News

Madman Entertainment Acquisitions from Supanova Gold Coast

The announcement was made by Sylvester Ip from Madman Entertainment during the Madman Panel on Sunday the 6th of April 2014 and confirmed on Madman's website. This is in addition to Saturday's streaming announcement of Knights of Sidonia during the MNCC.

Dai - Shogun - Great Revolution

In the late Edo period, Japan had experienced an unprecedented crisis by Kurofune (Black Ships), the ships from foreign countries. But due to the intervention of Onigami, giant robots that have existed in Japan since the ancient time, the Kurofune ships were driven away and the exclusion of foreigners was accomplished. The story starts in a Japan that has remained in self-imposed exclusion from foreigners ever since and the 1868 Meiji restoration never occurred.

Billed as a action romance anime, Fūun Ishin Dai Shogun was planned by ILCA's Kazuya Sasahara (Cat Shit One: The Animated Series) and Takashi Watanabe (Shakugan no Shana, Slayers) is directing the series at J.C. Staff and A.C.G.T. Project-D is credited with the original story and Dai Sato (Eureka Seven, Freedom, episodes of Cowboy Bebop) is in charge of the series scripts. Hiroya Iijima is adapting Shunya Yamashita's original character designs for animation. Makoto Ishiwata of Nitroplus is designing the mecha.

Chikako Shibata is the art director, and Michiyo Iriomote is the color key artist. Satoshi Motoyama is directing the sound, and Nippon Columbia is in charge of the music production.

If you would like to view the character designs, trailer or cast please click here. The show will premiere on the 9th of April in Japan and the start of Australian streaming on the Madman Screening Room is to be confirmed.

Date A Live II

Thirty years before a strange phenomena called a "spacequake" devastated the center of Eurasia, claiming the lives of at least 150 million people. Since then, smaller spacequakes plague the world on a irregular basis. Shidō Itsuka, a seemingly ordinary high schooler comes across a mysterious girl at the ground zero of a spacequake and learns from his sister Kotori she is one of the "Spirits" who are the real cause of the spacequakes that occur when they manifest themselves in the world. He also learns that Kotori is the captain of the airship Ratatoskr and recruits him to make use of his mysterious ability to seal the Spirits' powers and stop them from being a threat to mankind. However, there is a catch: to seal a Spirit, he must make her fall in love with him.

Based on the light novel series written by Kōshi Tachibana and illustrated by Tsunako, the series first season ran for 12 episodes in March 2013 on NicoNico. Date A Live II has Keitaro Motonaga (Getbackers, Jormungand) returning to direct the second season at a new animation studio, Production IMS, with visual director Hisashi Saito (Haganai, Heaven's Lost Property). Hideki Shirane (Hayate the Combat Butler, Queen's Blade: Rebellion) is in charge of the series scripts, and Takaaki Suzuki (Strike Witches, Last Exile) advised on the world setting, as he has done other anime and manga. Satoshi Ishino (Excel Saga, Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu) designed the characters based on Tsunako's original novel illustrations. Mika Akitaka (Martian Successor Nadesico, Galaxy Fraulein Yuna) and Yasuhiro Moriki are designing the mecha, and Go Sakabe (Gosick theme songs) will score the soundtrack with sound director Yasunori Ebina (A Certain Magical Index, Naruto) at Nippon Columbia. Glovision is producing the music.

The second season will premiere on April 11 in Japan. You can view a trailer and the voice cast here. You can also check out ANN'"'s anime spotlight on the series here.

Madman Entertainment licensed the series in October 2013 and will release the first season on home video in the near future. Date A Live II will be streamed on the Madman Screening Room at a point to be determined.

Riddle Story of Devil

The show's story is set at Myōjō Academy, a private girls' boarding school. All the students in the 10th year's Kurogumi class are assassins with one target, Haru Ichinose. Tokaku Azuma is a recent transfer student who is also targeting Ichinose but she gradually develops feelings for Ichinose.

Keizou Kusakawa (Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's and Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha films, il sole penetra le illusioni ~ Day Break Illusion, Ro-Kyu-Bu!, Sekirei) is directing the anime at Diomedea. Kiyoko Yoshimura is in charge of the series scripts, and Naomi Ide is serving as the character designer and chief animation director. Every episode of the series will have a different ending song and if you would like to view the voice cast and the character designs please click here. You can also check out ANN's anime spotlight on the series here.

Story creator Yun Kouga and artist Sunao Minakata launched the original manga in Newtype in 2012 and Kadokawa published the second compiled book volume in March 2014.

Riddle of the Devil premiered in Japan on April 3. Madman will be streaming the series in the Madman Screening Room at a point in the near future.

Gundam Unicorn

Based on Harutoshi Fukui's Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn space robot novels, the Gundam Unicorn story is set in the year of Universal Century 0096 — three years after Char's Counterattack, the last anime to feature the protagonist Amuro and antagonist Char of the first Gundam anime series. The story follows Banagher Links, a seemingly normal boy who lives and attends school in the space colonies. But Banager's life changes once he encounters Audrey Burne, a new Gundam and a mystery surrounding "Lapace's Box".

The seven episodes have been directed by Kazuhiro Furuhashi (Rurouni Kenshin, You're Under Arrest ) at Sunrise. Kumiko Takahashi (Card Captor Sakura, Ouran High School Host Club, Witch Hunter Robin) adapted the original character designs that Yoshikazu Yasuhiko (first Mobile Suit Gundam, Venus Wars, Arion) created for the original novels. Hajime Katoki (Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory, Mobile Suit Victory Gundam, Gundam Wing Endless Waltz Special Edition), Yoshinori Sayama (Birdy the Mighty: Decode, Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counterattack), Junya Ishigaki (Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, Macross Frontier) and Nobuhiko Genba (Fullmetal Alchemist: The Movie - Conqueror of Shamballa animator) designed the robotic mecha loosely inspired by Kunio Okawara's work on the first Mobile Suit Gundam series. Shinya Ogura (Eureka Seven , Gundam Evolve, Planetes) advise on the world setting of the story, as he has on other Sunrise anime projects.

Madman will be releasing the 7th episode in August 2014, volume 6 was previously released in June 2013.

Dai - Shogun - Great Revolution ©2014 Project-D

Mobile Suit Gundam UC ©SOTSU･SUNRISE