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Nikkan Sports: Leiji Matsumoto Makes Ozuma TV Anime
posted on by Egan Loo
The Nikkan Sports newspaper is reporting on Thursday that "an illusive unreleased scenario" by 73-year-old manga and anime creator Leiji Matsumoto (Space Pirate Captain Harlock, Space Battleship Yamato, Galaxy Express 999) has been "unearthed," and will finally be made into a television anime Project Three decades later. The title of the project is Ozuma, and it is set on a future Earth that has gone to ruins in a sea of sand.
The six-episode project will premiere on March 16 and run every Friday at midnight as the 20th anniversary project of the WOWOW television channel.
Matsumoto had created the plot in the 1980s, but it has not been animated until now. When he received a fervent pitch to finally adapt the project into anime to mark WOWOW's 20th anniversary, he gave his seal of approval.
Matsumoto commented that people all over the world contributed to the relief efforts during the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake (Higashi Nihon Daishinsai) disaster, and added that it is the responsibility of humanity to join forces and help each other.
Update: Matsumoto revealed last month that he is planning a Cosmo Super Dreadnought Mahoroba film for 2013. Matsumoto had also revealed plans for a new Zero Desigze anime and a live-action Galaxy Express 999 project earlier last year, but neither has been released yet.
The 1974-1975 space opera classic Space Battleship Yamato is being remade as this year's Space Battleship Yamato 2199 television series with special theater screenings by a new staff and cast. Toei Animation produced a 2010 computer-animated pilot for a proposed remake of the Space Pirate Captain Harlock anime, and it had initially planned for a full remake this year before listing a new tentative date of 2013.
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