Torch's Mazenchu brand has a TV anime starting October 7 as the first original anime within Kansai TV's morning program Yoidon!. Torch's earlier production, Black Torch, ended its run on September 19 on Crunchyroll, which also carried a same-day English dub.
Torch's most recent anime work is Black Torch, and it is finished. The television adaptation of Tsuyoshi Takaki's manga premiered on July 4 and aired its finale on September 19, with a final promotional video previewing episodes 11 and 12. Crunchyroll streamed the series across North America, Central America, South America, Europe, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East, and CIS, and carried a same-day English dub with a cast led by A.J. Beckles as Jiro Azuma and Erin Yvette as Ichika Kishimojin. The adaptation covered a manga that ran only five volumes and had been cancelled, a fact that shaped early coverage.
Before the premiere, promotion moved from an Anime Expo 2026 world premiere through a second trailer and theme song reveal, with SiM performing "Freeze Me Up" and I Don't Like Mondays. performing "Groooovy," to advance cuts and an opening video. Crunchyroll later added Black Torch to its Summer 2026 lineup among more than 50 titles, and in July extended a Hindi dub to the series as part of an Indian-language expansion whose date was August 29.
The one point of disagreement in coverage was quality. An Anime Feminist review of the first episode found a protagonist defined mainly by his love for animals and a plot following standard shonen beats, citing forced fanservice and the limits of a five-volume source. The production credits ran from Kei Umabiki as director at 100Studio through Gigaemon Ichikawa on series composition, Gou Suzuki on character designs, and Yutaka Yamada on music. Torch's next announced work is Mazenchu, a character brand created by Ebi, whose TV anime begins October 7 inside Kansai TV's Yoidon!, with Rea Obara, Hayashi Sakura, Uki Nashiki, and Kokoro Kikuchi in the cast.
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Sep 16
Torch announced on Wednesday that its Mazenchu character brand will receive a TV anime airing as the first original anime within Kansai TV's morning news and lifestyle program Yoidon!, starting October 7. Mazenchu is set in a school where all kinds of food live out their youth and form friendships, rivalries, and bittersweet romances. Obara Rea plays Sume, a sushi rice girl, Sakura Hayashi plays Abo, an avocado girl, Uki Nashiki plays Akami, a tuna boy, and Kokoro Kikuchi plays Shinko, a pickled vegetable boy. Ebi created the Mazenchu characters.