From FUNimation you can watch Sands of Destruction, Heroic Age, Gunslinger Girl: Il Teatrino, Darker than Black, and Shigurui: Death Frenzy for a mere $0.99 per episode. Interestingly, they're only charging for the dub-- if you go to each series' page, the subtitled versions are free. If you want my recommendation, check out Darker than Black if you haven't already.
The Sentai titles are all rental, and they appear to be al sub-only and are similarly priced:
- Destiny of the Shrine Maiden (aka Kannazuki no Miko)
- Daphne in the Brilliant Blue
- Dokkoida
- Tears to Tiara
- Legends of the Dark King ~ Fist of the North Star
- UFO Ultramaiden Valkyrie
- UFO Ultramaiden Valkyrie 2
- UFO Ultramaiden Valkyrie: Special OVA
- Burn UP! OVA
I haven't watched any of these, but I was just listening to Tiffany Grant talk about Tears to Tiara this morning, so if I was going to try one out, that'd be my pick. Although I'd probably just watch it on The Anime Network, since my subscription there includes the entire series and costs less than 7 episodes on YouTube.
On the other hand, I suspect that this is really aimed at reaching an audience already on YouTube who is NOT familiar with FUNimation or The Anime Network-- less us and more that guy who trolls YouTube for random funny videos.
But, what do you think? Will you spend a few bucks to try out some series?
It seems like they are going for the iTunes price point with these UTube rentals, but while I'd certainly pay $1 for a download of a show that I really liked and was likely to watch again sometime ... and could watch when not in range of the Internet machine ... $1 to watch a stream of a half hour show once seems a bit steep.
What he said.