AnimeCentral

Did You Know?

• All series were initially broadcast dubbed into English, but in late 2007 the final nightly repeats of Cowboy Bebop and .hack//SIGN were broadcast in Japanese with English subtitles.
• The channel used a consistent red-on-black visual theme across its advertising, bumpers, ident cards and website throughout its run.

Programming

Anime Central’s nightly lineup originally ran six different episodes, one per series, in a three-hour block that looped twice until 6:00 am. A series typically got one repeat run before a schedule change, unless it had more than 26 episodes. On March 1, 2008, the network switched to three double-bills, then two triple-bills, a move that drew mostly negative feedback on its forums. Early on, shows made in 16:9 were broadcast in letterbox format; in 2008, a few late episodes of Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd GIG aired in anamorphic widescreen. Over the 2007–2008 holiday break, from December 21 to January 4, the regular schedule was replaced by marathons of Cowboy Bebop, Fullmetal Alchemist, and Bleach, each day offering up to nine episodes in a 4½-hour block that repeated until 6:00 am.

Closure and replacement

In June 2008, Anime Central vanished from Ofcom's updated UK TV license list, and its license was soon replaced by one for True Entertainment. The channel shut down in August 2008. Afterwards, Showcase TV aired a smaller Anime Central block, starting at three hours and later shrinking to two, showing back-to-back episodes of Cowboy Bebop and Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. That block ended in August 2009 when Showcase TV rebranded as True Entertainment. Sony Pictures Television bought CSC Media Group in 2014. In March 2015, Scuzz launched Animax Movie Nights, a weekly anime film block that lasted just over a month. Later, the Anime Central website redirected to animaxtv.co.uk, but the UK Animax service closed in October 2018.