Some criticisms are superficial, while others go to the core. Goro Taniguchi’s remarks at Keio University on May 26 clearly fall into the latter category. The director of One Piece Film: Red used a 90-minute conference organized by producer ARCH to直言 that much of today’s anime is like junk food: stimulating on the surface, empty inside, and lacking a unifying vision.

Taniguchi’s main argument isn’t that current anime is bad due to lack of talent, but due to lack of directorial leadership. When directors don’t make clear decisions early on, each department operates independently without unified guidance, resulting in a disjointed product.

To illustrate his point, Taniguchi mentioned a concerning practice: cinematographers posting “before and after” images on social media, showing their adjustments. The problem, he said, is that many adjustments aren’t creative decisions but fixes for flaws in material received from other stages. The main director, who should have planned everything from the start and instructed the cinematography team on the desired outcome, simply didn’t do so. What’s presented as achievement is actually evidence of a broken workflow.

The second part of his critique targets the format. Taniguchi noted that the proliferation of single-cour seasons (11-13 episodes) since around 2005 largely destroyed anime’s traditional learning system. In past long seasons, team members worked closely with experienced directors across many episodes, gaining real skills through exposure. With shorter seasons, a team member might only participate in up to three episodes—insufficient, Taniguchi believes, for meaningful development.

The exception, he indicated, are certain studios still producing long series for children, where the learning model is better preserved. He specifically named Toei Animation, TMS Entertainment, and Shin-Ei Animation as examples where this tradition remains. The rest of the industry, in his view, still fails to address the resulting training gap.

Goro Taniguchi is one of Japan’s most recognized anime directors, with a decades-long career and titles that have marked generations. He’s responsible for series like Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion and s-CRY-ed, and recently directed One Piece Film: Red, the franchise’s highest-grossing film at that time. His latest work is L’étoile de Paris en fleur, an original film released in Japan on March 13, 2026, following two young women—a painter and a ballet dancer—as they reunite in Paris pursuing their dreams. For someone with that history to speak of an industry crisis isn’t a passing comment—it signals a real problem felt from within.

Do you think the issue with current anime is a lack of visionary directors, or are economic and production factors making that level of control impossible even if directors want it?