News

Kengan Ashura Anime Reveals Premiere Date, More Cast Roles

The official website for the anime adaptation of Yabako Sandrovich's Kengan Ashura manga revealed the July 31 premiere and more roles for previously revealed cast members on Saturday.

The newly announced roles are:

• Yasuyuki Kase as Takeshi Wakatsuki
• Ryuuzo Hasuike as Sen Hatsumi
• Yoshiyuki Shimozuma as Aki Saitō, Hiroshi Matsui
• Takehiro Hasu as Futoshi Hosome
• Kanehira Yamamoto as Yoshirō Yoshitake
• Yōhei Azakami as Iwan Karaev
• Yukana as Shion Sōryūin
• Makoto Koichi as Tomoko Matsuda
• Eiichirō Tokumoto as Tadashi Iida, Takerō Ushiroda, Horio Kure, Shinobu Koōzan, Koishi Yamamoto
• Kōji Ishii as Gen Shikano
• Jin Urayama as Ken Ooya
• Masaaki Mizunaka as Ryō Himuro
• Shigeru Chiba as Eriō Kure
• Yūya Hirose as Henzō Kure
• Tomoyo Kurosawa as Karla Kure
• Kenichirō Matsuda as Hollis Kure
• Ryousuke Takahashi as Reiichi Kure
• Misono Suzuki as Fūsui Kure
• Daisuke Hirakawa as Kenzō Yamashita
• Takahiro Kameoka as Masahiko Oota
• Fumihiko Tachiki as narrator

The show stars:

• Tatsuhisa Suzuki as Ōma Tokita
• Chō as Kazuo Yamashita
• Jouji Nakata as Hideki Nogi
• Yumi Uchiyama as Kaede Akiyama
• Hayato Kaneko as Rihito
• Tetsu Inada as Jun Sekibayashi
• Junya Enoki as Cosmo Imai
• Daisuke Namikawa as Setsuna Kiryū

Previously revealed cast members with still unrevealed roles include:

• Masuo Amada
• Akira Ishida
• Kazuya Ichijou
• Akio Ohtsuka
• Megumi Ogata
• Atsushi Ono
• Daisuke Ono
• Masayuki Katō
• Tetsuo Kanao
• Mai Kanazawa
• Noriyuki Kawamoto
• Taiten Kusunoki
• Naomi Kusumi
• Natsuko Kuwatani
• Tesshō Genda
• Katsuyuki Konishi
• Misao Kobayashi
• Yū Kobayashi
• Kōichi Gomi
• Rikiya Koyama
• Takahiro Sakurai
• Shouzou Sasaki
• Chiharu Sawashiro
• Hidekatsu Shibata
• Ikkyū Juku
• Hiroshi Shirokuma
• Shinya Takahashi
• Eiji Takeuchi
• Ryōta Takeuchi
• Kenjiro Tsuda
• Aki Toyosaki
• Rina Hidaka
• Nobuyuki Hiyama
• Mana Hirata
• Keiji Fujiwara
• Mai Fuchigami
• Sōichiro Hoshi
• Takanori Hoshino
• Yūsuke Hoshino
• Chado Horii
• Ryōko Maekawa
• Matthew Masaru Barron
• Yasunori Masutani
• Yoshitsugu Matsuoka
• Masaya Matsukaze
• Hiroshi Matsumoto
• Mitsuaki Madono
• Takahiro Mizushima
• Kenta Miyake
• Katsuki Murase
• Eiji Yanagisawa
• Kōji Yusa
• Masumi Yoshida

The anime will stream globally only on Netflix this summer, and is also slated to air on television in Japan. The anime had its world premiere at Anime Expo in July. The manga won a fan voting contest in 2015 to receive the adaptation.

Seiji Kishi (Danganronpa The Animation, Yuki Yuna Is a Hero) is directing the anime at Larx Entertainment. Makoto Uezu (Akame ga KILL!, The Heroic Legend of Arslan) is in charge of series composition, and Kazuaki Morita (Tsuki ga Kirei, Assassination Classroom) is designing the characters. Team-MAX's Yasuharu Takanashi (Fairy Tail, Naruto Shippūden) is composing the music.

Sandrovich launched Kengan Ashura with Daromeon's illustrations in the Manga ONE app in 2012 and ended the series on August 9, but a new arc will launch in the Manga ONE app on January 17.

In the manga's story, businesses and merchants wager large sums of money to hire combatants for unarmed hand-to-hand fighting matches. The winner takes all in these Kengan competitions that originated during the Edo period. Merchants use the fights as a means to resolve disputes with each other. The strong and mysterious Ōma Tokita, whose nickname is Ashura, enters these matches. Nogi Group president Hideki Nogi keeps his ambitions to himself when he meets Ashura. Events begin to swirl around the Kengan fights as Ashura enters the fray.

The manga is also inspiring a smartphone game this spring.

Sources: Kengan Ashura anime's website, Comic Natalie