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Blade Runner: Black Lotus Anime Reveals English/Japanese Casts

Crunchyroll and Adult Swim announced on Wednesday the English and Japanese casts for the Blade Runner: Black Lotus anime. The cast includes (English/Japanese):

• Jessica Henwick/Arisa Shida as Elle, a female replicant created for a secret and unknown purpose
• Will Yun Lee/Shinshū Fuji as Joseph, a mysterious figure who owns a spare parts junkyard in Los Angeles
• Samira Wiley/Takako Honda as Alani Davis, a fresh LAPD recruit
• Brian Cox/Takaya Hashi as Niander Wallace Sr, founder and CEO of the Wallace Corporation
• Wes Bentley/Takehito Koyasu as Niander Wallace Jr, a brilliant scientist working for his father
• Josh Duhamel/Taiten Kusunoki as Marlowe, a deadly Blade Runner
• Peyton List/Yoshiko Sakakibara as Josephine Grant, the wife of the police chief
• Stephen Root/Hochu Otsuka as Earl Grant, Police Chief of the LAPD
• Barkhad Abdi/Takayuki Kinba as Doc Badger, a black market dealer
• Gregg Henry/Masane Tsukayama as Senator Bannister, a politician with strong feelings on replicant production.
• Henry Czerny/Akio Nojima as Doctor M, a brilliant doctor and professor of medicine
• Jason Spisak/Kazuki Yao as Hooper, a journalist in the pocket of the Wallace Corporation

The anime is getting a first look at an online panel during the Comic-Con@Home 2021 virutal event on July 23 on 8:00 p.m. EDT. The panel will feature directors Shinji Aramaki and Kenji Kamiyama, executive producer Joseph Chou, voice director Wes Gleason, voice actress Jessica Henwick (Elle), and co-creator of Toonami and senior vice-president and creative director for Adult Swim Jason DeMarco.

Crunchyroll and Adult Swim are partnering with Alcon Entertainment to produce the 13-episode television anime series. The anime is based on Blade Runner 2049, the sequel to the 1982 Blade Runner film.

Aramaki (Ultraman, Appleseed) and Kamiyama (Ultraman, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex) are directing all the episodes at Sola Digital Arts. Both directors previously worked together on Ultraman and Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045. Shinichiro Watanabe (Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo) is a creative producer on the series.

The series' story will take place in 2032, between the two films, and will include some familiar characters.

Adult Swim will have worldwide distribution rights to an English-dubbed version of the show outside of Asia, and will air the anime in the United States on its Toonami block. Crunchyroll will stream the anime worldwide. The anime is scheduled to premiere this fall on Adult Swim in Canada. Directors Aramaki and Kamiyama had revealed in an interview in July 2020 that the anime would debut in 2021.

Andrew Kosove, Broderick Johnson, Laura Lancaster, and Al-Francis Cuenca of Alcon Entertainment are executive producers on the project along with Sola Digital Arts' Joseph Chou. Alcon executive Ben Roberts is serving as co-executive producer, and Production I.G's Mitsuhisa Ishikawa is a production adviser.

Crunchyroll previously streamed the "Blade Runner: Black Out 2022" anime short in September 2017, shortly before the debut of Blade Runner 2049. Watanabe directed the anime short at Cygames Pictures, Shukou Murase (Halo Legends, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing) served as character designer and animation director, and Flying Lotus composed the music.

The original film from director Ridley Scott and starring Harrison Ford is based on Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? novel. The Blade Runner 2049 sequel debuted in October 2017.

Source: Email correspondence