The Missionary Of Anime Nicholas Friedman

Anime – the Japanese cartoons that were once a little-known, niche entertainment form for the nerd set – have become increasingly popular in the U.S. and have crossed over into mainstream pop culture and entertainment. The anime film The Boy and the Heron took home last year’s Academy Award for Best Animated Film and anime characters Goku from Dragon Ball and Luffy from One Piece appeared as balloons in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Meanwhile, celebrities from Megan Thee Stallion and Ariana Grande to Michael B. Jordan and Ryan Reynolds have expressed their anime fandom and incorporated it within their own art forms. And streaming services such as Crunchyroll have made anime more accessible to U.S. audiences than ever before.

As National Anime Day approaches on April 15 – a day that celebrates the anime art form and its impact on pop culture – the podcast Crunchyroll Presents: The Anime Effect provides a gateway for the anime curious to enter the wide world of the medium. Two of the show’s hosts Nicholas Friedman and LeAlec Murray can discuss the reasons behind anime’s surge in popularity and how it continues to shape and inform our forms of popular culture and entertainment.

Nicholas Friedman is a career journalist who lives in the anime world. As head of Editorial at Crunchyroll, Nick sits at the center of the anime culture conversation, from the latest breaking updates on Crunchyroll News to the deepest dives into what fans are talking about.

LeAlec Murray is a podcaster and pop culture enthusiast. With 15+ years of experience in the anime and gaming industry, he lives his life one pixel at a time. LeAlec currently works as a Brand Manager at Crunchyroll, helping to bring to life the anime you see everyday.

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