The 170-episode Black Clover anime
Where modern anime splits into seasons, Black Clover's first television run took the older long-runner shape: announced at Jump Festa on December 18, 2016, it premiered on TV Tokyo on October 3, 2017 and aired weekly until March 30, 2021, accumulating 170 episodes without a seasonal break. Tatsuya Yoshihara directed episodes 1 to 152 and stayed on as chief director; Ayataka Tanemura, the assistant director since episode 28, directed the final stretch, episodes 153 to 170. Character designs were by Itsuko Takeda and the music by Minako Seki.
The run bent exactly once. In late April 2020, pandemic production delays pushed back episodes from 133 onward; episode 1 was rebroadcast on May 5, and the series resumed on July 7, 2020. It never broke again.
Abroad, Crunchyroll simulcast it and Funimation dubbed it; it premiered on Toonami on December 2, 2017. Crunchyroll's viewing data made it the most-watched anime series on the platform in 2020, watched in 87 countries and territories. English home video confusingly split the single run into four boxed seasons, though Japan and Crunchyroll treat it as one first season. Why it stopped at 170 is its own story, told on the 2021 ending page.
