Interest
Dogo Onsen Bath House PR Anime Releases 2nd Episode
posted on by Kim Morrissy
The Dogo Onsen hot spring bathhouse collaboration anime with Osamu Tezuka's Phoenix released its second episode on Saturday. The anime is part of a revitalization project for the Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture bathhouse that began in January last year.
The episode shows two gods Ōoku Ninushi (played Takeshi Tsuruno) and Sukuna Hikona (played by Suzuko Mimori) helping to build the bathhouse. Time then fast forwards to the Meiji era, where the first Dogo Yunomachi mayor Isaniwa Yukiya (also played by Takeshi Tsuruno) decides to refurbish the bathhouse in order to make the area into a resort. Two literary figures Masaoka Shiki (played by Jun Fukuyama) and Natsume Sōseki (played by Shinnosuke Tachibana) visit the bathhouse after its refurbishment. There, they encounter the Phoenix (played by Nana Mizuki). Tomochika plays Madonna and the narrator.
The prologue and first episode were released in May last year. The third episode will cover the modern day and future, and is scheduled for mid-2020. The story follows those who have watched over the bathhouse since the age of gods traveling through time to the modern day.
The anime was produced by Tezuka Productions. It was storyboarded and directed by Fumihiro Yoshimura (Black Jack). The screenplay was handled by Shōichirō Masumoto (Yamishibai: Japanese Ghost Stories) and Taisuke Nishimura. The character designer and chief animation director was Shinji Seya (Black Jack: Child from the Sky), and the music composer was Yuuji Nomi (Phoenix).
Viz Media published the Phoenix manga in North America, and it describes the series:
Considered by many the peak of Osamu Tezuka's artistic achievement and called his "life's work" by the author, Phoenix is made up of twelve complex stories linked by the presence of the mythical bird, an immortal guardian of the universal life force. Read in order, the separate stories jump across time, alternating between a distant future and a distant past, converging on the present, with characters from one story being reincarnated in another.
The manga has inspired a series of anime film and OVA adaptations from 1978 to 1987, each adapting a different story in the manga. The manga also inspired a 2004 television anime.
Pony Canyon has been livestreaming a view of the Dogo Onsen on YouTube since March last year.
Source: Comic Natalie
