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BLUELOCK -Episode Nagi- Film Reveals Chiaki Kobayashi as Ranze Kurona
posted on by Crystalyn Hodgkins
The official website for the anime film of Kōta Sannomiya's BLUELOCK -Episode Nagi- spinoff of Muneyuki Kaneshiro and Yūsuke Nomura's Blue Lock soccer manga revealed a new cast member on Saturday. Chiaki Kobayashi voices the character Ranze Kurona.
BLUELOCK -Episode Nagi- opened in Japan on April 19, and is also screening in IMAX, MX4D, and 4DX. The film sold 337,000 tickets to earn 463 million yen (about US$2.99 million) in its first three days, and ranked at #2 in the Japanese box office in its opening weekend. The film has earned a cumulative total of 1,230,859,360 yen (about US$7.94 million) as of last May 5.
The film features returning cast and staff members. The television anime's assistant director Shunsuke Ishikawa is directing the film at 8-Bit. Taku Kishimoto (Haikyu!!, Silver Spoon, 2019 Fruits Basket) is supervising and writing the series scripts, and the manga's Kaneshiro is supervising the story. Nomura is credited as the character designer. Jun Murayama is composing the music.
Nissy and SKY-HI perform the theme song "Stormy." Takahiro Nishijima is a member of the group AAA and does solo work under the name Nissy. Mitsuhiro Hidaka is also part of the band and uses the name SKY-HI for his solo work.
The spinoff manga focuses on Seishirō Nagi before he enters the titular Blue Lock facility. Kodansha USA Publishing announced in October it will start releasing the spinoff manga in print in fall 2024.
Kodansha USA Publishing is releasing the original Blue Lock manga in English digitally, and is also releasing it in print. Kaneshiro and Nomura launched the manga in Weekly Shōnen Magazine in August 2018.
The BLUELOCK TV anime premiered in Japan in October 2022. Crunchyroll streamed the series as it aired, and streamed an English dub. The anime is getting a second season that will premiere in October.
Sources: BLUELOCK -Episode Nagi- film's website, Comic Natalie
