While it’s never happened to me personally, due to the fact that I watch the vast majority of my anime for the first time on physical media, I’ve met people who’ve noticed that the visuals of an anime that they’ve watched has been changed on DVD/Blu-ray. While not exclusive to the world of anime, Star Wars is a particularly infamous Western example, the idea of making further changes to a show/movie for their home video release is quite heavily associated with anime. Therefore, I thought it might be interesting to take a look at some anime that have had their visuals upgraded for their home video releases and why companies choose to do this.
Understandably, the history of this practise is relatively brief compared to the medium itself. The introduction of home video in the 1980s allowed the development of OVAs, anime developed specifically for home video, but the idea of making further changes to the show between the TV airing and the home video release didn’t arise until later on. Since the beginning of the 2000s, it has become surprisingly commonplace for anime series to air in underdeveloped states with the home video release that comes out afterwards looking more refined and complete.
Of course, one has to wonder why air these shows when it’s clear that the animation and artwork isn’t finished. From what I can find, a lot of it has to do with production scheduling. The workload that an anime studio faces is quite often very intense. With this in mind, it might make sense to them to finish the bare minimum required and to air the show. After all, many anime series lose money when they air on TV and make most of their revenue from home video sales and merchandising. Since the TV airing is essentially advertising for the DVD/Blu-ray release, it makes sense that more work would be put into the home video release than the TV version.
These productions can be so rushed at times that the series may contain animation errors as well as characters who may appear quite off-model. A home video release offers a chance for the production crew to return to the series and to make these corrections. Of course, there is an argument to be made that these issues shouldn’t have made it through to the TV version in the first place but, considering I rarely see the TV version, I am personally not bothered as long as they correct it in the end.
Whether or not you agree with this practise, the idea of updating media for its home video release is very different to the vast majority of Western releases and is a fascinating aspect of modern anime. Let me know your thoughts on the reasons why anime visuals are upgraded for their home video releases, whether you’ve noticed this practise before or if you heard about it like I did, whether you think that this is a good or bad practise and any additional information you might have on the topic.
Hopefully you have found this article interesting and informative and, if you wish to seek any of the works I mentioned, don’t hesitate to use amazon.co.uk and amazon.com for all of your needs!