TV Nihon Receive 'Cease and Desist' From Toei

[thechase]

Toei have apparently sent TV Nihon a 'cease and desist' order regarding their availability of Sentai and Kamen Rider torrents.



They are currently investigating, but as a precaution, Nihon have removed the torrents as requested



twitter.com/tvnihonsubs/status/1392808722574024708

[James Fabiano]

Toei? Ceasing and desisting? You don't say.

In other news, water is wet.

[Tenshigure]

Honestly I'm kinda surprised it took them damned near two decades to catch onto what TVN has been doing. Always appreciated the graphical flourish they did with their subs, even if they weren't always 100% accurate.

With that said, hey Toei: if you want to C&D one of the few fansub communities left, why not do us a favor and make the damned shows generally available like the various anime out there? Yeah, I know you've released the shows via Shout Factory, but that ain't gonna cut it for those who want to watch!

[Gus Richlen Was Wrong]

Shout! Factory actually stopped with Hurricaneger due to rights issues unless something changed. So I mega-pissed about this.

[Bang Bang Bart]

May 13, 2021 21:08:19 GMT -5 Gus Richlen Was Wrong said:

Shout! Factory actually stopped with Hurricaneger due to rights issues unless something changed. So I mega-pissed about this.

I think Hasbro outright buying Power Rangers might've put a stopped to Shout's Super Sentai season subs.

[Tenshigure]

The plot thickens...Over-Time believes the C&D orders are fake, and to be honest unless they hired the same lawyer as Matt Riddle to write up the orders I'm starting to believe that's the case:


The letter is written in verbatim to the one sent to TVN, and the fact that no specific individual is named (can't order a web link) and they don't property isn't capitalized per copyright ("kamen rider series") is giving me serious doubts...

EDIT: Wellllll....shit.

[Tenshigure]

Wellllll....shit, O-T has reversed couse and now they too are pulling their subs/torrents. This is a tremendous one-two punch to the gut for fans of Sentai/Rider in the West, losing both in a matter of days. Sure, there will be private trackers and replacements in the future, but it's going to take quite a bit to regain traction after this.

[Gus Richlen Was Wrong]

GODDAMN IT.

[Rumble McSkirmish]

Take it away Michael Scott:

[thechase]

KRDL still has Sentais and KR up, but probably not for long. They got hit with these letters too.

Sucks too because I was in the middle of a script-fic adaptation of Lupinranger

[Mozenrath]

Toei are shit.

If you ever have the mistaken belief Toei have anything resembling integrity, look up what happened between Go Nagai and Toei when they hired him to make Gaiking... and then credited others and left him out, thinking they wouldn't have to pay him royalties that way.

Toei are shit.

[DrBackflipsHoffman]

May 13, 2021 8:31:00 GMT -5 James Fabiano said:

Toei? Ceasing and desisting? You don't say.

In other news, water is wet.

ive got a framed cease and desist from toei they sent to a friend a few years back

[eJm]

Toei are pretty much the main reason we’re not getting more Dragonball Z Abridged so…yeah, not really shocking.

[thechase]

It brings me no joy to announce that after discussing the situation with my staff, we will no longer be continuing work on either Saber or Zenkaiger. Not even softsubs. Personally, I couldn't continue work on either series if it means worrying that it would paint a target on our members backs. I don't want to mess with people's livelihoods or be responsible for being the one that got them in legal trouble.

So what does this mean for our group? We'll continue subbing as usual, but with series that aren't as contentious. If you like the stuff we sub in general, hopefully we pick stuff you'd also enjoy. Heck, we might even sub future KR or Sentai stuff and release it in some cheeky sneaky fashion in the future. Just not Saber or Zenkaiger for now.

What we will continue to do:

Sub the commercials
Create discussion threads
Update our wikis for the series
We don't want to leave you high and dry, so we'll be plugging other fansub groups that are working on Saber and Zenkaiger. So far, I know that Over-Time is okay with being plugged, I think they're doing Zenkaiger. If your group is comfortable with being plugged here, please let us know. (Only contact me if you're a member of said group, for obvious reasons I want to make sure they want to be plugged on our site.) Also, if you're an international translator for Saber/Zenkaiger, lemme know and I'll happily plug you too.

Thank you to the fans of both series for giving us their support all these years. I hope you understand the situation that we're in and what lead us to the decision that we made. It's just not worth it to me if it lands a friend in prison or kicked out of Japan or something. Hopefully you'll check back and we'll be working on something that will delight you just as much.

www.tvnihon.com/node/4274

[ZERO]

A few thoughts on this:

There were some truly dumb fans who, upon seeing how bad "official" subs for Agito and Faiz were ("honshin!"), decided to take it up with one Shinichiro Shirakura, Toei's director of Planning & Production, worked on most of the Heisei-era shows at whatnot. He's active on Twitter and will sometimes even interact with western fans. Fansub groups such as TV-N were mentioned.

WTF? Toei was able to turn a blind eye in the past until this nonsense. They knew, but didn't have to let people know they know. International fans were buying the toys, so the shows were having the intended effect.

Then when the C&D was sent to TV-N, they went to Shirakura AGAIN, like he has anything to do with how the shows are distributed, and some of them were at best, rude about it, downright offensive, even.

Western tokusatsu fans are f**king idiots (I knew before this, see the "You're not supposed to know about Trinity" debacle). I don't think Shirakura cared about fansubs, but this situation pretty much forced Toei's hand, and let's be honest, they are perfectly within their rights to do this. Do not forget, Fansubs are still piracy.

If these C&D letters are a prelude to Toei actually making goddamn effort at Western distribution, then fine. But it has to be more than just America.

Even something as simple as simulcasting Kamen Rider Revice for audiences outside of Japan, like Tsuburaya did for Ultraman on Crunchyroll and more recently, Ultraman Z on Youtube last year, would be a simple gesture that would mean a lot.

[The Dark Order Inferno]

Toei are kind of awful in general, even to people who want to give them money. They've been notoriously difficult to work with over the years for people producing Transformers media, sending incomplete versions of things or refusing to send anything at all, European and Australian companies just put out low quality fansubs of Scramble City because Toei were so difficult and unreliable.

That said, if fans kept making them aware of Tv Nihon, they had no choice but to act. Can't keep poking the bear like that.