In recent years, Netflix has invested heavily to stake its claim on the anime market. They’ve produced hit after hit with runaway successes like Castlevania, Voltron: The Legendary Defender, and a trilogy of Godzilla films over the last half a decade, with plenty of other potential heavy hitters like Resident Evil and Pacific Rim: The Black on the way later this year. Now they’ve announced two more anime adaptations that fans will go bananas for (well, one of them is anyway)!
As part of a recently announced partnership with Legendary Television, Netflix is developing new anime series based on both the worlds of Kong: Skull Island and the Tomb Raider video game franchise!
The series themed around Kong: Skull Island is simply titled Skull Island and takes place in the Legendary Pictures Monsterverse! That means the series is also sharing a world with one of this year’s most anticipated blockbuster feature films, Godzilla Vs. Kong; though how strong of a connection this animated series may have to the live-action films is unclear.
The Skull Island anime series will take us back to the titular island last seen in Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ Kong: Skull Island (2017), which is home to Kong and a myriad of other horrifying creatures. While we don’t know whether the series is set closer in the timeline to Kong: Skull Island (set in the 1970s) or Godzilla Vs Kong (set in modern day), what we do know is that Skull Island will follow a group of shipwrecked characters who are trying to survive whatever the island throws at them while searching for a way off the island. If the events of the 2017 film are any indication of what they’ll run, this band of castaways is in for the fight of their lives!
The new Kong themed anime is coming from the Powerhouse Animation studio, who are also behind Netflix’s critically acclaimed Castlevania series as well as the series Blood Of Zeus. This should give viewers an idea of what to expect for the look and feel of the show.
No voice actors have been announced yet. Depending on where in the Monsterverse timeline the series is set, perhaps we might see a return of some of the surviving characters from Kong: Skull Island or from Godzilla (2014)? If it’s set in the past, here’s hoping we see Ken Watanabe show up!
Meanwhile, on the Tomb Raider side of things, video game fans will be very excited to hear that Lara Croft is set to star in her very own anime series! This new anime is expected to follow the recent series of video games rather than the current live-action film series. This makes sense as the film series was only just relaunched in 2018 with Alicia Vikander in the lead role. The sequel recently added Lovecraft Country‘s Misha Green as the writer for the project, but it is still fairly early in development. The game series, however, just concluded a trilogy of stories with 2018’s Shadow Of The Tomb Raider. The new Netflix series is set to pick up with Lara Croft following the events of that game and continuing her story.
Currently, there is very little information available for this project, but as it is the first-ever Tomb Raider television series, and fans will most likely be watching with great interest to see how it develops. Sadly, we do not yet know who will be voicing our lead adventurer, Lara Croft, in the series or if any of the game series supporting cast will be making an appearance. An animation studio for this project has yet to be confirmed by Netflix.
Netflix’s Tomb Raider anime will be executive produced by Tasha Huo, who will also take on writing duties for the series. Huo recently worked on writing Netflix’s upcoming The Witcher spinoff, The Witcher: Blood Origin, so it seems the company has a lot of faith in their writing abilities.
No release dates have currently been set for Netflix’s new original anime series for Skull Island or Tomb Raider, although it is expected we may see them as soon as 2022.
Are you excited for these new original anime series that expand these pre-existing corners of popular culture? What other properties do you think would be cool to see adapted into anime? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below and be sure to stick around Geek Anything for all the latest updates on your favorite film series!
