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Anime on Satellite TV (Europe)

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Highlights

Sailor Moon (German).
A Little Princess, aka. "Little Princess Sara", fine WMT adaptation. (Polish dialogue) 		BST clock
CET clock

Introduction

There is quite a lot of anime shown on TV in continental Europe (both satellite and terrestial), for instance France has had Ranma 1/2, Spain has Dragonball Z and Italy has had Kimagure Orange Road. Evangelion is being shown in France, but only on a digital pay channel, alas. These countries and others have aired lots of well-known anime at some time or other. This still continues today; Spain for instance has several TV channels which regularly show anime.
Helen McCarthy's ANIME UK /ANIME FX magazine had quite useful listings of European TV anime, and even mentioned some ot the titles covered below, and mentions satellite TV, but seems not to have pointed out the present extent of the ASTRA & EUTELSAT anime service. However, TM3 did not start broadcasting from ASTRA till several months after ANIME FX folded, though it was on EUTELSAT 13deg.E.
Yes, there often is English-language anime on the English-language subscription channels, but it is almost invariably the same videos you could have bought in British video shops. The anime available from Europe (on clear channels) is far more interesting.
If you live in continental Europe and are interested in this, there are some pages of European TV programme listings, covering many countries and channels, that you can check through. See Euro TV Database, or World TV, or Eutelsat program schedule links, or German TV Anime. These listings, I should caution, are far more useful if you already know the local title of the show, which may bear no relation to the English or Japanese title!
Satellites: The advantage of viewing via satellites is that you can view from anywhere in the satellite "footprint" and not just within range of national terrestial TV transmitters. I suspected that the remarks on terrestial TV above also applied to satellite TV, and despite getting almost no information from British anime fans I put up a cheap dish and receiver just so I could check for myself.
The results exceeded my expectations! On just two clear Astra channels I found hours of world animation being transmitted daily, and a percentage of this is, or appears to be, Japanese-animated. (There is rather less now.)
The broadcast format used on many TV channels is to transmit a "session" of animation for kids in a block several hours long at an off-peak time. Everything is dubbed. A few items are obviously anime, as is confirmed by the credits.
Apart from those with a well-known name you'll also stumble on unknown TV series, that despite the dubbing are as Japanese as sushi. Others have European settings and were presumably made in Japan for export. Others just look Japanese, but you can't be sure because there are no credits. (The tm3 channel is the worst offender.) This is a completely different flavour of animation from that available in UK video shops, and also quite different from that available from fan sources or shown at fan conventions. If you want to watch a lot of animation, and don't mind it being in German, etc, then putting up a dish is the cheapest way to do it!. The otherwise rare World Masterpiece Theater (WMT ) anime turn up frequently and should be checked out as they are quality items and are usually very good. More WMT info and mailing list at: Meisaku
Shows are shown daily, some having an afternoon repeat. Broadcast times vary irregularly. The suggested way of proceeding is to tape the whole session and then search the tape for any series you'd like to see more of.
Archiving a series can be difficult unless you have two VCRs to edit down the session tapes. The timings can vary so much that using timed recordings for single episodes can lead to disappointment.

Polish Anime

Polsat:
Like POLSAT 2, this channel often carries some anime. Polish foreign programmes are usually overdubbed, which sounds extremely strange at first hearing, since the original soundtrack is faintly audible, with one Polish voice dubbed over it after each speech, with the same translator doing all the voices in a monotone!
In the case of SAILOR MOON and LUCY MAY, we got the original Japanese episodes, with overdubbing in Polish. You may find this maddening, or conversely, be able to mentally filter out the Polish and follow some of the Japanese dialogue.
If you are timer recording, note that the animation starts at the exact time given in the Teletext, to within a few seconds! Technical note: these two channels are strong, so can be received in most places with an Astra-sized dish.
POLSAT 2 offerings included Jenny Jenny (classic tennis anime)on Tuesdays & Thursdays; Rodzina Trapp#w (=Trapp Family Story), period WMT soap anime, Samurai Pizza Cats, Candy Candy - and Mary Bell (magical girl anime). The best-known show was SAILOR MOON. Polsat & Polsat 2 rely much less on repeats than the other anime channels, though Sailor Moon has ben shown several times in its entirety.

Arabic anime

There is a certain amount of anime on the Arabic channels on 13 deg.E and 16 deg.E, also on Turksat at 42 deg.E - but it is impossible to find any advance program information. To make matters worse, the schedules of animation seem to change often and for no obvious reason! For these programmes I am just giving the sighting time; if anyone is interested they can deduce the repeat dates for themselves. Note that Friday, not Sunday, is the Muslim holy day.
It's worth surfing the Turkish channels as there's quite a lot there, and a fair chance that something really good will turn up sooner or later. This Easter I have found 8 anime a day being shown on Turkish channels! Note: Most Arabic progs. 1 hr later after March clock-change!

Listings

Viewing guide for March/April '99

Listings for English-language channels are in the usual TV/satellite listing magazines.
Listings for RTL2 and other European channels are published in magazines like "Satellite TV Europe". As the original anime names are rarely used, they are more useful for finding repeats of programs one has found by chance, but better than nothing.
Some channels have their own WWW pages with detailed programme listings and even synopses. These can be located via AltaVista. Some channels have their own Teletext, and RTL2 has, at page 280, a daily start-time guide to a number of other channels including TM3, which will at least let you check the animation sessions. For what it's worth, the teletext works even on otherwise encrypted channels like Bravo!
There is a German fan page by Taro Rehrl which gives news of German TV (and satellite) anime: German TV Anime - useful for advance planning.
Listings in alphabetical order by satellite, by channel name, then by title. BST times in BOLD, CET European times in italics. Beware the time-zones - it seems that Europe changes at the same time as the UK! The UK times are always an hour earlier! - 0630 BST = 0730 CETetc.
"Teletext" = Teletext on channel. "WWW" = WWW page on Internet.

ASTRA 1A 1B 1C 1D, (19.2 deg.E)

EUTELSAT Hot Bird 1, 13 deg.E

Click here for useful Eutelsat program schedule links

EUTELSAT II F3 16 deg.E

Many channel frequencies on this satellite changed in November '98 when a more powerful "bird" replaced II F3.

INTELSAT 707 1 deg.W

I have a report of anime in English at this satellite position; to check it out you will need a D2 MAC receiver and Eurocrypt card.

HISPASAT 30 deg.W

Spain reportedly screens a lot of anime. But this satellite is only carrying encrypted or digital signals now.

INTELSAT 63 deg.E

Italian regional channels have all gone digital, to the dismay of thousands of expatriate Italians. Around here a lot of them have big motorized dishes, now no more use to them than my cheap one. Word was that these channels are still screening anime, while RAI rarely does.

TELECOM 2B 5 deg.W

All programmes on this satellite are in SECAM.

EUTELSAT 2F3, 36 deg.E

Getting TV from Iraq at all is kinda cool - you can get propoganda in English at 1900 BST, and see the guy with the moustache almost any time. When they show anime it's even cooler...

TURKSAT 42 deg.E

Turkish glossary: Temmuz = July, Bugun = today, Az sonra = next, Yayin akisi = TV schedule (on Web site), Cizgi Dizi = animation, Yarin = tomorrow.

British Terrestial TV

Click here for Reviews. 

Articles on Satellite TV Anime

An essay on WMT anime, with some reference to shoujo anime.

Digital Reports

I dont't have a digital receiver so the following are unconfirmed. See also FAQ. 
AB Digital, 12.521/11.678 GHz, H, WWW
Includes AB Cartoon, a 18hrs. per day cartoon channel, mostly anime (Sailor Moon etc). This is a digital pay channel. Subscriptions and decoders probably only available in France, alas.
>Just a little addition: > >The digital channel JUNIOR in Germany (where I am working) is regularly >airing Anime-programmes. Right now we are showing: > >-Rascal >-Hobberdy Dick >-Kum Kum >-Thumbelina >-Tao Tao >-Eleven Cats > >coming up are: > >Alice, Maja the Bee, etc. etc. etc....... > >There you are! > >Greetings! > >Eduard habsburg > 
>In France on FR3, between 17h15 and 17h45 >there is "Le petit Lord" of Nippon Animation. >(Shokoshi Cedey?) >On Canal+ one thuesday per month >there is a broadcast about anime. >This week, there were >the four OAV of Macross +. >Next time, it will be Ninja Scroll. >On C: every week, there is a episode >of the TV series Evangelion. >Club Dorothee on TF1 doesn't exist anymore since september 97.

Links

WMT Mirror for World Masterpiece Theater homepage.
To get the latest update of the Java clock program by David Zhao, go to http://www.siusa.com/dclock/

 

G.Cowie, 21 Jan.99