“This is Asuna. Knights of the Blood Oath, Second in Command. They call her “Lightning Flash.” I could never match her speed in battle, or her accuracy with the sword.” - Kazuto “Kirito” Kirigaya, Sword Art Online (Episode 21, as he introduced Suguha to her…at the same time the infamous“Tentacle Scene” was occurring.)

“Today on Toonami we learned that, unlike TOM 3.5, Asuna does not have much conviction in pushing the button.” - AmazingCornman

“Annnd this is why Japan’s otaku culture is viewed THE WAY IT IS” - AoFukai13

“I don’t think people were offended about SAO last night so much as they were insulted. Intelligent fans know how good a character Asuna was” - ZeroAlucard27

Well, I guess now we all know why some people have gone as far as saying that Sword Art Online would “kill” Toonami like Naruto’s pre-Shippuden fillers supposedly did, as while we’re all hoping for Toonami and Space Dandy to help spark another anime boom, the actions of Reki Kawahara (or whoever greenlighted the tentacle scene) may have just single-handedly set the anime industry back another five years. But all joking aside, here’s the Toonami Trending Rundown for January 18-19, 2014.

It was fanservice night (or depending on who you ask, fan dis-service night) on the Absolution as while we had a bit of a rough night of trending with Drake hosting SNL, Williams being upset by Ivanovic at the Australian Open, and Pascal’s decision victory over Bute, among others, things went better in regards to social media buzz compared to last week as every show between Space Dandy to FLCL as well as FMA Brotherhood and InuYasha managed to trend in the US and Space Dandy also managed to trend worldwide. In addition, Space Mexico also trended US and Worldwide (the first of such for Space Dandy) as our crew crashed landed on the planet while they were in a rush to a Boobies restaurant before their rewards coupons expired and ran into a fanservice-laden woman…who turned out to be a boobie monster. Yeah, I wish I was making this up, folks.

I also wish I was making up the fact that this happened on the same night as Toonami airing SAO’s infamous tentacle snail scene (though considering that Vic Mignogna voiced the infamous monster, it does make me wonder if the tentacle creatures were made as a result of Sugo doing some human transmutation…just saying) as well as OG Naruto’s infamous Naruto x Sasuke accidental kiss. Unfortunately despite all the buzz generated from those events, Asuna didn’t trend (and neither did Sasuke nor OG #Naruto) perhaps due to said above mentioned events.



This week’s new promo was one about Girl Power. Toonami is an advocate for gender equality, alright, and I’m sure we can all agree on that we all love girls with determination and ass kicking abilities. Though considering last night’s Space Dandy and SAO episodes, you might say that this was bad timing, though considering the resiliency Asuna had to face and will continue to for the rest of this arc, maybe it probably is good timing.

An announcement in regards to the trending rundown. In a few weeks, Facebook will be implementing a trending topic system. Depending on how things go, we will be having a section for Facebook trends if Toonami related trends show up there. For those that liveblog the block on Facebook, here’s your chance to shine and as with the Twitter trends, let @AnimeSavior know if you spot one.

This Monday at 7:30pm Eastern, CN will be showcasing a new special episode of The PowerPuff Girls, Dance Pantsed. Keep in mind it will have a different artstyle and series creator Craig McCracken doesn’t have any involvement in this, but feel free to check it out.

In Boondocks news, after several delays, we finally got a date for the premiere of Season 4: Monday April 21st at 10:30pm Eastern. Let’s hope the wait will be all worth it soon.

In the meantime, tune in next week as Clone Wars kicks off season 2 and FLCL reaches it’s series finale, which also means Samurai Jack’s return is only 2 weeks away. And for those that haven’t heard, Samurai Jack will start airing at 4am Eastern on February 1st, which will bump up OG Naruto to 2:30am and Ghost in the Shell to 3am.

And for those that are feeling like dropping Fairy Dance in disgust or already have, we only got 4 episodes left to go, so just sit tight and chill for now. And personally while I do enjoy SAO (though i enjoyed Aincrad more than Fairy Dance), I will definitely agree with many of you that the tentacle scene, while not as bad as some folks said it was, still felt a bit unnecessary. I sure hope that that scene was placed to amp up the drama rather than to please someone’s fetish, cause if the latter is so, all I will say is that there is a good reason why some people say that the industry wide trend of pandering to “otaku” fetishes played a big part on why the previous anime boom came to a very nasty end, hence why I’ve warned you numerous times that Toonami, as a gateway drug to anime and action cartoons, should and will never pick up “Otaku Pandering” content. (And on the subject of Suguha’s relationship with Kirito, while cousin relationships might be more acceptable in Japanese culture, i personally don’t think this one wasn’t really well done.) Of course, since SAO also has gateway drug appeal, it’s an exception, but whether this will sour the chances of Toonami picking up Phantom Bullet onwards however, is a question that won’t be answered for quite some time. But of course, that debate is another topic, for another day.

Till next week, have a Happy Martin Luther King day and stay gold. And as one of my followers would say, always be #FasterThanAsunaHittingTheButton…but seriously, poor Asuna.

Legend: The number next to the listed trend represents the highest it trended on the list (not counting the promoted trend), judging only by the images placed in the rundown. For the mobile app trends, the listed number of tweets are also sorely based on the highest number shown based on the images on the rundown.

US Trends:

Toonami/#Toonami (During Sword Art Online, FMA Brotherhood, Ghost In The Shell, and InuYasha) [#4]

#SpaceDandy [#6]

Galaxy Mexico (From Space Dandy) [#7]

#Bleach [#4]

#NarutoShippuden [#6]

#OnePiece [#7]

#SoulEater [#4]

#SwordArtOnline [#2]

#FLCL [#5]

#FMABrotherhood [#1]

#InuYasha [#2]

Worldwide Trends:

#SpaceDandy [#7]

Galaxy Mexico (From Space Dandy) [#9]

Mobile App Trends:

Toonami/#Toonami (During One Piece, Sword Art Online, Ghost In The Shell, and Inuyasha) [#5 with 11.5K Tweets]

#SpaceDandy [#4. Tweet Count Unknown]

Galaxy Mexico (From Space Dandy) [#8. Tweet Count Unknown]

#OnePiece [#6 with 10.8k Tweets]

#SoulEater [#3. Tweet Count Unknown]

#SwordArtOnline [#5. Tweet Count Unknown]

#FLCL [#5. Tweet Count Unknown]

#FMABrotherhood [#3. Tweet Count Unknown]

#InuYasha [#2. Tweet Count Unknown]

Special thanks to @Andy_Salcedo, @Cement3000, @DatDamnPR, @JMB_70056, @MisterADRaveN, @the_big_aa, @TheNextHokage, and others I forgot to mention for spotting some of the trends on this list.

You can’t keep a good girl down. Only Toonami on [adult swim] on Cartoon Network.