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Producers, Sponsors and Fans of Tiger & Bunny: A Case Study of the Flow ofMedia Content in Convergence Culture

Erika Junhui Yi

Abstract:

The popular Japanese anime Tiger & Bunny has become a topic of discussion in media reports because of its eye-catching product placement approach. This paper is a case study on this superhero anime in order to demonstrate that the convergence in media is a process both top-down corporate-driven and bottom-up consumer-driven. The unique feature of this anime is the integration of product placement with the story itself. The sponsors in real life place their productlogos onto the hero suits of the superheroes in the anime, whom are celebrity superheroes of a reality TV show in the story universe. Therefore, in the story world of this anime, characters are dealing with a highly commercialized media convergence themselves.

This research illustrates the change in audience attitude and their reflections on such commercialization within and outside of the story world. The data unfolds the changing relationship between audience and producers and the influence of participatory culture on the media production, especially in the realm of audience's sense making towards the product placement within the show.

Key words: media convergence, anime, affective economics, product placement

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“You do know who made you a hero, don’t you?”

“Our sponsors, sir!”

- Tiger & Bunny, Episode 1

This line seems to be a self-referenced mockery to the unique way of associating sponsorship with the content in the Japanese anime Tiger & Bunny, especially when it is said by the leading character with a solemn expression on his face. The story of Tiger & Bunny is about superheroes, but these heroes are also celebrities. They participate in a competitive reality TV show, gaining points by stopping crimes and saving people. In the story world, the heroes are sponsored by companies, in exchange, the heroes need to put what are supposed to be their sponsors’ company logos onto their hero suits, making them into a walking advertisement board. The anime actually put the real-life sponsors’ logo onto their hero suits, notably SoftBank, Amazon.co.jp, Ustream, and Pepsi (See figure 1.). Therefore, the product placement in real life isintegrated with the product placement in the story world. In the story, heroes are hired employeesof their sponsors, and they are expected to promote the sponsors’ image and stock price by achieving high rankings in the competition within the story world. Just as the above mentioned lines implied, the heroes are conscious of their identities as a public relation representative for the sponsors, and they are expected to undertake responsibilities not only in saving lives, but alsoin gaining publicity for sponsors. Therefore, in the story world of this anime, characters are coping with a highly commercialized media environment that echoes the media environment in real life. The intertwining of commercialization in the reality and the anime world made Tiger &Bunny a unique phenomenon, and a very interesting case study to illustrate the media convergence that is happening in recent years.

Figure 1. In the show, the sponsors’ logos are clearly visible (Pepsi, Calbee, DMM)

The purpose of this paper is to use Tiger & Bunny as a successful example of media convergence in order to demonstrate how convergence from both top-down and bottom-up influence and facilitate the changing relationships between audience and producers. Such changeis especially evident in the ways how the media texts are produced and consumed. The focus of this paper is to explore the changing interpretation from the audience towards this new product placement approach. Before we go into details about Tiger & Bunny and the related theoretical

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backgrounds, it is necessary to have an overall look at Japanese anime industry and where Tiger & Bunny stand in terms of the anime’s success.

Anime industry in Japan has a long history of prosperity. The current state of Japanese anime industry could be seen as a matured and highly developed one. Over 200 shows are aired each week, and the well-integrated market aims to reach for the largest amount of audience(Jenkins, 2006b). The long time top-selling anime such as One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach, are onair for over ten years, and the related products tremendous. Indeed, compared with these shows, the length of the show and revenue generated by the show might not be significant, but the originality in content and in product placement approach of Tiger & Bunny makes it stands out asa suitable example for this case study. Therefore, next section will be a rationale for using this particular anime for case study.

Revenue is only one aspect that sets Tiger & Bunny aside from other shows, together withpreviously mentioned interesting features of this anime made it a suitable example. First, most ofthe anime in the market nowadays are either adaptations from existing manga, such as the above mentioned three, or light novels, for example, Fate series, Suzumiya Haruhi series. This seems to be a relatively low-risk decision for producers, because the original work usually had already established a stable and enthusiastic fan base before they were made into more expensive animations. Tiger & Bunny, unlike most anime shows, is an original creation of the anime studio Sunrise. The studio revealed the news of airing and advertising for Tiger & Bunny in November, 2011, and several well-known producers’ names were mentioned. Although the fame of the producers might help to draw some audience’s attention, it is likely that Tiger & Bunny had much less of a fan base than the adapted shows. Therefore, the success of this anime owes almostcompletely to the anime itself rather than other influencing factors. The online news also mentioned that “Tiger & Bunny offers to place company logos within the series on the characters, who are called both "heroes" and seishain (company employees)” (Anime News Network, 2011). This sponsor element of the anime is another feature that sets Tiger & Bunny apart. The details of how the sponsorship works with the show is a critical element for discussion, which will be presented in more details in the latter part of this paper.

For an anime that was broadcast at midnight each week, Tiger & Bunny achieved unexpected success among anime fans worldwide. The first season of this hit anime was aired from April to September, 2011, altogether 25 episodes in total. The total viewing rate of Tiger &Bunny was unclear due to its multi-channel release method. However, the live view time on Ustream alone reached 1,875,217. One of the most direct means for observing the success of Tiger & Bunny is to look at its blu-ray DVD sales. According to the data published on Anime News Network (2011), from May to December, 2011, altogether 7 blu-ray DVDs were released as the show was airing. The sales record increased from 19,656 copies for the first disc to 23,879for the seventh disc, and the second disc was the top selling one, totaling 27,394 copies. The firstblue-ray DVD of Tiger & Bunny, which had sold the lowest number of copies among the series, was among the top-selling blu-ray animation DVDs in Japan, in the first half of 2011. Officially released by-products of Tiger & Bunny were plentiful and covered a lot of categories. A key word search on Amazon Japan would render a result of 682 pieces of related products, ranging from regular anime-related items such as DVDs, character songs, action figures and costume-play items, to day-to-day items such as themed toothbrush sets, key chains, stationaries, and

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beddings. The record of Tiger & Bunny is quite remarkable in both the viewing times and the sales in DVD and other merchandises.

However, the success of Tiger & Bunny did not stop at views and sales, user-generated contents relating to Tiger & Bunny is also plentiful. In Pixiv, the noted Japanese fan art hosting site, under the tag “Tiger&Bunny” there are 90,957 pieces of fan artworks and 911,692 views in total, ranked one of the most used tags in the website. Heated discussion among fans resulted in some 17,857 comments were received in Tiger & Bunny anon meme in Livejournal. One of the Tiger & Bunny online communities had 2,752 members and 2,175 lurkers, generating 1,257 journal entries. In offline life, Tiger & Bunny themed fan events started not long after the show went live, and some of the events continued after the finale of first season. For example, the Japanese fan event series “Boku no Hero” (My Hero), was held on a monthly basis in different cities of Japan till September, 2012, exactly one year after the season finale. These numbers in membership and reoccurring events are evidence of Tiger & Bunny’s wild popularity among audience.

Jenkins (2006a) addressed the on-going dynamics between audience, producer, and sponsors that is observable in Tiger & Bunny, a phenomenon he called convergence. At a glance,the fans of Tiger & Bunny are gladly receiving what the producers are providing them, meanwhile, they are actively generating fan works and holding fan events. These visible signs of the anime being popular were picked up by producers and hence more related product release – products with the sponsors’ logos on. This theory framework took on the phenomenon of the freeflow of media content cross platforms, and the mutual influence to and from top-down tier in media consumption cycle, the media producers and sponsors, and the bottom-up tier, the audience. The convenience of new technology accelerated the process of media convergence in recent years. Not only scholars, but personnel in fields involved with media convergence had been aware of this process for a while. Media producers try to make sense and thus utilize the characteristics of media convergence to meet audience’s needs for better profit. However, how tobecome a hit in the era of media convergence remains to be a question unanswered.

The aim of this research is not to find the answer to this overwhelming question, but to analyze a successful case in order to make out one possibly generalizable way for successful product placement in affective economics. Therefore, next section will be addressing the definition and process of media convergence and related concepts, the power dynamics between producers and fans, and the integrity of product placement in order to layout the base theory structure guiding this research.

Literature Review

Currently, media convergence gives the audiences more ways to experience and consumemedia texts, and it also gives producers more ways to spread their products. Henry Jenkins(2006a: 322) defined convergence as the “technological, industrial, cultural, and social changes in the ways media circulates within our culture”, a situation in which multiple media systems coexist and media content flows fluidly across them. Convergence refers to a process rather than a result, a process in which media content flows between different media platforms (Jenkins, 2004) – both new and old media – resulting in “the migratory behavior of media audience who would go almost anywhere in search of the kind of entertainment experiences they want”(Jenkins, 2006a: 322). The once medium-specific contents now are able to flow freely

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across platforms, because the delivery channels nowadays are not as important as they used to bedue to the pervasive network infrastructures and broader access to various media contents granted to consumers (Jenkins, 2006a; Ito, 2008). The digitization of media objects and the ease with which they can be cut up and recombined has the potential to reconfigure our media cultures and industries (Meikle and Young, 2011). Media texts can no longer be considered fixedartifacts; rather they reflect a dynamic process of invention and reinvention, and this demands a new emphasis on the user as the creator (Meikle and Young, 2011). Media products are no longer constrained by pages of print or the edges of screens, and this fluidity allows expression across a canvas that includes a variety of traditional media platforms and the reality of location(Meikle and Young, 2011).

The dynamics in media text circulation now are shifted to the struggle between cooperative convergence and grassroots convergence (Jenkins, 2006a). Cooperative convergencerefers to the more and more concentrated media ownership that leads to the owners’ wanting to ensure the free flow of their media content across different media platforms to maximize profits, expand markets, and reinforce viewer commitments (Croteau et al., 2012; Jenkins, 2004; Jenkins, 2006b; Milner, 2010); while grassroots convergence refers to the free flow of media content via unauthorized or illegal means among consumers for better archiving, annotation, appropriation, and recirculation (Bruns, 2008; Jenkins, 2006a; Van Dijck, 2009). The difference between the two types of convergence only lies in the origins, namely, audiences and producers. Both are on-going process affecting the flow of media contents.

The two convergences facilitate media flow in different ways, but both are important for free flow of media contents. These two seemingly contradictory forces coexist, cooperate and reinforce each other (Bruns, 2008; Jenkins, 2006a; Milner, 2010). On one hand, media producerstake advantage of convergence to expand products on various platforms, reaching out for more consumers, and using different forms of new media to stay connected with them (Milner, 2010; Jenkins, 2004; Jenkins, 2006a; Jenkins, 2006b). On the other hand, consumers generate a tremendous amount of data that enriches and expands the scope of media content, promoting it voluntarily (Jenkins, 2006a; Jenkins, 2006b; Baym, 2010b). Via the freer flow of media content, consumers are also able to make their voices louder and to demand more participation in its production (Jenkins, 2006a; Milner, 2009); meanwhile, producers are observing and engaging with various fan activities in order to better connect with the fans (Baym, 2010a; Jenkins, 2006a; Milner, 2010). Therefore, both the producers’ efforts in promoting media flow and the actions taken by the audiences are salient.

Online fandom is a powerful representation of an audience that is facilitating grassroots convergence. The top-down corporate-driven convergence and bottom-up consumer-driven convergence, in addition to the emergence of subcultures promoting Do-It-Yourself mentality with new technologies, form a new participatory culture (Ito, 2010; Jenkins, 2006a; Milner, 2009; Milner, 2010). “Knowledge communities” are formed according to the member’s “intellectual enterprises and emotional investments” (Jenkins, 2006b: 137). Online fan communities are believed to be one of the fullest embodiments of such community. While a single fan could not possibly know everything about the media product, collectively, fans interpret, reconstruct, and reshape media producers’ works, making sense, and creating “channels for lobbying the producers” (Jenkins, 2006b: 138). Their collective intelligence is characterized by multiple means of obtaining knowledge, dynamic exchange, and less control

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over information flow (Jenkins, 2006b; Kozinets et al., 2008; Milner, 2009). “Members pool what they know, creating something much more powerful than the sum of its parts” (Jenkins, 2006b: 140). Power is changing because the scope of participation is increasing due to the expansion of authorship (Rosen, 2006). Media producers are aware of these engaging fan communities, and some of them embrace this change in power and the loss of total control over their own texts (McCourt and Burkart, 2007). This reduction in control from the producers, in return, gives fans more agency to interpret and appreciate the original media text.

This on-going, never-ending power dynamic between fans and producers requires the producers to make alterations in their marketing strategies in order to adapt to the now actively engaging target audiences who were once passive receivers. Jenkins (2006b: 148) argued that, instead of viewing the fans as a threat to their artistic and intellectual integrity, successful producers should be “more adept at monitoring and serving audience interests”. Baym (2010c) suggested that even unauthorized content sharing had the potential of increasing audience size, not to mention the user-generated data would be very helpful for the producers in their market research and decision making. As such, a new type of marketing is suggested, in which consumers are no longer the target, but rather, they take up the role of producers of the texts and medium for spreading (Kozinets et al., 2008; Milner, 2009; Zwick et al., 2008). “Marketing in aninteractive world is a collaborative process with the marketer helping the consumer to buy and the consumer helping the marketer to sell” (Jenkins, 2006b: 148). According to this argument, producers should bond with the consumers socially instead of pressing legal actions to obtain profit from them (Baym, 2010b). Instead of positioning the audiences as a threat, these arguments advocate acknowledgement of the audiences’ power and propose a new marketing approach.

This shift in marketing approaches is in line with what Jenkins (2006a: 319) called “affective economics” – “a new discourse in marketing and brand research that emphasizes the emotional commitments consumers make to brands as a central motivation for their purchasing decisions”. Recognizing the importance of audience engagement, producers now agree that marketing should focus more on quality of the engagement than other attributes (Jenkins, 2006b; McCourt and Burkart, 2007). This market model will enhance the consumers’ loyalty to the brand, increasing their purchase power through engaging with their “emotional, social, and intellectual investments,” according to Jenkins (Jenkins, 2006a: 63). Dean (2013: 113) points outthat audiences’ feelings can be considered as products – “attachment, affection, excitement, fear, ease, or well-being”. Similarly, in line with Jenkins’ (2006a) “affective economics,” Gregg(2009) described affective labor, which refers to the amount of time and effort fans put in engaging fan activities. Baym and Burnett (2009) noted that the free labor fans were contributingthe equivalent to jobs that would be paid if they were done by anyone else. In his research, Andrejevic (2008) demonstrated how fans and producers co-create contents via interactive media.

Change of marketing strategies, for example, new product placement strategies, might be crucial for the success of a media text and its related products, especially in an environment dominated by affective economics. Producers and sponsors are trying to take full advantage of consumers’ emotional engagement (Zwick et al., 2008), via collaboration in product placement, to shape “the total entertainment package” (Jenkins, 2006a: 68). Because poor product placement

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might result in consumer backlash, it is suggested that a good product placement should have “the ability to illuminate an aspect of an existing character’s personality through an appropriate brand or product” (Austin et al., 2010). Jenkins (2006a) used American Idol as an example of collaboration between producers and sponsors to demonstrate the complexity of the relationshipsamong producers, sponsors, and fans. It is clear that there are still risks that the product will be negatively related to the media content with the development of the show (Jenkins, 2006b; Jenkins, 2006a). This further illustrates the influence of the power of bottom-up convergence andthe importance of emotional engagement of the fans. The unique way of product placement and the unexpected success of Tiger & Bunny might be able to provide more insight in these paradigms.

The following research questions were asked to understand the nature of media convergence in the context of Tiger & Bunny.

RQ1. How does the audience receive and make sense of the product placement in the show?

RQ2. How does the top-down and bottom-up convergence exert influence on each other as the story unfolds?

Method

In order to illustrate the change in audience attitude and their reflections on the commercialization within and outside of the story world, I collected episode discussion threads from a Tiger & Bunny online community as the main source of bottom-up information. The community is the biggest English speaking community available, altogether 4932 users. It was created in April, 2011, roughly the same time with the airing of the first episode. The discussion thread was posted every week after the show was aired, one per each episode. Therefore, it is likely that most of the episode-related discussion was collected in this community.

Meanwhile, producers’ responses such as tweets, news articles translations and interview translations were also included as top-down information source. I use the term producers to broadly refer to people who was in the staff list, and that include the director, screenplay writer, character designer, and voice cast. There is also an official Tiger & Bunny twitter account, whichwill release news and broadcast time periodically. Some of the official source was originally Japanese, which the devoted fans of the anime translated and published online. One Wordpress blog was specialized in translating official news, according to the authors, they are only doing it “for fun”.

I was heavily involved with Tiger & Bunny fandom myself since April, 2010. My personal experiences with this fandom help to understand the context of fan discussion, the jargon and references in the discussion thread. The weekly discussion in private chat groups, microblog entries posted by fellow fan girls, and some of my observations before this research was launched all became valuable general reference data to better grasp the dynamics of the Tiger & Bunny fan communities. One very important function of these reference is to verify and determine an accurate fan translation by comparing different versions of translations that are accessible only through some closed fan communities in which I was involved with.

The bottom-up data was coded in accordance to the research question. I specifically looked for fan discussions about the product placement, and their reactions towards this new wayof sponsorship. Meanwhile, other relevant themes were constructed to address the relationships

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among producers, sponsors, and fans. To compare the two sets of data, I arranged them chronologically on a matrix, in order to form a timeline of development. Rows of the matrix were created according to the identified themes, because of the massive amount of data, not all the examples could be put into the cells, summaries were added instead.

The data collection process echoes the utilization of collective intelligence, without dedicated fan translators, I would have had a very difficult time in collecting top-down corporation information. With the help of collective knowledge exchange, I was exposed to moredata sources and heard more voices from both the top-down and bottom-up. The main data included 25 threads of blog posts, taking up 384 single-spaced pages of 9-point font.

Findings

The discussion threads picked up pace in quantity and quality with the increasing popularity of the show. At the first three or four episodes, the discussion posts only had a few commenters, but with the development of the plot, more people were drawn into the discussion. The back and forth of the comments sometimes grew both in quantity and intensity. For example, a heated debate of a supplemental character Yuri Petrov was carried out regarding his undisclosed abusive childhood experience, the debate of his characterization later turned into people’s reflection on domestic violence and its influence on children’s upbringing. Sometimes, commenters compose essay-length arguments on their opinions of the plot development, character analysis, and meta-analysis of the anime. The bottom-up data set is rich in quantity andquality, therefore only the themes speaking to the research question were closely analyzed. Hereunder I will divide the section into three parts in order to address the top-down, bottom-up convergence, and their perceived interactions.

Top-down convergence

Via accelerating the flow of media content across delivery channels, producers seek to expand revenue opportunities, broaden markets, and reinforce consumer commitments. Tiger & Bunny utilized multiple delivery channels to spread the show, thus the production team of Tiger & Bunny facilitated top-down convergence. The show schedule for Tiger & Bunny in Japan was not very ideal, even though the intended audience were “all the tired, middle-aged men”(Aki_the_geek, 2011), airing after 12:00 pm local time on a Sunday night was not a popular time. However, this show expanded its exposure to other media platforms as well. In the United States, audience were able to view the latest episode with close caption on Hulu only four hours after it was released in Japan. Their subtitling actually beat the fan subtitle groups in terms of speed and sometimes quality – a rare case in anime fan subtitiling realm. Ustream was another choice to view Tiger & Bunny online for Japanese audience as well. Anime News Network also streamed the show for audience in Australia and United Kingdom. Legal software was also available for audience to view the low-quality live stream of the anime everywhere around the world. Moreover, blu-ray DVDs were released in a timely manner worldwide, the first blu-ray DVD came out one month after the premier, and after that, the rest of the disks were released roughly on a monthly schedule. A special event was held for the season finale held in several theatres in Japan, in which the last episode was played on the wide screen. Producers and voice casts celebrated the season finale with the fans through this event.

With the help of internet and digital technology, Tiger & Bunny was able to reach to a much broader audience than television shows using traditional means of approach. Because of

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the diversified channel of delivery, this anime not only found its way into the local market, but also reached out to a global audience. It seems that the producers originally indeed aimed for a global market instead of a domestic one. In his interview in New York Comic-Con, the producer and co-creator of Tiger & Bunny, Masayuki Ozaki confirmed that the anime was designed for a worldwide audience (Ozaki, 2011). For example, the style of Tiger & Bunny is a mixture of Japanese and Western element. The design of costumed superheroes are obvious visual imitations of Western comic book superheroes, but the plot itself is closer to Japanese anime, which usually adopts a more relaxed and lighthearted storytelling style. One viewer noted that “the show is like a mix between tokusatsu and western comics, and is like what all of the marvel anime series wish they could be”. Tokusatsu is a Japanese word to describe costume superhero TV show, something close to reality TV show in the West, an example of tokusatsu is Ultraman. Another fan commented on the opening and ending credit of the show, who apparently recognized the mixed elements in this show: “I think the opening really fit with the Western superhero aspect that we are used to with this show, while the ending was more anime-like and dealt more with the characters rather than the superheroes”. The degree of convergence here lies not only in the diversity of delivery channel, but also in the convergence of Japanese and Western elements integrated in the anime.

The by-products of Tiger & Bunny really made an effort to increase diversity that satisfied different needs from different types of fans, which in turn helps to promote audience commitment. The by-products of Tiger & Bunny the anime show are the themed merchandise available on several Japanese and American websites. As previously noted, the merchandise spreads across a lot of categories, from heavily anime-related products like action figures and costume-play items, to products suitable for daily use such as mug cups and headphones. The price of the items varies in large degrees, from plastic card holders to 18K golden necklaces. It isalmost impossible for a single fan to purchase all the products. However, what is made possible is that the great amount of merchandise enabled fans to always find something catered to their financial ability, aesthetics, and needs.

Some of these products carry mere souvenir value of a show, but some official products in fact function as small constructing blocks in the construction of the story world of Tiger & Bunny. For example, the extra contents in some official products are indeed new contents that arerelated to the story. Official fan books and manga were published, the content of which are not mere recaps of the anime, but rather insightful information regarding the story world within the show. For example, the official gossip book of Tiger & Bunny disclosed all the main characters’ personal information regarding hobbits, relationship history, friendships, and so on, which in turnadded believability of the characters. Information about the story world was also provided for a better understanding of the fictional city Sternbild. For instance, in Tiger & Bunny Official Hero Book, it is mentioned that the current three-level structure of Sternbild is the result of flooding problems. Such detail might not be influential in terms of plot development in the anime, but it helps to build a diegetic world, which in turn increases fans’ emotional commitment with the story.

Bottom-up convergence

Interestingly enough, it is not only the producers that use multiple media platforms to accelerate the flow of content; consumers are doing the same thing from a bottom-up perspectiveas well. The result of bottom-up convergence is similar to that of the top-down, in that revenue

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opportunities are increased, markets are expanded, and viewer commitments are enhanced. One of the most evident examples is the fansub group activities. In the regions where official streaming is not available, fansub groups tend to take up the responsibility of publicizing the show, though via an unauthorized or downright illegal means. The content was ripped from live stream, embedded subtitles of local languages, and delivered non-commercially in the web. A quick glance on the torrent publishing sites will find subtitles in English, Italian, French, and Chinese. The market of Tiger & Bunny, therefore, was expanded into regions without legal broadcast channel. Such market expansion by fans and fansub groups were quite effective. For example, the well-established fan base of Tiger & Bunny in China is almost entirely owed to the work of fansub groups. Currently, the influence of Tiger & Bunny in China became big enough to hold “Tiger & Bunny only” events – fan events that featured only the fandom surrounding the show. This is something that requires high popularity and large fan base. It is not hard to imagine, the number of fan crafts – fan books (toujinshi), fan artworks, and other fan made items– must also be large enough to hold such a sales event. Similar to the official products, these fan products have a very specific yet dedicated market of consumers. One of such consumers is a friend on my microblog. She posted the list of her trophies from the events she attended during summer. In the picture, there are some twenty different fan books piled up on top of each other, with a comment in the bottom: “this is not all of them”. The fansub groups publicized the contentof Tiger & Bunny to areas that did not have legal channels of delivery. By doing so, the show reached an audience market that was otherwise unapproachable.

Audience commitment was enhanced in similar ways with what the producers did – constructing and enhancing the story world. The fan events and unauthorized distribution might not be able to generate profit for the producers, per se. Nevertheless, fan activities are very important in promoting user commitments and fan community building, which in turn will inevitably transfer their enthusiasm into revenue because emotions are vital for the successful affective economics. So how committed are the fans to Tiger & Bunny? One can infer their commitments from two aspects: collective world building and their emotional involvement. The audience compiled snippets of information indicating time and place of past events into a coherent storyline: “Speaking of time, I was so glad they showed the date in that scene. I've been trying to work out a timeline of things and that helped a great deal”. And some of them ponderedover the political system in the fictional city Sternbild to make sense of the motives behind certain characters:

“Actually, I can see why the people are like that and actually, kinda, find it to be realistic. In the sense that Sternbild doesn't have a death penalty of any kind, so murderers and whatnot can only, at worst, get life in prison... I don't agree with Lunatic's philosophy, nor with the philosophy of the death penalty, but I understand why they would have the populace cheering for him, since it isn't that far off the mark. :/”

This fan approach did not try to add or create new contents to the show, instead, they mapped out the bigger picture of the story world by analyzing details shown in the anime. All thecontent being analyzed were strictly evidence from the show, but the analysis from the fans transcended the meaning of a line or a screenshot from merely a piece of information into something more believable and realistic.

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The in-depth analysis contributed to the emotional commitment from fans. As a result, the fans of Tiger & Bunny have a very remarkable emotional commitment to the anime. After a particularly emotionally disturbing episode, comments about the fans’ emotional reaction emerged, for example, “Excuse me. I'll be over here, crying legit tears of actual sadness over an ANIME. oh God, everyone ;_;”, “*CRIES BIG FANGIRLY TEARS WHILE CURLED UP IN A BALL UNDER MY BED SHEETS*”, and “...this makes me cry so much. no wonder the director was crying, I don't blame”. The last comment also touched upon the interaction between producers and fans. The director once wrote on his twitter that that episode was going to make people cry, which stirred up the speculations before the episode was aired. After that, fans referred back to his tweet and expressed their thoughts. It is evident that directors were taking fans’ emotional involvement into consideration when promoting the show. The deep emotional involvement from the audience is a critical component for an effective implementation of affective economics.

Bottom-up convergence is also evident in the fan-initiated activities with the producers. Such convergence is not only an expression of emotional commitment, but also a fan-based showpromotion that benefits both the audience and the producers. The Sternbild Fried Rice Event would certainly be an example of bottom-up convergence that achieved such effect. The event was launched by a blog, in which the authors asked the fans to take pictures of their homemade fried rice with a character in Tiger & Bunny, and upload the picture to the website. The event received more than 300 replies, and fans used some very creative way to express their love to theshow. The fried rice was a reference from the anime which later turned into a symbol of showingaffection for those who are familiar with the show, but here it turned into something more entertaining and participatory with the event. Eventually, the event caught the attention of the executive producer Ozaki Masayuki, and he tweeted about it:

“I wish to express my deeeepest appreciation for all of amazing lovely fried rice!!! I'm so proud of citizen of Sternbild! To reciprocate your affection, I'd like to realize T&B CAFE in near future. Thanks, and thanks again!!”

The support from Masayuki was definitely a boost to fan commitment, the Sternbild Fried Rice event later became an event to be held repetitively for celebrating significant dates and announcements of Tiger & Bunny. The effort from fans, in addition to that of the producers, made the influence of this 25-episode anime continued to spread even after the show was over. Hence the content of Tiger & Bunny flows beyond the constrain of time and space.

The product placements of Tiger & Bunny

Indeed, the top-down and bottom-up convergence could happen in any shows with a crowd of dedicated fans like this, but what is unique about Tiger & Bunny lies in the product placement and the way fans make sense of it. Instead of merely tolerating the product placement,fans actively make sense of them and integrate the product placement within the story world. Thesuccess of product placement in Tiger & Bunny owes to the irony of product placement itself – instead of slipping in a product here and there while maintaining the artistic integrity, the show threw the advertisement right to the audience’ face, making it an essential part of the anime itself. This new method obviously caught audience’ attention – not in a bad way, either – that they actively seek to understand the dynamics between producers and sponsors from their own points of views. One named such product placement approach “media satire”: “Can you say ‘media satire’? The corporate sponsorship and sensationalistic reporting of superheroes is setting

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off my senses like WHOA”, and another commented: “My favorite part is that it's satirizing commercialism while simultaneously taking advantage of it? Like those are all actual companies that have actually paid Sunrise for advertising, if I'm not wrong. It's like meta-satire or somethingI don't even”. Fans obviously picked up this product placement approach and actively addressed it. Their encounter with this novel approach leads to a more active sense-making towards the product placement, and the products in turn received more attention.

The sponsorship in real life merged with that in the fictional world, making the advertisements more acceptable – or rather, such product placement gave the advertisements an active role in constructing story, and thus become the reality within the story. The presence of a sponsors’ banner right on the character’s armors – their chests, arms, weapons, and other accessories – constantly reminds audience the roles of these so-called superheroes. They are not only heroes, they are working class employees, and a part of their job is to make their sponsors look good. Fans are aware of the existence of the sponsor logos, and they justify such existence with their own interpretations. For example, one commented: “This episode also had a nice way of still showing the commercial aspect of this series (such as having the sponsors gathering together to figure out what to do to raise the people's trust in heroes...”. The real-life commercialization is embedded in the commercialization in the story world, to the degree that one viewer said: “Sternbild seems like a company-run city, so I guess it makes sense that they'd [heroes’ sponsors] have a high influence over the mayor D:”. These discussion took into account the sponsorship element of Tiger & Bunny, hence the logos are no longer an independent and separate part from real life that creep their way into the show, but an organic component of the story world that reflects itself in the real life in the forms of sponsorships that fans are familiar with.

The fans tend to have deeper emotional bond with the products that the characters actually use than the products related to them. For example, a more subtle product placement could also be found in the series. Certain products in the anime look like some merchandise in real life, such as the iPhone-looking cell phone the main characters used and the cars each character drives. Some fan even examined the anime frame by frame, picking out real-life products shown in the anime. One interesting example is the perfume in episode 2. Someone found out the perfume that the main character Wild Tiger uses is l’Eau Par Kenzo pour Homme, a limited edition perfume produced by Kenzo (See figure 2.). However, news got out that there would be a Tiger & Bunny perfume out in the market, which was designed by Cozy Wave according to the personalities of the two leading characters respectively. In response to this news,a pool was published on one of the Tiger & Bunny main blogs, asking the voters which one of the perfumes they wanted the most. Not surprisingly, out of 138 votes, 64.49% went to the one appeared in the show, l’Eau Par Kenzo pour Homme. This is yet another example of the influence of affective economics. It is not clear whether such obscure product placement is sponsored or mere artistic adaptation from the real-world products, but there is no denial that such placement still has a significant effect on the fans in terms of commitment building.

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Figure 2. A fan posted this comparison picture of Wild Tiger’s perfume and that ofKenzo’s

Notably, with the thickening of the plot, the influence of sponsorship grew among fans. Their initial attitude from the fans were to view such sponsorship something satire and ironic, butlater, such attitude had altered into a more committed and integrated one, to the point that fans started to view the presence of sponsorship a hint of the plot direction. For example, in one episode, Blue Rose, the female superheroine who was sponsored by Pepsi, wanted to quit the hero business. Commenters made fun of the reaction of another character Barnaby when he was disappointed that she did not quit: “She's sponsored by Pepsi. Of course she wouldn't leave. Use your head, Barnaby.”. Whether characters have a sponsor’s banner on them becomes a big indicator of whether they will stay longer in the anime or not. For example, in episode 14, a second league of young superheroes appeared in the show, some people were suspecting if they would become a regular part of the next half of the anime, and one drew the following conclusion: “The Second League: Don't know how much of them we'll be seeing again. My guess is not very...none of them have sponsors...”. Here one can see that having a sponsor in this anime had become a key criterion of the character’s importance in the story. Similarly, it is also very important to avoid backlashes for the sponsors, therefore, the sponsor should not get any negative association with the characters. Towards the season finale, the main character Barnaby was brainwashed and become a villain-like role. At this point, he stopped wearing his white-and-red armor with the sponsor’s logos on it, instead, he was given a black-and-red armor without any logos. At that point of the story, the sponsorship element was no longer a novelty for the fans. They took for granted the influence of a sponsor to the plot development, and built their expectations upon that fact.

Interesting enough, the popularity of the characters is closely associated with the sponsorships as well. Take Yuri Petrov for example, he is rather popular among fans as an anti-

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hero who punishes criminals by his own standard. Some fans made jokes about him when he firstappeared in the opening credit as an established dark hero, that they think Yuri should find a sponsor to stay alive in the anime. Not only did the popularity of characters affect fans’ expectations on the sponsorship, the sponsors in real life love to pour money onto the popular characters for product placement as well. One of the main characters Barnaby received a new sponsor logo in the sixth episode, apparently Amazon Japan realized the commercial value of Barnaby in his fast-rising popularity. Moreover, a supporting character, Origami Cyclone, who isalso a sponsored superhero, received a lot of attention from the fans from the very beginning, even though his appearances in the show is much less compared with other characters. It is possible that the sponsors noticed his unexpected popularity, in the second half of the season, three more sponsor banners appeared on Origami Cyclone’s armor, making him the superhero carrying the most sponsor banners (See figure 3.). Fans did not find this move exploiting, instead, one was rather happy about the attention given to Origami Cyclone from the real-life sponsors: “Origami has a lot of sponsors now o_o He's popular!”. It is clear that not only the sponsors utilize character’s popularity in the show to facilitate their merchandise, fans also embrace the idea that more sponsorship means more plot to the character, and yes, they want it!

Figure 3. Origami Cyclone sponsor logo comparison before (left) and after (right) mid-season

Conclusion

The power dynamics shifted from a completely top-down influence to a top-down and bottom-up interaction, although producers still have more power over the fans, the audience’ voice are getting louder and actually being heard by the producers. It is hard to determine whether the changes in plot and characterization are definitely due to fan reaction, but one can certainly find the media contents passing back and forth between audience and producers. One

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side throws out a story, and the other side reacts towards it, the dance between fans and producers does not follow a singular direction, but rather a mutually influential one. It seems to be a win-win situation for both the fans and the producers, the former has faster and broader access to the media content, vaster choices in merchandise purchase – both from producers and other fans, and more intense emotional engagement with both the show and the producers via their interactions; the latter accepts fandom practices – including the unauthorized ones and utilizes them for their own benefits, the purpose of which is essentially to generate more profit.

This dance-like communication becomes even more complex and intertwined when the sponsors are added to the situation. In Tiger & Bunny, the sponsors are a part of the diegetic world, and this relationship with the fans seems to be working much better than other forms of product placement. They are no longer the passive displacement of merchandise that sneak in theshow with the hopes that their products will be picked up and not hated. Fans are practically asking for product placements on their favorite characters to ensure more character-centered plot,while sponsors are investing on the popular characters to ensure they are getting eyeballs for the product placement. This case study has its unique characteristics, however, the way the producer and sponsor of Tiger & Bunny approached audience could serve a great example for other media producers. Instead of managing the delicate balance between appropriate product placements andexploiting the audience, the strategy for such commercial practice could take an entirely differentturn, that is to weave the product into the story world and give them an active role to the point that sponsorship is closely related to the development of the story itself.

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