In a recorded message played for fans at the Tokyo stage greeting for Gintama The Movie – Yoshiwara In Flames on the night of Sept. 26, 2026, Hideaki Sorachi made a confession that caught even longtime fans off guard: nearly two decades ago, the creator himself didn't believe the anime adaptation of Gintama would work.
"Now that I can finally say it — honestly, I thought it would flop," Sorachi said. He explained that Gintama's distinctive brand of humor and storytelling was always going to be difficult to translate to the screen, and that even if the production team pulled it off, he wasn't convinced enough viewers would actually get the joke.
He Just Wanted People Willing to Make It With Him
What made Sorachi happy at the time, he said, was simply that people were willing to raise their hands and take on the project with him. As long as the crew making the anime was having fun doing it, he considered that goal already met — even if the show ended up being cancelled quickly. That mindset, he added, is part of why he largely stayed hands-off during production.
"I was only expecting royalties from the manga," he said. "I never imagined the anime would end up boosting those royalties as much as it did."
Even His First Editor Wasn't Convinced
Sorachi wasn't alone in his doubts. Kohei Onishi, the first editor assigned to Gintama, recalled that neither of them believed the manga was popular enough to land an anime adaptation in the first place. According to Onishi, their reaction at the time was closer to dismissing the idea outright — a TV series felt like a stretch nobody would actually watch. It wasn't until he saw the finished anime that it truly sank in for him that the adaptation had become real.
A Production Built on a Tight Deadline
Hiromitsu Higuchi, one of the people who helped get the anime project off the ground and its third producer, recalled that the team had to move fast. He was asked to work on a pilot right after Japan's Golden Week holidays, with a full TV series already in mind as the eventual goal. Because the project was set to be officially announced that autumn, staffing, casting, and every other piece of the production had to come together in a short window.
Twenty Years of Gintama
The Gintama anime began with an OVA produced by Sunrise, first shown at the Jump Festa 2006 Anime Tour in 2005, before launching into a 367-episode TV series that ran from April 2006 to October 2018. The franchise later added two theatrical films — Gintama: The Movie (2010) and Gintama: The Movie: The Final Chapter — Be Forever Yorozuya (2013) — before wrapping its core story with Gintama: The Very Final in January 2021.
This year marks the franchise's 20th anniversary, and Gintama The Movie – Yoshiwara In Flames — a remake of the beloved Yoshiwara arc, following Gintoki and the Yorozuya crew as they get pulled into an all-out battle while helping an orphaned boy reunite with his mother — is the newest theatrical release marking the milestone.
Source: Oricon, via Animehunch. As of September 27, 2026.