This week sees the debut of Crunchyroll’s summer season of anime, and one of the streamer’s new lineup of shows has become the focal point of online discussion not for the content of its story, but for its subtitles, which appear to include a line explicitly mentioning ChatGPT.
On Tuesday, Bluesky user pixeldoesthings uploaded a screenshot of Cyangames’ and studio Gokumi’s VR video game-centric action anime, Necronomico and the Cosmic Horror Show. In their screenshot, the lower third of the anime’s German subtitles read, “ChatGPT said:Wenn ich die Welt von hier an weiter genießen kann.” According to Anime News Network, the dialogue line appears at the end of the premiere episode of the anime around its 19:12 timestamp.
“Beyond disappointed to find Necronomico and the Cosmic Horror Show's subs on Crunchyroll are blatantly and openly ChatGPT,” pixeldoesthings wrote in the post. “This is not acceptable. How can we be expected to pay for a service that clearly doesn't care about the quality of its products?”
Beyond disappointed to find Necronomico and the Cosmic Horror Show's subs on @crunchyroll.com are blatantly and openly ChatGPT.This is not acceptable. How can we be expected to pay for a service that clearly doesn't care about the quality of its products?
— Pixel (@pixeldoesthings.bsky.social) 2025-07-01T18:10:35.620Z
As ANN notes, as of July 2, the German subtitle line no longer includes “ChatGPT” in its subtitling; however, for many, the damage was already done. Pixeldoesit’s post has since been cross-posted from BlueSky to Twitter, leading to an outcry from anime fans wondering if the streamer was caught blatantly using ChatGPT, rather than hiring human subtitlers.
Speaking with Aftermath, a Crunchyroll spokesperson provided an official statement this morning saying, “We were made aware that AI-generated subtitles were employed by a third-party vendor, which is in violation of our agreement. We are investigating the matter and are working to rectify the error.”
Speaking with The Verge in February 2024, Crunchyroll President Rahul Purini mentioned that the company was experimenting with machine-learning technology to "improve and optimize [their] processes" for delivering subtitles in more languages worldwide at a faster rate compared to the original Japanese release date of seasonal anime. The following March, Polygon asked whether Purini’s stance on AI had changed in the wake of Crunchyroll’s merger with then-competitor Funimation—a merger that led to fan outcry over losing digital anime content they once owned on Funimation.
Purini reiterated to Polygon that the anime company wasn’t using AI in its subtitling, despite subscriber worries over his February 2024 statement, which had hinted at the possibility that the streamer would implement machine-generated subtitles.
“AI is new, we are curious to see what it can do, what it cannot do, to understand it better,” Purini told Polygon. “Quality is of paramount importance for us, and if we find out the technology is not to the level that it can create the best subtitles we want for our fans, then we will wait until the technology gets there. And if it never gets there, then it never gets there.”
When Polygon asked how and when Crunchyroll might implement AI-generated subtitling and closed captioning into the company’s localization workflow, Purini declined to comment on a timeline.
“We still don’t know if we can get them done,” Purini said. “It’s really, really early testing so far.”
The widespread outrage within the anime community over obvious ChatGPT-produced subtitles for a lesser-known show highlights a long-standing concern. Many worry that, like the manga, film, TV, and video game industries, anime may also be showing signs of increasingly relying on AI for faster production and higher output.
Anime fans’ collective outrage over Necronomico and the Cosmic Horror Show’s ChatGPT-generated subtitles shows they recognize the vital role of human translators and localizers. After all, it's these human beings’ expert skills and training that have contributed to Crunchyroll’s lofty position as the leading platform for anime fans, not AI. And it should stay that way.
