Was Akatsuki no Yona marketed well?
Akatsuki no Yona had so much going against it. Itâs such a great story with fantastic art and I think it wasnât even given the chance it deserved.
It makes me so glad to find out that the AnY fandom is actually bigger than I suspected. This post broke 2k notes and I didnât even think the AnY fandom was that big. Like wow, guys.
Not to mention, both Yona and Hak were nominated to be in Anime Americaâs sexiest anime characters challenge.
THE COSPLAYS, I met so many cosplayers this year it was amazing! No matter how Yona managed to draw in an audience, it did it.
However, I think it the series in general was misrepresented early on, and it was not given a fair chance to show what it was really going to be.
Hereâs why I think the series wasnât given a fair chance, because I just need to vent about it:
1. First off, when the anime was going to be released during the 2014 Fall Anime season, it had a horrible synopsis. I read the summary and looked at the rating and genre, as I do every season when scoping new shows to watch, and even I turned away at the beginning. I admit it.
It was labeled as a romance and harem, and talked about Yona being a spoiled princess who was in love with her cousin. OF COURSE THAT DOESNâT SOUND INTERESTING! Where was the journey to gather the Dragon Warriors mentioned? NO WHERE. Even some later synopses lack that information and focus on the first episode only, and some mention in the way of having to flee her home with her friend/guardian Hak. Sometimes they mention learning about the harsh reality of life and war. The dragon gods? Heh, youâd think they would mentioned that right? Nah man, thatâs just trivia (apparently). This was how the anime was represented before it even aired. All I say now is, ???
2. Hardly any publicity. The trailer was cool though. But I didnât even see it until long after I gave the show a chance.
3. The English dub started with episode 13, and as of the time of this post, the first half still isnât released and wonât we for another month with the release of the Part 1 Bluray/DVD box. They waited a year or so before releasing the first half. I know people that wonât watch something until itâs all dubbed, so this was really a mark against them, starting the dub in the middle like that. (The dub also made some very strange word/translation edit choices, but I wonât get into that now.)
4, Shoujo anime are constantly left hanging, no matter how popular (see Ouran High School Host Club, Blue Spring Ride, Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun etc). I still find myself having to stretch in order to call Yona a shoujo anime though. Like if this is a shoujo, than how was Inuyasha a shounen? (other than the fact they have names for their attacks⊠WIND SCAR) If AnY was called something like âHakâ or âDragon Warriorsâ, could it have been labeled shounen instead? (And therefore marketed a little differently, not that I want it changed at all to please young boys. This series also has way more respect for itself than a lot of other things.)
5, I canât empathize enough how this anime was set up for and presented as being the opposite of what it actually is. Yes, there is a love story sprinkled in there, but thatâs not what itâs about and it has yet to truly focus on it, even over 100 chapters into the manga. Itâs an adventure tale. I repeat, adventure! Adventure, action, fantasy, and comedy⊠not a romantic reverse harem at all (especially in the typical sense that I know most of us are used to). I turned this anime down at first because I saw the genre was tagged as such and then it had that awful synopsis. I almost missed out!
6, With the way the anime was presented, I would have never guessed it was based off of a manga. It was treated like an anime-only in the way that what I expected and what I got were completely different. Had the manga been more known at the time, maybe the writers of the synopsis would have given it more credit and more respect than they did. At the very least, Iâm hooked on the manga now.
Was Akatsuki no Yona marketed well?Â
No. Not really. Such a shame.
It has been good to see that even with so much against it, that it still managed to stand out and catch enough attention to spread fanart and get people talking about it.
So thatâs it for now. I just needed to get that out. Itâs a great series and I wished we could get more than a few OVAs after the masterpiece of season one. It was beautifully animated and the music was wonderful. Like many others, I am supporting the series how I can and preordered the english manga for when its available in my country.
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