Shopping Guide
A Kickstarter has launched for the newest animation by Creative Intelligence Art (CIA) called Under the Dog . Their projected goal is $580,000.
The story takes place in Tokyo Bayside Special District five years after a terrorist attack at the 2020 Summer Olympics. The main characters are an international group of chosen boys and girls whose parents, family, and classmates have been kidnapped. If they die, their family will die too. If they fail, their family will die. And if they run away, their family will die. In such a situation where they are driven into a corner, the main characters frantically continue fighting to try and find an exit - to try and live. (Excerpted from a comment made in the Kickstarter PR video.)
The staff working on the anime is a truly remarkable lineup. Directing is Masahiro Ando, a talented creator who was in charge of the original art on Neon Genesis Evangelion and the storyboards on Ghost in the Shell and who directed Hanasaku Iroha. In charge of the character and mecha designs is Yusuke Kozaki who worked as character designer on the Nintendo game Fire Emblem: Awakening. Producer Hiroaki Yura is the founding member of CIA and has a wide range of experience that includes working on The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya and Steins;Gate. Yura also participated in a Kickstarter last year for the game Project Phoenix.
In the PR video available on the anime’s Kickstarter page, each member of the staff talks about his feelings on the anime. Original writer Jiro Ishii began writing the story to Under the Dog in October 1997. Ishii commented that he arranged the content of the story so that it would fit into 26-minute episodes (two seasons). Animation producer Muneki Ogasawara declared his enthusiasm for the project by saying, “We want to create something that [viewers] will think is genuinely entertaining.”
Just what path will the characters take in the story? The future of this anime relies on the results of its Kickstarter campaign.
© 2014 Creative Intelligence Arts, Inc.
© 2014 Jiro Ishii
© 2014 Yusuke Kozaki
© 2014 Hiroaki Yura. All rights reserved.
This is a Tokyo Otaku Mode original article.
