The Anime Industry is a lot more interconnected than one might guess at first blush. This manifests itself both in meaningful ways and in silly ones. This series of posts, where I link Yugioh 5Ds to every other anime Kevin Bacon-style, is most definitely the latter. This time, I’m shackling the three most notable currently airing anime to the laughable albatross.

The Rules: For the most part, this is similar to the 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon, which is also similar to wiki-racing except with anime instead of actors.

-Each Series, Manga Magazine, Anime Studio, Creator (Director, Scriptwriter, Mangaka, etc.), and Voice Actor/Actress counts as one link.

-License-holders (e.g. Funimation) and Publishers (e.g. Kadokawa, Kodansha) do not count. Too few of them own too many series for this to be a truly interesting game.

-6 links are the maximum number allowed.

-Anime-Manga versions of the same series don’t count as separate links.

For Attack on Titan, the link is easy and fun, as it gives me the opportunity to bring up Shueisha’s biggest business failure since probably ever.

1. The Attack on Titan manga was originally submitted to and rejected by Weekly Shonen Jump

2. Which also ran the Yugioh series.

3. Of which Yugioh 5Ds is a spinoff.

I already used the easy WSJ route on Titan, so let’s see if we can mix it up for HxH:

1. Hunter x Hunter is scripted by Atsushi Maekawa.

2. Who was a member of the writing staff on Yugioh GX.

3. Of which Yugioh 5Ds is a sequel.

Free finally gives me a chance to use Katsumi Ono’s vaunted Symphogear connection:

1. Free is produced by Kyoto Animation.

2. Which also made Hyouka.

3. In which a major character (Mayaka Ibara) is voiced by Ai Kayano.

4. Who is also the voice of Kirika Akatsuki in Senki Zesshou Symphogear G.

5. Which was directed by Katsumi Ono.

6. Who also directed Yugioh 5Ds.

As always, I invite those who would challenge this column with shows as obscure as humanly possible to do so. I have a few other ideas for what to cover in the next installment, but happily welcome requests.