News
The Pillows Return to Provide Music for FLCL: Grunge, FLCL: Shoegaze Anime
posted on by Adriana Hazra
Production I.G. USA announced at its industry panel at Anime Expo on Friday that The Pillows will be providing music for the FLCL: Grunge anime and the FLCL: Shoegaze anime, two new seasons of the FLCL anime. The band's vocalist Sawao Yamanaka made a statement to fans. Yamanaka stated whereas the original FLCL theme song focused on Naoya's identity, the new theme song will center on the new characters.
Hitoshi Takekiyo is directing FLCL: Grunge at MontBlanc Pictures. The season will premiere in 2023. The CGI anime will center on three teenagers who graduated and have started working. The anime will have a theme of the feeling of being an adult.
Yutaka Uemura (FLCL Alternative) is directing FLCL: Shoegaze at Production I.G and NUT. The anime will take place 10 years after FLCL Alternative and will center on a high school boy and girl.
Both anime are currently in production.
Jason DeMarco, creative director of Toonami and senior vice president of action and anime for WarnerMedia, is the executive producer and Production I.G. USA's Maki Terashima-Furuta (FLCL Alternative, Fena: Pirate Princess) is the producer for both seasons.
The original FLCL OVA inspired two sequels, FLCL Alternative and FLCL Progressive, in 2018. FLCL Progressive's English-dubbed version premiered on Adult Swim's Toonami block in June 2018. The English dub of FLCL Alternative debuted on Toonami in September 2018. Both anime debuted as theatrical screenings in Japan in September 2018, and a Blu-ray Disc box set with both anime shipped in Japan in October 2018.
The six-episode FLCL OVA shipped in Japan in 2000-2001. Synch-Point and later Funimation have released the anime in North America. The anime aired on the Adult Swim block in 2003.
The original anime was the first directorial effort from Kazuya Tsurumaki, who served as assistant director on the Neon Genesis Evangelion television anime and would go on to direct the new Evangelion films. Production I.G noted that the dubbed versions of the anime have been popular overseas, particularly in North America where it ran on television. Kadokawa Shoten's Kadokawa Sneaker Bunko novelized the story, and Kodansha's Monthly Magazine Z adapted the story into manga as the anime was being released. It won third place in Canada's Fantasia Film Festival in 2003.
Sources: Email correspondence, Production I.G. USA Panel (Kalai Chik)
