News

Live-Action Wakako-zake Series Gets 9th Season Debuting on October 1

BS TV Tokyo announced on Friday that the live-action series based on Chie Shinkyū's Wakako-zake manga will get a 12-episode ninth season that will premiere on BS TV Tokyo and BS TV Tokyo 4K on October 1 at 24:00 (effectively October 2 at 12:00 a.m.). The show will stream on the Lemino Premium, Net mo Teletō, and TVer services.

Rina Takeda will again star in the series.

Also starring in the season are Kinuo Yamada, Kenta Kamakari, Wataru Monma, Mizuki Watanabe, Takayuki Sakoi, Shinya Hasegawa, Kōhei Shiotsuka, and Yoshihiro Nozoe.

Shinji Kuma, Shōhei Wakabayashi, and Tarō Kubota return from the previous season as directors. Scriptwriters include Kumiko Asō, Momoka Meriyama, Shinji Kuma, and Shōhei Wakabayashi.

The Wakako-zake cuisine manga follows 26-year old Wakako, who drinks different kinds of alcoholic beverages at bars and restaurants alone every night, searching for her place to belong. In the new television season, Wakako travels to Hokkaido and Fukushima in northern Japan.

Shinkyū started the manga in Coamix's Monthly Comic Zenon magazine in 2011. Media Do released the first volume of the manga digitally in English on several platforms in October 2018. The manga inspired a 12-episode series of three-minute anime shorts, starring Miyuki Sawashiro, that premiered in July 2015. Crunchyroll streamed the anime series as it aired.

The first 12-episode live-action television season based on the manga aired in January-March 2015, and the second and third 12-episode seasons premiered in January 2016 and April 2017, respectively. The fourth season premiered in January 2019, and the fifth season premiered in April 2020 and aired for 12 episodes. The series had its first special in December 2020. The sixth season premiered in January 2022, and the seventh season premiered in July 2023. The eighth season premiered on January 8 earlier this year.

Sources: BS TV Tokyo, Comic Natalie