Studios Mine Dead Manga When Safe Bets Disappear

Bandai Namco Filmworks just greenlit a television adaptation of *Watashi wo Center ni Suru to Chikaimasu ka?

The original ran in Shounen Magazine Edge starting in 2022, then migrated to a digital platform when the magazine folded in 2023. Now it's getting a studio greenlight anyway—the claim being that the manga has enough fan momentum to justify animation.

The real story is uglier. This is what adaptation looks like when safer options run dry. Idol romance anime rode genuine cultural heat from 2010 through 2016, spawning hits like *Love Live!

Studios learned the formula and it was repeatable—it printed money. Then the genre collapsed with remarkable speed. By 2018, titles like Carole & Tuesday arrived to middling returns and Revue Starlight found only cult audience traction. The idol romance adaptation became what risk-averse studios avoid.

The rational move becomes obvious. Stop hunting for new properties with momentum and start mining backlist from defunct publications at reduced acquisition cost. The title doesn't need to have proven audience legs. It needs to be cheap and available. A manga that died in two publications becomes attractive precisely because no one is bidding against you for the rights.

The historical parallel is precise. When theatrical distribution collapsed in the 1950s, studios didn't abandon movies. They made cheaper movies faster, mining B-picture backlogs and pulp IP. The product got worse. The profits didn't recover.

What's different now? Streaming services still fund anime adaptations even when theatrical returns vanish. That's the variable. It's also the trap. Cheaper greenlight cycles mean more adaptations of weaker source material.