherwise aired on Toonami either went to Adult Swim, or the SVES block. In a way, the move to Saturday sort of sparked new life in to Toonami with some fresh programing.

 

3. Some shows like Yu Yu Hakusho, and Rurouni Kenshin became too violent to air on weekdays without completely butchering them, which is one of the reasons Kenshin was moved to SVES. So moving to saturdays provided looser standards than what was considered appropriate for daytime TV in the US.

 

Keep in mind, all of this is based of what I've read from the Toonzone forms, Adult Swim boards, and official press releases and statements from CN and Willams Street, so feel free to provide any additional reasons and info if you have any.
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Well, with having a largely under 18 demographic, and a time slot around midnight moving it to Saturday allowed for far more people to view it.

"On Saturday, April 17, 2004, Toonami was moved from weekday afternoons to a Saturday evening slot, where it aired regularly for four hours starting at 7:00 pm EST". Sounds to me like they were trying to maximize viewership, as with a underaged audience having it weekdays around midnight  cuts off a lot of people who would be watching but cannot due to their age and parental time constrictions.

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It was because they introduced Maguzi for weekday afternoons and moved it to Saturday nights. I wasn't much of a Toonami watcher as a kid. Wasn't into anime. I did watch Maguzi sometimes for like Teen Titans. Though if I do remember an awesome show from Maguzi, it was Code Lyoko.

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