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Toonami has released a surprising schedule update showing they intend to return to the tradition of airing music video visual albums on April 26, 2025.
At midnight, Toonami’s new original anime Lazarus continues its run. This series by the visionary director of Cowboy Bebop is Toonami’s current flagship series. It focuses on a hunt to find Dr. Skinner, the creator of a miracle drug.
At 12:30, Common Side Effects continues its run. Adult Swim has concluded airing the first season of 10 episodes on Sundays, but Toonami has been a month behind Sundays’ premieres. A second season has recently been highlighted.
At 1:00 AM, Blue Exorcist remains as the first season nears its conclusion. On May 3, Blue Exorcist and Common Side Effects will reach their season one finales. Three more seasons of Blue Exorcist aired in Japan, but it is unknown if Toonami will license more episodes or continue another Aniplex anime like Mashle or Demon Slayer.
At 1:30 and 2:00 AM, One Piece continues to air for a full hour of the Dressrosa saga. Many of its lengthiest fights have recently come to a close, allowing the series to focus on Luffy’s climactic battle with Doflamingo.
At 2:30 AM, Naruto continues to air the Zabuza arc. These episodes have not aired since 2014, and this marks the first time Toonami has aired them in HD, aside from a recent slip-up where a degraded 20 year old master of episode 5 aired.
The biggest surprise of the night comes at 3:00 AM with the visual album Shinbangumi by Ginger Root. This is a full hour presentation rated TV-14. Schedule guides’ plot synopsis state that “After being fired from media conglomerate Juban TV, Ginger Root takes it upon himself to start his own TV company. Thus, the birth of Ginger Root Productions.” A trailer with the retro anime style can be seen on YouTube:
Longtime Toonami fans will recall this Toonami tradition goes back decades. On the “Midnight Run Special Edition” in 2001, TOM aired custom anime music videos “Dreams: Broken Promise” and “Mad Rhetoric: Walking Stick.” These were Toonami staples often used as interstitial material on the weekday afternoon block. They were followed by Kenna, Gorillaz, and Daft Punk animated music videos. On August 31 and in an encore on November 16, 2001, this special musical presentation gave audiences a preview of the 2003 anime film Interstella 5555, with art by Leiji Matsumoto and music from Daft Punk’s Discovery album. Music videos continued from the TOM 2 to 3 era, during a period where licensed rock music was often used in Dragon Ball Z movies aired on Toonami as well. While the music video wasn’t a major part of Toonami’s run on Saturdays on Cartoon Network, the Adult Swim run of Toonami has aired countless music videos, usually to fill time during the short in runtime, but not in episode count Naruto Shippuden during its decade long run. As Shippuden’s run came to a close and the block suffered budget cuts, the use of licensed music videos has fallen by the wayside, and even the Toonami made anime music videos have become infrequent.
Are you glad to see Toonami experimenting with music videos again, or did you prefer Sailor Moon at 3?
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