At the recent live event for the upcoming TV anime adaptation of Yoshiki Tanaka’s Legend of the Galactic Heroes (Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu) light novel series, lots of new details have been revealed for the new series, including the first visual, cast, staff and first video preview. The anime itself will begin airing next Spring.
The event revealed that the new adaptation will come in two parts. The first will be a 12 episode TV anime called The Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These Kaikou (The Legend of the Galactic Heroes The New Thesis: Star-Crossed) that will air in April 2018, during the Spring 2018 anime season.
The second part of the adaptation will be an anime film trilogy that will release in 2019. The trilogy, titled The Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These Seiran (The Legend of the Galactic Heroes The New Thesis: Stellar War), will continue on from the 2018 anime. The three films will be made up of 4 episodes each, effectively another 12 episode season.
The first members of the anime’s main cast were revealed alongside the first set of character designs. They consists of:
- Mamoru Miyano (Rintarou Okabe from Steins;Gate) leading the cast as Reinhard von Lohengramm
- Yuuichiro Umehara (Kuroo Hazama from Young Black Jack) voicing Siegfried Kircheis
- Kenichi Suzumura (Mikiya Kokutou from Kara no Kyoukai) who voices Yang Wen-li
- Yoshimitsu Shimoyama (Alzack Connell from Fairy Tail) as the Narrator
The leading members of the anime’s production staff were also revealed and includes:
- Director: Shunsuke Tada (Kuroko’s Basketball, The Prince of Tennis)
- Series Composer: Noboru Takagi (Durarara!!, Kuroko’s Basketball)
- Anime Character Designers: Yoko Kikuchi (Kuroko’s Basketball, Junjou Romantica), Iwao Teraoka (Seihou Tenshi Angel Links, Yuusha Keisatsu J-Decker) and Katsura Tsushima (Kuroko’s Basketball Animation Director)
- Chief Animation Director: Takayuki Goto (Kuroko’s Basketball, Blood-C)
- Mecha Desingers: Atsushi Takeuchi (Guilty Crown, Ghost in the Shell), Shinji Usui (009 Re:Cyborg), Shinobu Tsuneki (Guilty Crown, Zoids Genesis), and Naoyuki Kato (The Legend of the Galactic Heroes, Uchuu no Senshi)
- Animation Studio: Production I.G. (Kuroko’s Basketball, Ghost in the Shell)
The first promotional video has been released that show off the visuals of the anime, its characters and ships:
The event for the new anime saw the attendance of Ryo Horikawa (Vegeta in Dragon Ball Z), Masashi Hironaka (Kimihiko Masumi from Kishin Heidan), and Nozomu Sasaki (Yuusuke Urameshi in Yuu☆Yuu☆Hakusho), who voiced Reinhard von Lohengramm, Siegfried Kircheis, and Julian, respectively, in the original 1988 adaptation.
The anime was first announced in 2014 at the end of a stage play of Legend of the Galactic Heroes and is scheduled for a 2017 broadcast. The secretary of Yoshiki Tanaka, the author of the novels, confirmed that the new anime series will indeed not be a remake of the 1988 anime series, but a brand new adaptation.
Legend of the Galactic Heroes, known in Japan as Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu, is a series of light novels written by Yoshiki Tanaka, with illustrations from various artists. It is a science fiction series that began in 1982, with the original series ending in 1987. A new series titled Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Side Stories was then launched in late 1984 by Tanaka. The series gained popularity, where it won the Seiun Award for Best Novel of the Year in 1989. Since then there has been various adaptations based on Tanaka’s work, the first being a manga one-off called Legend of Galactic Heroes: Golden Wings.
The first animated version of the series was the film My Conquest is the Sea of Stars in early 1988, animated by Artland and Magic Bus. The film was successful and warranted an animated series that aired from late 1998 till 1997. The series wasn’t a standard televised anime, but a long string of OVAs. Since then a slew of animated films were released, and a manga adaptation by Katsumi Michihara that started in 2007. There was also a stage play based on Legend of the Galactic Heroes that started showing in 2011, where a new anime announcement was made at a 2014 showing. Production I.G. (Ghost in the Shell, Kuroko’s Basketball) will be animating the new project, set to air in 2018.
Here is the synopsis for the original anime:
For 150 years the galaxy has been locked in an interstellar war between the Galactic Empire and the Free Planets Alliance, fighting battles with thousands of spaceships and millions of soldiers on both sides. The crumbling Goldenbaum dynasty rules the Empire while the Alliance is an increasingly dysfunctional democratic state.
Two new commanders enter the stage: Imperial Admiral Reinhard von Lohengramm and the FPA’s Yang Wen-Li. Reinhard is a talented minor aristocrat given a high station—and a powerful grudge—after the Kaiser took his older sister as a concubine. Wen-Li originally joined the military only to fund his university education, but has become a brilliant though reluctant leader. Each begins to attract a circle of similarly gifted soldiers, generals and thinkers around him, and in time the rivalry between these two very different men will shatter the existing stalemate. As they deal with superiors and subordinates, maneuver through personal and political problems, plot strategies and fight battles, both will bend the course of events to their will and, in turn, be tested and changed by the greatest war in human history!
The upcoming new adaptation of Legend of the Galactic Heroes from Production I.G. will premiere in April 2018 for 12 episodes as The Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These Kaikou. The TV anime will also be followed by an anime film trilogy in 2019. Further details will be revealed at a later date.
You can visit the anime’s website here: http://gineiden-anime.com/
And follow their Twitter: @gineidenanime
Source Article - Anime News Network
“The Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These Kaikou”, “The Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These Seiran”, “Legend of the Galactic Heroes”, “Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu”, image and all associated brands and titles © 2017 Yoshiki Tanaka, Tokuma Shoten Publishing Co., Ltd., Production I.G. and Magic Bus