The 2016 rendition of the ever-popular dark fantasy "Berserk" is almost upon us and this year's seventh issue of Hakusensha's "Young Animal" magazine is getting fans pumped this Friday by not just announcing the anime's July premiere but the cast and staff behind it as well.
The return of the Kentarou Miura's "Berserk" is a long time coming for fans who have been itching for a new addition for the series. Though technically it's most recent animated form came in 2012-2013 with the "Berserk: The Golden Age Arc" film series, an honest-to-goodness episodic series hasn't been seen since the end of 1997-1998 TV series.
A monumental return requires a stellar voice cast and "Berserk" 2016 aims to please. The cast are as follows as per the Anime News Network:
- Hiroaki Iwanaga as Guts
- Kaoru Mizuhara as Puck
- Yōko Hikasa as Farnese
- Kazuyuki Okitsu as Serpico
- Hiro Shimono as Isidro
- Hiroki Yasumoto as Azan
- Toa Yukinari as Casca
- Takahiro Sakurai as Griffith
- Akio Ohtsuka as Skull Knight
- Unshou Ishizuka as Narrator
The staff behind the series is equally impressive, with many of them contributing to other notable anime series and films. Shin Itagaki is directing the anime, while Makoto Fukami in collaboration with Takashi Yamashita will be supervising the series scripts. Finally, Hisashi Abe will be responsible for character design. Shirō Sagisu will be making a return from the "Golden Age Arc" films to compose the music for the series while Susumu Hirasawa, composer of the 1997 series will also be making a return to produce an insert song titled "Hai yo."
LIDEN FILMS is credited for production, while GEMBA and Millepensee are credited for animation production.
As for the anime itself, the series will run on the WOWOW channel and in MBS TV's "Animeism" programming block. It will, as mentioned before, start on July and run for an undisclosed amount of episodes. The series will be titled "Berserk."
A teaser trailer for the series was released in December.
It's still unclear what parts of the series the new anime will cover, but testimony from Miura in Hakusensha's "Young Animal" magazine in December indicates that the it will depict Guts in his "Black Swordsman" appearance, which is only revealed in parts of the manga that hadn't been seen in the adaptation.
While the animation has been somewhat stagnant, the original manga has been going strong since it made its 1989 debut in "Monthly Animal House" before moving on to "Young Animal" in 1992. The series had gone on hiatus in December, but is slated to make a return "around" this summer. Upon its return, it will run as an irregular series.
To date, "Berserk" has 37 volumes with the 38th slated for June 24.
