Seems like it will be underwatched because of this.
Summary:
- Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night will be licensed by HIDIVE.
- Most of the world wouldn’t get access to it.
- If you’re in Asia, you’d be able to watch it legally for free on YouTube, but there are other issues with that method.
Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night (Yoru no Kurage wa Oyogenai) is an upcoming original anime by studio Doga Kobo that airs this Spring. The previously revealed material looked promising, and fans were looking towards watching the series this spring.
The anime will actually be licensed, but fans aren’t exactly happy. Why? Because it will be on HIDIVE. The platform is much smaller than Crunchyroll or Netflix, and shows being streamed on it are usually underwatched — but that’s actually the least of the problems.
Issues with HIDIVE
It’s not like HIDIVE anime are all unpopular. It is home to such hits as The Dangers in My Heart (Boku no Kokoro no Yabai Yatsu) and Oshi no Ko — it is possible for a series to be widely popular despite being streamed. However, these anime are usually exceptions.
One big issue is that HIDIVE licenses anime for most of the world, yet only allows watching from 5 countries — the USA, Canada, the UK, Australia and Ireland. You can’t even pay for the service using a payment method from a different country — yes, even if you use a VPN.
HIDIVE also doesn’t have the best player out there — and they revamped it recently, which resulted in removal of several functions.
Their sub quality is also questionable, though it has been improving steadily over the past years. Still, it’s really not a platform that is liked by anime fans, but most don’t know about it in the first place.
For an original series that doesn’t get a hype boost from its source material — which isn’t action or romance — being locked behind HIDIVE is a death sentence.
Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night is already predicted to be the underwatched gem of the next season before it even came out. The series seems to be focused on following your own dream and finding yourself, as seen from PVs and other promotional material.
Are there any alternatives?
Some countries will still be able to watch the series outside of HIDIVE. For most Asian countries, the series will be licensed on Muse Asia — and will be on YouTube for free. If you can’t watch it on HIDIVE, you can watch it there.
That said, Muse Asia has its own issues. Their sub quality is noticeably poor (even compared to HIDIVE), and both audio and video quality on YouTube can leave a lot to be desired. It’s a shame that a seemingly cool series wouldn’t be watched by many fans