The recent concerns over the COVID-19 virus (also known as coronavirus) and the quickly spreading nature of the pandemic have led to a variety of companies and businesses having to alter how they operate. Many small businesses and restaurants around the world have been forced to close down, either temporarily or permanently, due to dwindling amounts of customers as quarantines and self-isolation become more common. For larger companies and corporations, however, employees have been shifting to working from home as they continue to put in hours on their jobs. One such company is Funimation, the anime streaming and licensing company that is responsible for releasing dozens of anime overseas each season. Despite shifting their employees to online work, though, certain parts of their simuldub production are being impacted severely, as the company has just announced that several of their currently airing simultaneous English dubs will be hit with delays and temporary pauses as a result of the production changes.
In a post made to the official Funimation blog, the streaming company explain that they are allowing everyone to work from home due to the fact that “The safety of our Funimation family is our highest priority right now,” but as a result of that workplace shift, the following anime will either have their simultaneous dubs delayed or paused as production slows down:
- BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense. starting with episode 9 on March 18
- Hatena Illusion starting with episode 8 on March 19
- Infinite Dendrogram starting with episode 8 on March 19
- Nekopara starting with episode 9 on March 19
- Smile Down the Runway starting with episode 9 on March 19
- Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun starting with episode 9 on March 19
- Asteroid in Love starting with episode 5 on March 20
- Case File nº221: Kabukicho starting with episode 21 on March 20
- Darwin’s Game starting with episode 9 on March 20
- My Hero Academia starting with episode 84 on March 21
- Black Clover starting with episode 124 on March 22
- ID: INVADED starting with episode 13 on March 22
- Sorcerous Stabber Orphen starting with episode 10 on March 24
- A Certain Scientific Railgun T starting with episode 8 on April 3
While the simultaneous dubs are being put on hold for the time being, the Funimation blog post assures fans that subtitled are still set to continue as scheduled each week with no alterations or delays. Additionally, the blog post promises that some “special content releases” are currently in the works to make up for the sudden dub delays.
