CATDOLL: Episode 6 of Shirobako stopped broadcasting on Niconico due to copyright issues

Japanese late-night TV animation usually starts a limited-time free online broadcast event after a certain number of episodes have been aired in order to increase its popularity. SHIROBAKO, one of the popular new episodes in October, also held such an event on Niconico. However, Shirobako's sixth episode was stopped from being broadcast online due to copyright issues, as there were many memes from "Legend of the Titans: King of Eden" in the sixth episode.

The sixth episode of Shirobako mainly tells the story of the original artist Mr. Endo and the 3D supervisor Yuichiro Yanagi, who had serious disagreements and conflicts over who should produce the explosion scene in the animation, and finally found their original intention of joining the animation industry by visiting the exhibition of "Legend of the Titans Eden" and finally reached a reconciliation. The problem is that the exhibition of Eden that appeared later in this episode showed many machines, settings and classic lines from the Eden animation.

"Legend of the Titans Eden" is a very early robot animation. The TV version was broadcast from May 8, 1980 to January 30, 1981. It was directed by Tomino Yoshiyuki when he was still called Tomino Yoshiyuki. It was originally scheduled to be broadcasted for 43 episodes, but due to low ratings, it was cut to 39 episodes. The ending of this work is the extinction of all mankind. This animation is often regarded as the highest masterpiece of Tomino's dark personality.

Another theory that Shirobako's sixth episode was stopped is that the first half of the sixth episode featured female actors rehearsing the play "Waiting for Godot", but according to Samuel Beckett, the original author of "Waiting for Godot", "women are not allowed to perform in this play". Previously, a theater in Japan performed this play with female actors, and then the copyright holder of "Waiting for Godot" banned all performances after learning about this. Therefore, Shirobako's sixth episode cannot be broadcast before the picture is modified.