News

BLUELOCK Manga Gets 3rd Season Anime, Live-Action Film Adaptation

The "Blue Lock Egoist Fest 2025" event on Sunday revealed that the anime based on Muneyuki Kaneshiro and Yūsuke Nomura's BLUELOCK soccer manga will get a third season, adapting the "Shin Eiyū Taisen" (New Hero Wars) story. The event also revealed the manga's live-action film adaptation slated for release in summer 2026. CREDEUS (live-action Golden Kamuy film) is producing the film and TOHO is distributing. 

The second anime season titled BLUE LOCK vs. U-20 JAPAN debuted in October 2024. The second season had 14 episodes, and "focused on the match between BLUE LOCK and the U-20 National Japan team, in which the survival of the BLUE LOCK project is at stake." Crunchyroll streamed the anime in North America, Central America, South America, Europe, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East, and CIS.   Crunchyroll also streamed an English dub.

New cast members for the second season include:

• Eiji Mikami as Yo Hiori
• Kakeru Hatano as Nijiro Nanase
• Satoshi Hino as Oliver Aiku
• Akihisa Wakayama as Shūto Sendō
• Jun Kasama as Kento Chou
• Gakuto Kajiwara as Teru Kitsunezato
• Taito Ban as Itsuki Wakatsuki
• Kenshō Ono as Haru Hayate
• Yusuke Shirai as Miroku Darai
• Takuya Satō as Kazama Niou
• Shunichi Toki as Teppei Neru
• Chikahiro Kobayashi as Gen Fukaku
• Yūichi Nakamura as Ryusei Shidou

The anime film of Kōta Sannomiya's BLUELOCK -Episode Nagi- spinoff manga premiered in Japan in April 2024. The film sold 337,000 tickets to earn 463 million yen (about US$2.99 million) in its first three days, and ranked at #2 in the Japanese box office in its opening weekend. The film premiered in North America in June 2024. The spinoff manga focuses on Seishirō Nagi before he enters the titular Blue Lock facility. Kodansha USA Publishing is releasing the spinoff manga in print. Crunchyroll is streaming the film.

Kodansha USA Publishing is publishing the original BLUELOCK manga in English digitally, and is also releasing it in print. The company describes the story:

After a disastrous defeat at the 2018 World Cup, Japan's team struggles to regroup. But what's missing? An absolute Ace Striker, who can guide them to the win. The Japan Football Union is hell-bent on creating a striker who hungers for goals and thirsts for victory, and who can be the decisive instrument in turning around a losing match...and to do so, they've gathered 300 of Japan's best and brightest youth players. Who will emerge to lead the team...and will they be able to out-muscle and out-ego everyone who stands in their way?

Kaneshiro and Nomura launched the manga in Kodansha's Weekly Shōnen Magazine in August 2018. The manga won the Best Shōnen Manga award in Kodansha's 45th annual Manga Awards in 2021.

Sources: BLUELOCK anime's X/Twitter account, Comic Natalie