Highlights
- Dandadan manga has captured the community’s attention and its upcoming anime adaptation is highly anticipated.
- Science Saru, known for its quality anime, will be handling the animation, promising an exciting adaptation.
- The talented team behind the anime, including the director, character designer, and composer, hints at a visually stunning and immersive experience for fans.
Sometimes a manga comes along that has such a unique grip on the community’s attention that it’s not a matter of if it will receive a big anime adaptation, but inevitably when. Lately, that manga has been Dandadan, and though many put their money on the series getting picked up by Bones or tossed onto MAPPA’s ever-increasing heap, it was in fact Science Saru that came up to bat.
Yukinobu Tatsu’s Dandadan began publication on April 6, 2021, coming in at over 100 chapters and 11 volumes as of the time of writing, with a 12th scheduled for release on December 4. The story follows the adventures of a girl who believes in ghosts but not aliens and a boy who believes in aliens but not ghosts before they realize that, unfortunately, they’re both right.
Dandadan: Introducing The Next Big Thing on Shonen Jump+
Dandadan is one of the biggest things out of Shonen Jump’s online magazine at the moment. Here’s a glimpse at the series.
Why It’s a Big Deal
People love this series, and even less manga-savvy anime fans have probably heard at least a few people talk about it and how wild an anime version would be. Since it debuted, it’s been revered for its humor, its over-the-top action, and its colorful cast of characters, to say nothing of the great artwork. The last time an anime adaptation was this hyped was probably Chainsaw Man, and there’s more of a connection there than one may think.
Sure, both are mature stories with transfixing imagery that’s at once befitting an art exhibit and at other times a goldmine of meme potential. However, if Dandadan gives off a similar vibe, it might be because Tatsu was an assistant to Tatsuki Fujimoto on Chainsaw Man. He was even an assistant on Jigokuraku: Hell’s Paradise, the author of which, Yuji Kaku, was himself an assistant on Chainsaw Man under Fujimoto.
Birds of a feather, as they say, and clearly the time spent working with these two acclaimed mangaka gave Tatsu the tools necessary to make a sensation of his own. Given that Chainsaw Man and Jigokuraku were both adapted to animation by MAPPA and both were received well, fans were ready for the same to be true of Dandadan’s inevitable anime. Instead, they were pleasantly surprised.
Science Saru Strikes Again
Masaaki Yuasa may no longer be the president of the studio he co-founded, but any slight worries about Science Saru losing its edge along with him have evaporated in recent years. For starters, even their non-Yuasa projects like Heike Monogatari have really hit it out of the park. Plus, just this past month, Abel Gongora helmed the critically acclaimed Scott Pilgrim Takes Off. The announcement of the Dandadan adaptation was practically just flexing at that point.
The staff for Dandadan‘s anime is even more promising, notably for its director, Fūga Yamashiro. While this is technically his debut as a series director, he’s been the assistant director on several of Yuasa’s projects, namely Ride Your Wave, Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken, and Inu-Oh. He was also the assistant director on Tatami Time Machine Blues, directed by Shingo Natsume (One Punch Man Season 1).
If Dandadan‘s manga was a case of an author taking what he learned from two greats of the industry, then its anime is following in those same footsteps, just with its director. It will be so exciting to see how Yamashiro approaches the adaptation and how it’s received by manga fans. If all goes well, it could be a career-making directorial debut.
The character designer is Naoyuki Onda, who worked on Legend of the Galactic Heroes in the late 80s, the Berserk movies of the 2010s, the Psycho-Pass franchise, and much more. It’s no surprise that he’s worked with director Shukou Murase on several of his projects. Their character designs tend to share a fondness for very gorgeous lips and lashes, adding small details that go a long way toward making their designs not only stand out but uniquely emotive.
Even more exciting is who they have tapped to work on the designs of the aliens, ghosts, and other oddities: none other than legendary animator Yoshimichi Kameda. For those unaware, he is famous for his work on action shows like Fullmetal Alchemist and One Punch Man. In addition to his use of very stark shadows, he has a distinct brushwork style that appears in extreme closeups or during complex character movements.
Any quick search on YouTube will provide the necessary materials for one to go “Oh! This guy!” but that’s the abridged version. He is an incredible animator, and he’s also proven to be a great designer, having served in that role in the Mob Psycho 100 series. In addition to creating the weird entities in this upcoming anime, one wonders if he’ll be providing some key animation as well, but it’s too early to tell.
Finally, MAPPA might not have given Dandadan the Chainsaw Man treatment, but Science Saru did commandeer Chainsaw Man‘s composer. Kensuke Ushio will be lending his musical talents to this new series, and judging from the teaser trailer, Ushio’s music will be more psychedelic than ever, more than fitting for such a bizarre story.
Dandadan‘s anime is finally real and set to come out in 2024, making this perhaps the most exciting TV anime release from the studio since Eizouken back in 2020. No word yet on the cast or where the anime will be streaming, but more info on the latter will be provided on December 16 during a stage event at Jump Festa 2024.
Source: Comic Natalie
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