The official Manglobe site, http://manglobe.net/, has now entered the dreaded Forbidden 403 error and that has come amid a swirl of rumors from 2ch about the company having entered bankruptcy. This has been quickly followed by several directors on Twitter talking about it and essentially saying that the company has shuttered for the moment. Bankruptcy laws are different around the world and I don’t play a lawyer in real life or the internet, so it’s unclear where things will go with this.
That said, Manglobe just had its latest series finish airing with Gangsta and they’re involved in the production for the upcoming theatrical feature film Genocidal Organ, though how that will be impacted is far from clear for obvious reasons. The company began with its first work back in 2003 with the ONA Trip Trek and gained a lot of attention for its work on Samurai Champloo a year later. They’ve toplined a lot of series that have gotten attention but have also done a lot of assistance work as well to fill in the gaps over the years. They had no toplined series in 2014 and last worked on five series in 2013 with Psychic Squad: The Unlimited, Karneval, The World God Only Knows S3, Samurai Flamenco and the Hayate the Combat Butler! Cuties seies.
@Heater_san さあ、これからどうしよう…
— おㄘんㄘん師匠☆٩(๑❛ᴗ❛๑)۶★ (@FR3AK50FC0CK) September 30, 2015
違う仕事探さないと(*_*) — 小森秀人@監督業復帰 (@komohide10) September 30, 2015
@hijiyamafox 某社が飛びました(;´д`)
— 小森秀人@監督業復帰 (@komohide10) September 30, 2015
@hijiyamafox 某社が飛びました(;´д`) — 小森秀人@監督業復帰 (@komohide10) September 30, 2015
どうも本当に倒産したらしい。
— 森田 繁 (@siglic) September 30, 2015
Man, that’s a bummer. Samurai Champloo is still one of my favorite anime’s, but it’s hard to deny a lot of their productions were hit-or-miss, so it’s not surprising.
I wish them all the best in future endeavors.