The newest Dragon Ball TV anime finally has a release date and timeslot – October 11th at 11:40pm on Fuji TV, marking the first time a Dragon Ball anime has premiered during a late night slot in its native Japan with the first episode being 10 minutes longer than normal. The announcement was made at a revision presentation at Fuji TV headquarters in Minato-ku, Tokyo.
Previously Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball GT premiered at 7pm on Wednesday nights before Dragon Ball Kai and Dragon Ball Super episodes first aired Sunday mornings at 9am. As such the new timeslot is the latest any Dragon Ball series ever had new episodes debut on Japanese TV.
Dragon Ball Daima will air as part of Fuji TV’s new programming block dedicated to anime. The name of the block has not been confirmed, but as various sources have said its a new block, it is unlikely Daima will feature as part of Fuji TV’s existing blocks Noitamina and +Ultra. Although the former broadcasts Friday nights from 0:45am to 1:45am, and the latter had a partnership with Crunchyroll to stream content in over 200 territories worldwide after their TV premier, so either would be a suitable candidate for Dragon Ball Daima.
The channel’s head of programming Yuichi Nakajima revealed the reason behind the change from Sunday mornings to Friday evenings is so Daima can be enjoyed across the whole of Japan because the former didn’t have a consistent timeslot in all regions of the country. Programming director for Dragon Ball Daima Nakajima Yuji added that Sunday mornings are not a national network and that they aimed for a timeslot accessible for both Dragon Ball fans and the target audience.
Japanese fans can also get a sneak peak of the first episode during an event known as “Daimatsuri” (meaning Daima and festival) held at the Tokyo Big Sight on October 6th with three screenings of the first episode at 10am, 2:15pm and 6pm.
With regard to how long Dragon Ball Daima can be expected to last, TOEI Animation’s localisation director Daniel Castañeda that the series will have roughly 20 episodes. There is no news about when Daima will be licensed internationally, but it likely won’t be long as Dragon Ball remains an incredibly strong brand and franchise globally.