Netflix users were outraged when the popular anime ‘Naruto’ was streamed in Mandarin Chinese instead of the original Japanese audio. Japanese audio is available in all seasons except for season 15 of Naruto Shippuden. When one user tried to watch it in Japanese, he got the reply of ‘content licensing and show agreements’.
Anime industry is booming in India and witg releasing anime movies in theatres and making them available in multiple Indian languages, the makers also target to increase their audience base in India. But, even though the shows are usually available in English, if not in Hindi, the craze of watching them in original Japanese audio is huge. The average anime audiences are teenagers and they like to have full fun of the shows by watching them in Japanese with subtitles.
For such a dedicated fandom, the unavailability of the Japanese audio is a big deal indeed.
Crunchyroll is an anime streaming platform with a great user base. Netflix trying to compete with it should keep in mind that delivering what the audience wants must be a priority if they want to have a good following from the anime fans.
There are many users frustrated and tweeting about this glitch. It is not commendable for such a huge OTT giant to make such mistakes while streaming what is arguably the most famous anime of all times.