Author Archives: Alexander Case

Live Action “Ninja Scroll” film from WB

SciFi Wire reports that Warner Brothers has acquired the rights to adapt the action-horror anime Ninja Scroll for live action. The film is currently being produced by Leonardo DiCaprio’s production company Appian Way, as well as Japanese animation studio Madhouse, who did the animation for the original release. The script is currently being written by Alex Tse, who wrote the screenplay for the upcoming adaptation of Watchmen as well as the currently-in-production adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s “Illustrated Man” anthology – both films being either directed by or likely to be directed by (respectively) Zach Snyder (300)

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Witchblade (Anime) Pilot on iTunes for Free.

Anime News Network and Sci-Fi Wire are reporting that
Funimation has announced that the first episode of the
Anime spinoff of Top Cow’s moderately successful comic
series “Witchblade” is being made available on iTunes
for free. iTunes has been distributing anime for over
a year now, though it’s been distributed dubbed rather
then subtitled, so those who prefer to watch anime
with the original Japanese voice acting will probably
want to stick with the DVDs.

The first episode itself is okay, but it does have
it’s weaknesses – but the show does pick up some
afterwards. I’ve been meaning to sit down and watch
the whole show for a review, now that it’s been
licensed. If you’re interested in reading a review of
the show, let me know.

Hellsing Manga ends (in Japan)

Just in time for Halloween (sort of) Anime News Network reports that Japanese
Seinen manga magazine “Young King Ours” (known for
running, among other genre manga titles,
Trigun) is running the final volume of Kouta
Hirano’s action/horror manga Hellsing.

Currently, the English translation of the series is
being published by Dark Horse Comics, and the
Hellsing Ultimate OVA series (which sticks a
little more closely to the original comics then the
previous series) is currently being distributed by
Viz.

Kenneth Branagh in talks to direct Thor

Sci-Fi Wire reports that Kenneth Branagh
is currently in talks to direct the film adaptation of
Marvel Comics’ Thor. Branagh has directed a
couple genre films, the most notable being the box-
office flop Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein.

Branagh is best known for his adapations of the
works of William Shakespeare, most notably
Hamlet, and Henry V, and he has acted in
a few genre films (the most well known ones being
Wild Wild West and Harry Potter and the
Chamber of Secrets)

Correction: Kenneth Branagh did not direct
Othello, he did star in it as Iago. My mistake.

Hulu, Joost start offering streaming subtitled anime.

Not long after the demise of
Toonami, Anime News Network is reporting that
several US anime distributors, notably Viz, Sony, and
Funimation, have signed agreements with streaming video service Joost, as well as Hulu.com to legally stream for free
subtitled episodes of various anime series including
such genre titles as Death Note, Naruto, Bleach, Cosmo
Warrior Zero, and the 2003 version of Astro Boy, with
more titles coming in the future for both services.

Toonami Ends Tonight

According to Animenewsnetwork.com, tonight is the last night Toonami airs on
Cartoon Network.

Over the 11 years the Cartoon Network ran its Toonami
block, it ran many genre anime, including the original
Mobile Suit Gundam, Blue Submarine No. 6, Voltron,
Robotech, Outlaw Star, Ronin Warriors, Naruto, Tenchi
Muyo!, The Big O, and .Hack//Sign. According to
Cartoon Network’s schedule, the block will be filled
in the next few weeks with Spider-Man
on September 27th and Batman:
Gotham Knight on October 4th.