Interest

SoftBank's 1st Live-Action Phone Ad Featuring Sailor Moon, Astroboy, Kenshiro Streamed

The first 30-second ad for SoftBank's series of commercials for its cell phone network depicting several classic anime characters all grown up began streaming on Monday.

Like the previous introductory video, the ad stars Kyoko Koizumi (Tokyo Sonata, Hanging Garden) as Usagi Tsukino at Moon Ribar, an atmospheric rooftop bar where she plays a guitar ballad. The video gives brief glimpses at the bar's patrons and their current lives.

Maruko-chan (Chibi Maruko-chan, played by Suzu Hirose) is shown wiping down a table where she works as a shop assistant, Fist of the North Star's Kenshiro (famous Kabuki actor Ichikawa Ebizō XI) performs his deadly series of punches, Obocchama-kun (played by Shinnosuke Mitsushima) re-enacts a banana gag as a poor, streaming entertainer, Duke "Golgo 13" Tōgō (played by Fumiyo Kohinata) is now the Prime Minister of The Diet, and Astro Boy himself, played by Masato Sakai (Honey and Clover) arrives at the bar at the end of the ad. Comedian Naoki Matayoshi also appears briefly as Joe Yabuki (Ashita no Joe) who now works as a novelist.