After Fuji TV won the rights to air the globally popular series Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Season 2, they released a World TV Premiere of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba the Movie: Mugen Train on 25th September from 9 pm to 11:40 pm.

The first terrestrial broadcast of Mugen Train hit a Household Audience Rate of 21.9% and remained above 15% in the Individual Audience Rating.

From October 2020, Fuji Tv started airing the series as a “special show” on Saturdays at 9 pm after “Mugen Train’s” success. However, that broadcast hit an audience rate of only 15% which is a low margin to stay among the five big stations(NHK, Nippon TV, TBS, TV Tokyo, and TV Asahi).

This time due to Mugen Train’s successful broadcast on the 25th, it pushed up the average so far by more than 5% at once, and put the household average in the 20% range.

君の名は。以外の興行収入TOP10の初回放送視聴率

千と千尋の神隠し：46.9%
タイタニック：前編34.5%、後編35.4%
アナと雪の女王：19.7%
ハリーポッターと賢者の石：30.8%
ハウルの動く城：32.9%
もののけ姫：35.1%
踊る大捜査線 THE MOVIE2：18.8%
ハリーポッターと秘密の部屋：21.7%
アバター：15.1%

— きみすたすかーれっと@平安名すみれ生誕祭 (@sazankuwata) January 3, 2018

Nonetheless, Spirited Away still holds the top spot for having the highest audience rating for the First-time Broadcast series.

• Spirited Away: 46.9%
• Titanic: 1st part 34.5%, 2nd part 35.4%
• Anna and the Snow Queen: 19.7%
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone: 30.8%
• Howl’s Moving Castle: 32.9%
• Princess Mononoke: 35.1%
• Bayside Shakedown THE MOVIE2: 18.8%
• Harry Potter and Chamber of Secrets: 21.7%
• Avatar: 15.1%

Since the timing for the broadcast was not focused on the C class (male and female of 4 to 12 years old), the individual and household ratings of Fuji TV for the other classes of the demography spiked up more than 30%.

The other demographics include about 4% of the 4-tier (male and female 65-year olds) and 12% of the 3-tier (50-64 years old male and female).

However, the T-layer (male and female 13-19 years old) exceeded 15%, and M2 (male 35-49 years old) was more than 16%, and 1 layer (male and female 20-34 years old) and F2 (female 35-49 years old) were in the 17% range.

The figures are based on Switch Media Lab(SML) data from 5,000 households in the Kanto region.

On the other hand, a news report from the website Yutura reported that soon after the official announcements of the broadcast of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba: Season 2 from October 10, the official Twitter account of ABEMA’s anime channel tweeted that the two cours had been decided to be distributed at ABEMA around midnight on 25th October.

Pointing at the announcement of ABEMA TV, Tenchimu (1.65 million subscribers), Sankoichi (1.24 million followers), R-chan (580,000 followers), and “Rikari K channel” (250,000 subs) along with 10 more influencers on YouTube and Instagram, posted tweets citing ABEMA distribution news.

In a live broadcast conducted on the 26th, “Korekore KoreTube” (1.55 million registered users) concluded that these series of posts were “stema (stealth marketing)” and “this is tweeting with money”, and expressed disgust.

Many fans of the series have also raised their voice on SNS questioning the morale of influencers.

It is not half wrong that ABEMATv, a live TV streaming website with one of the owners being TV Asahi will put a dent in Fuji Tv’s hard work to build a solid audience. However, since the broadcast on ABEMA will begin a few weeks after the official premiere, the scenario may not differ heavily.

Source: Yahoo News, Yutura