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The original was posted on /r/hobbydrama by /u/Available_Reason7795 on 2024-07-07 19:12:46+00:00.
I once talked about CLAMP in my last post on the Cardcaptor Sakura dub and how that screwed up and Nelvana was unfairly blamed by fans and critics for all of the trouble by was Kids WB did. Now it’s time to talk about another CLAMP that almost suffered the same fate as Cardcaptor Sakura, but got lucky due to a bidding war from two tv blocks for children.
What is Magic Knight Rayearth?
Magic Knight Rayearth is a magical girl manga series created by CLAMP that ran November of 1993 to April of 1996. The anime premired in October 17th, 1994 and ended on November 27th, 1995 and also included an alternative three part OVA version simpliy titled Rayearth that was relesed on July 25th, 1997 through December 10th, 1997, with a director's cut titled Wings of Hope that was released on October of 1998. The plot focuses on three school girls: the tomboysish and headstrong leader hikaru Shidou, the beautiful, but brash Umi Ryuuzaki, and the shy, intelligent Fuu Hououji. During a field trip to the Tokyo Tower, the three girls get transported to another world named Cephiro and they learned that the princess of Cephiro named Emeraude was kidnapped by the high priest named Zagato and it's up to them to rescue the princess. Once they defeated Zagato, they learned the horrible truth: Emeraude has fallen in love with Zagato and has actually summoned the girls to kill her so that no one can harm the Pillar of Cephiro. After a long battle, the Magic Knights kill the Princess and were transported back to Tokyo in distraught of the fact that they had to kill Emeraude. Magic Knight Rayearth was widely praised by fans and critics for its use of great visuals, wonderful storytelling, and likable characters. It was also broke new ground as being the first mecha magical girl work as well as an isekai in advance. However, it was very niche in the States and people were wondering how could an anime that popular as Magic Knight Rayearth be so niche in the states? The answer might had to do with an attempt to get in on TV in America and a bidding war between two tv blocks that ended up Rayearth to be not airing on television.
Fox Kids and Toonami’s battle for the bid on Rayearth
Fox Kids was a beloved Saturday morning cartoon block that ran from September 8th, 1990 through September 7th, 2002. It aired some of the most iconic shows such as Power Rangers, Batman TAS, Beast Wars, Spider-Man TAS, X-Men 92, and many others. It also aired anime such as Digimon, Mon Colle Knights, Shinzo, Medabots, and Monster Rancher. So wanting for more anime, Fox Kids set out to look for an anime that would satisfy their needs for an audience. Fox Kids set their eyes on Magic Knight Rayearth hoping it would increase their anime invasion schedule, but another block was also wanting to air Rayearth on their program and it wanted to air two more anime alongside Rayearth. Cartoon Network's Toonami block launched on March 17th,1997 and it was starting to become the new hottest trend of the late 90s and early 2000s for kids and teens who wanted to see anime on Cartoon Network. Toonami grabbed Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z in 1998, after the two got low ratings on syndication. With their success on making Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z popular in the US with their consitent time slots, they were wanting to see which anime would they want to air next. Toonami expressed their interest in three anime that would unfortunately be snatched by Fox Kids in 2000: Slayers, Vision of Escaflowne, and Magic Knight Rayearth.Fox kids wanted to get the three anime before Toonami did and while they did succeeded in snatching the rights of those anime, two of them never were aired on television because one of the anime that they aired, Escaflowne, flopped on the block because it had a lot of heavy censorship that it had and that made fans mad. Since the failure of Escaflowne on Fox Kids, you may think that this would be Toonami's chance to air the other two anime that Fox Kids didn't air, but nope instead Fox Kids decided to sit on the licenses of the two anime, Slayers, and Rayearth, as a way to spite Toonami making them too old to air on television.
The lost dub of Magic Knight Rayearth
Everyone knows about both the Bang Zoom and Manga (New York) dubs for both the tv series and the ova, but people may not know that another studio had a dub for the show that was only used for the pilot. TMS used Summit Media Group and Ocean Production Studios to plan launch for US TV that fall of 1995 for Fox Kids. However, due to the initial flop of Sailor Moon, both dubs were not well received in conventions due to the name changes and the replaced dub intro that sounded something for an 80s action cartoon. Thankfully, both Manga Entertainment (New York) and Bang Zoom came to the rescue to dub the tv and ova series in a year apart in 1999 and 2000.
Magic Knight Rayearth could have been the next Sailor Moon on US Television with Toonami airing it, but instead it was snatched away by Fox Kids' ambition to create and anime schedule that could rival Toonami's. But then on July 2, 2024, Clamp and TMS was announcing that Rayearth will be coming back for its 30th anniversary in a remake of the anime and fans were excited. I hope when the remake anime is dubbed, it would finally get a chance to air on Toonami Rewind.