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The Dinner Table Detective Anime Adds Kunitachi City Mascots

The official website for the television anime of Tokuya Higashigawa's The Dinner Table Detective (Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de) novel series announced on Monday its collaboration with the city of Kunitachi, which is the setting of the story. As part of the collaboration, the city's real-life mascots Kuninyan and Yaho Rangers will appear in the anime, and the anime's staff revealed the mascots' cast:

Yui Horie as Kuninyan

Satoshi Nakao as Yaho Ranger Red

Taichi Takeda as Yaho Ranger Blue

Kōsuke Echigoya as Yaho Ranger Yellow

The former Kunitachi Station building, which is now a historical landmark, will display advertising banners of the anime for about a month starting on Tuesday, and fans can take selfies with a panel featuring the anime's art inside the building during that time.

The novels take place in Kunitachi in Tokyo, where Reiko Hōshō, daughter of the owner of the world-famous Hōshō Group, has become a rookie detective. Her boss is Inspector Kazamatsuri, the son of the owner of Kazamatsuri Motors. The two work to solve difficult cases. When tackling her cases, Reiko always consults her butler and driver Kageyama, who spouts harsh language insulting Reiko but always brilliantly manages to solve the case.

The anime stars Kana Hanazawa as Reiko Hōshō, Yūki Kaji as Kageyama, and Mamoru Miyano as Kazamatsuri.

Mitsuyuki Masuhara (Ace of Diamond, Polar Bear's Café) is directing the anime at Madhouse. Mariko Kunisawa (Ascendance of a Bookworm first three seasons, Hatsukoi Limited) is overseeing the series scripts, Izumi Kawada (key animator for Akame ga KILL!, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind) is the animation character designer, and Takeshi Hama (Magical Sempai, MAOYU) is composing the music. BILLY BOO will perform the ending theme song "Rhapsody."

Additional staff includes:

• Art Setting: Kyōko Yauchi, Masako Takayama, Tomoyasu Fujise
• Art Director: Hiromasa Ogura
• Color Key Artist: Harue Ono
• 3D CG Director: Hayato Aragaki
• Compositing Director of Photography: Hiroshi Inoue
• Efects Director: Kumiko Taniguchi
• Editing: Mariko Tsukatsune
• Sound Director: Yōji Shimizu

Manga creator Oreko Tachibana (Firefly Wedding, Promise Cinderella) is designing the original characters for the anime.

The anime will premiere in Fuji TV's Noitamina programming block on April 4 at 11:30 p.m. (10:30 a.m. EDT), and it will also run on the AT-X channel. (Noitamina currently airs at 12:55 a.m., but it is changing its timeslot this spring.) The anime will begin streaming on Amazon Prime Video on April 5 at 12:00 p.m. (April 4 at 11:00 p.m. EDT).

The story has previously inspired a stage play, a live-action series in 2011, live-action specials in 2012 and 2013, and a live-action film in 2013.

The story debuted in 2007, and Shogakukan published three novels in 2010, 2011, and 2012. A "Best" version novel released in 2019, and two Shin Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de novels released in March 2021 and September 18. Yūsuke Nakamura provided illustrations for the Shin Nazotoki wa Dinner no Ato de novels.

Sources: The Dinner Table Detective anime's website, Comic Natalie