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Here’s What The Hulu & Funimation Partnership Means For Netflix

By Trisha Faulkner
Published on: 12:57 PST, Dec 9, 2018

As Netflix subscribers know, the streaming giant has been working hard the last few years investing both a lot of time and money into increasing the anime content in its library. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago that Netflix announced a wealth of new anime titles – including some Netflix Originals – slated to hit their streaming library next year.

A few days ago, Variety reported on a new partnership formed between Funimation and Hulu. Given Hulu is a competitor of Netflix, this new partnership has many Netflix subscribers wondering what this could mean for the current content sitting in the Netflix library.

Funimation is a name just about anyone who watches any type of anime recognizes. It is an American-based entertainment company that produces and releases dubbed versions of anime series currently only existing with Japanese audio. Funimation is the reason anime series such as Dragon Ball Z and One Piece can be viewed with English audio. Funimation is widely popular with more than 600 titles under their belt.

According to What’s On Netflix, the deal between Hulu and Funimation isn’t something that should cause Netflix subscribers that love anime to panic. This is because Funimation has had their own streaming service for some time. Furthermore, Netflix has a lot of plans in place to expand the anime content in their library and none of their plans have anything to do with Funimation.

The Netflix fan site also points out the fact that there is still an “overwhelming” volume of manga titles that have yet to be adapted to an anime. Netflix could pursue purchasing rights to turn any of these unclaimed titles into a series and steer clear of Funimation completely.

Another key reason Netflix subscribers do not have much to worry about is the fact that there are not currently very many Funimation titles sitting in the Netflix library. In fact, there are only a few larger titles such as Attack on Titan still sitting in the library.

In the interest of promotion, it wouldn’t be in Funimation’s best interest to pull their hottest titles from Netflix. Instead, Funimation would be better off utilizing nonexclusive contracts that allow them to stream some of their hotter titles on a few different platforms instead of being limited to one streaming service.

While the deal does mean more Funimation titles will be coming to Hulu, this deal doesn’t mean Netflix subscribers are suddenly going to run out of anime content to enjoy.

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