"Irreconcilable Differences": The ANBU / AnimeOne Breakup
August 12–14, 2004 · The Two Original Public Statements
For years the ANBU/AnimeOne Naruto breakup survived mostly as scene folklore because the phrase everyone remembered was almost designed to create rumors. On August 12, 2004, AnimeOne announced that its joint with Anbudom had been terminated because of "Irreconcilable Differences." AonE said it would continue Naruto independently, expected episodes 95–96 soon, and refused to disclose the specific reasons "in order to keep things civil."
Two days later ANBU published its own much longer statement. ANBU independently confirmed that the joint was over and said it would continue Naruto itself. In the accompanying FAQ, ANBU pointed to AnimeOne staff turnover, workflow and communication problems after translation/editing, inconsistent release timing, licensing-policy concerns, and the extent to which fans had begun treating ANBU and AonE as if they were one group.
THE IMPORTANT PART:
Those details are ANBU's contemporaneous account of the dispute, not a neutral ruling on what happened privately. AnimeOne deliberately chose not to publish its side beyond "Irreconcilable Differences." The surviving sources finally let us reconstruct the public breakup without pretending that every private argument is known.
Later AnimeSuki and AniDB records continue to carry ANBU & AonE joint attribution on archive batches and rows reaching episode 119. That does not automatically prove that the groups reconciled. ANBU's own surviving Episode/File Guide ends at 119, while later database attribution reaches 121, leaving the exact post-breakup file history as a narrower proof problem.
Dattebayo's Trail Leads to Anime-Heaven, Not the ANBU/AonE Breakup
[A-H STAFF IN NEW GROUP] · Naruto 105 · Direct Dattebayo Evidence
The old scene rumor often ties Dattebayo directly to the ANBU/AnimeOne breakup. The surviving primary source points somewhere else. Dattebayo's own archived yhbt.mine.nu page is visibly branded "dattebayo fansubs" and directly lists [DB] Naruto releases from episodes 105 through 122. Its Naruto 105 release carries the remarkable label [A-H STAFF IN NEW GROUP].
A contemporary AnimeSuki page for Anime-Heaven provides the missing expansion: on that same group page, joint credits are written as A-H & Animax and AonE & A-H. In other words, A-H was actually being used as an abbreviation for Anime-Heaven at the time.
Why it matters
That is much stronger evidence for Dattebayo's origin trail than later fan recollection. The new group included staff coming from Anime-Heaven. It was not simply the product of the ANBU/AonE breakup.
CAUTION:
[A-H STAFF IN NEW GROUP] proves a staff-origin relationship. It does not identify every founder, establish the exact organizational birth date, or tell us the private reason those staff left Anime-Heaven.
