C (TV series)

Lore & Background

C is set in a world where Japan goes through a financial crisis that causes high rates of unemployment, crime, and suicide. The series revolves around Kimimaro Yoga, a 19-year-old scholarship student of economics who is offered money by a mysterious man named Masakaki in exchange for his future as collateral. Kimimaro becomes an Entre and is drawn into the Financial District, where Entres use a special currency called Midas Money and battle in Deals. Each Entre is paired with an Asset, a creature personifying their future; Kimimaro is accompanied by Mashu, a horned girl who can conjure fire-based attacks. Entres who lose all their money face tragic consequences in reality, such as the erasure of loved ones.

Reader's Guide

C was broadcast in Japan on Fuji TV's Noitamina programming block between April 15 and June 24, 2011. It was Tatsunoko Production's first original anime television series to air on Fuji TV in 27 years, following 1984's Okawari-Boy StarzanS. The series was simulcasted with a week's delay by Funimation Entertainment in the United States, by Siren Visual in Australia, and by Anime on Demand in the United Kingdom. Its premise and core concept have been praised by Western reviewers, who were nonetheless disappointed by the execution of the story and the development of the characters. Critics noted the story was inconclusive and some plot elements were not fully worked. The art received mixed responses but was highly criticized for its use of 3D computer graphics, while the musical score was mainly praised. The series has been highlighted both as a good action show and as a series that can arouse reflective discussions on economic philosophy.

Did You Know?

• The series was inspired by the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers in 2008.
• Director Kenji Nakamura conducted over twenty interviews with retired politicians, finance professionals, and other experts during development.
• C was Tatsunoko Production's first original anime to air on Fuji TV in 27 years.
• The series uses macroeconomics jargon to address trust and the need to act for a better future.

Origins & Founding Vision

Born in April 2005, Noitamina emerged as a deliberate departure from conventional anime broadcasting. Fuji Television, in partnership with advertising firm Dentsu and Sony Music Entertainment Japan (or its subsidiary Aniplex), created a half-hour late-night slot airing Thursday nights from 24:45 to 25:15 JST—effectively the small hours of Friday morning. The block's founding mission was to push past the narrow young-male audience that typically dominated anime programming, aiming instead for a broader, more diverse viewership. The name itself is a playful inversion: 'Noitamina' is simply 'Animation' spelled backwards, a nod to the block's identity as a space for experimental and unconventional storytelling. By anchoring the schedule in the late-night window, Fuji TV positioned the block as a creative laboratory where series could take narrative and visual risks that prime-time slots would not tolerate. The tripartite production model—broadcaster, advertiser, and music-entertainment company—gave the block a distinctive commercial and creative infrastructure from day one.

Shifting Timeslots & Format Evolution

Over nearly two decades, Noitamina's broadcast identity has shifted repeatedly. In 2010 the block doubled from thirty minutes to a full hour, stretching its Friday-morning window to 25:45 JST. That expansion was short-lived in spirit: by 2015 the schedule temporarily contracted back to a half-hour slot because five feature films produced under the Noitamina banner were scheduled for theatrical release in Japanese cinemas that same year, demanding production resources and promotional attention. The most dramatic repositioning came on December 9, 2024, when Fuji TV announced the block would move to an earlier, prime-time window—the first time in its history it would air during conventional evening hours, and the first time it would follow a network-wide timeslot rather than a station-local one. However, that arrangement proved transitional. By March 3, 2025, the slot had been reassigned to Friday nights at 23:30 JST, a change necessitated after the new earlier window was occupied by Dragon Ball Daima from October 2024 through February 2025.

International Streaming & Distribution Partnerships

Bringing Noitamina to Western audiences has been a story of shifting partnerships. On April 15, 2010, Fuji Television and Funimation struck a deal to simulcast the block's series in North America within roughly an hour of their Japanese broadcast, giving overseas fans near-simultaneous access. That arrangement carried forward into Aniplex of America's portfolio after Sony—the parent company behind both Aniplex and Funimation—completed its acquisition of Funimation in 2017, effectively consolidating the North American streaming rights under one corporate umbrella. A separate, more exclusive arrangement emerged on March 17, 2016, when Fuji TV partnered with Amazon to stream and simulcast Noitamina titles exclusively through Prime Instant Video, debuting the partnership with Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress. That exclusivity window lasted until 2018, when The Promised Neverland became the first series to break free from the Prime Video-only restriction outside Japan, signaling the end of the Amazon deal.

Programming Identity & the Fuji TV Ecosystem

Noitamina occupies a distinctive niche within Fuji Television's broader anime ecosystem, sitting alongside sibling blocks such as Blue Lynx, the network's dedicated boys'-love anime label, and +Ultra, which airs on Wednesday nights into Thursday mornings. What sets Noitamina apart is its commitment to animation as its core medium: across its entire run, the only non-anime entry was the 2010 live-action adaptation of Moyasimon: Tales of Agriculture, a rare exception in an otherwise exclusively animated lineup. The block has also served as a launchpad for theatrical features, with five films produced under its banner receiving Japanese cinema releases in 2015 alone. This dual output—weekly television series plus feature-length films—gave Noitamina a production scale that set it apart from other late-night anime blocks across Japan. The name, a simple reversal of 'Animation,' encapsulates the block's self-aware, slightly irreverent identity: a space where the medium turns itself inside out, inviting audiences to see familiar storytelling through an unfamiliar lens.