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The Eccentric Family 2 Anime Premieres in April

P.A. Works announced at Comiket 91 on Thursday that its Uchōten Kazoku 2 (The Eccentric Family 2) sequel anime will premiere on April 9 on Tokyo MX, KBS Kyoto, and other channels.

The anime is P.A. Works' first sequel series. Along with Sakura Quest, it will be one of two P.A. Works anime premiering in April.

The first season's main staff members are returning for the sequel. Masayuki Yoshihara is directing the series at P.A. Works, Kōji Kumeta (Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei, Kakushigoto) is designing the characters, and Lantis is handling the music production. Additionally, Kousuke Kawazura is adapting Kumeta's designs for animation and is serving as animation director, and Yūsuke Takeda and Harumi Okamoto are serving as art directors.

The first season's main cast are also returning, including:

• Takahiro Sakurai as Yasaburō Shimogamo, the third son of the family
• Junichi Suwabe as Yaichirō Shimogamo, the eldest son of the family
• Hiroyuki Yoshino as Yajirō Shimogamo, the second son of the family
• Mai Nakahara as Yashirō Shimogamo, the youngest son of the family
• Mamiko Noto as Benten, the bewitchingly beautiful woman

The 2013 anime adapted the original novel of the same name by Tomihiko Morimi (The Tatami Galaxy). The comedy drama is set in Kyoto, where tanuki (shape-shifting raccoon-dogs), tengu (long-nosed goblins of Japanese folklore), and humans intermingle. The story follows the tanuki Shimogamo Yasaburō, the third son of the Shimogamo family who live in the Tadasu no Mori forest of Shimogamo Shrine. One day, Yasaburō's father is eaten as a hot pot by human members of a group known as the "Friday Club." As Yasaburō takes care of his teacher, an old tengu, fights with other tanuki, and plays with a psychic human girl, Yasaburō approaches the truth about his father's death.

The Eccentric Family 2 will adapt the second volume of the original novel series.

The first anime season won the Excellence Award at the 17th Japan Media Arts Festival Awards in 2013. Crunchyroll streamed the anime under the title The Eccentric Family, and NIS America released the series on Blu-ray Disc in January 2015.

Gentosha published Morimi's original Uchōten Kazoku novel in 2010, and then published a sequel novel titled Uchōten Kazoku Nidaime No Kicho in 2015. The original novel has sold more than 360,000 copies.