As the Toonami block tends to do around holiday, and as most broadcast networks tend to do as well with these periods, they’ve scheduled a Hunter X Hunter anime marathon to run on July 2nd. Which will make for some additional fun for Anime Expo folks that are in their rooms and can throw a bit of a viewing party. The network has scheduled the first seven episodes to run that night beginning at 11:30pm in lieu of other anime series as part of their normal schedule and it’ll end at 3:00am on Sunday. Hunter X Hunter has had fairly solid ratings on the service so far, though it should be noted that marathon ratings tend to not be too high because they land on holidays when most people are out and about and not on their own regular schedules.
The series has a good bit of popularity behind it for its 148 episode run between 2011 and 2014. Viz Media announced their acquisition of the series back in October with plans for release in bilingual form with DVD and Blu-ray releases coming.
Series concept: A Hunter is one who travels the world doing all sorts of dangerous tasks. From capturing criminals to searching deep within uncharted lands for any lost treasures. Gon is a young boy whose father disappeared long ago, being a Hunter. He believes if he could also follow his father’s path, he could one day reunite with him.
After becoming 12, Gon leaves his home and takes on the task of entering the Hunter exam, notorious for its low success rate and high probability of death to become an official Hunter. He befriends the revenge-driven Kurapika, the doctor-to-be Leorio and the rebellious ex-assassin Killua in the exam, with their friendship prevailing throughout the many trials and threats they come upon taking on the dangerous career of a Hunter.
