A new anime series based on the Blade Runner franchise is coming to the Toonami block of Adult Swim.
The show’s called Blade Runner: Black Lotus and it’s set after the events in the anime short Blade Runner: Black Out 2022 but before the events in the Blade Runner 2049 movie. Instead of focusing on the private detective angle, Black Lotus is told from the perspective of the replicants.
The show is the result of a partnership between Adult Swim and Alcon Entertainment. It has 13 episodes and will feature familiar characters from the series. You can check out new key visuals for the show below:
The original Blade Runner movie, starring Harrison Ford, was a hit when it came out in 1982. It’s set in a dystopian, neon future where synthetic humans named replicants are manufactured by an evil entity called the Tyrell Corporation. It’s based on a Philip K. Dick short story called Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
The anime’s style is sleek and modern looking, with the same drippy, noir feel of the original. It stars (English/Japanese) Jessica Henwick/Arisa Shida as main character Elle, Will Yun Lee/Shinshu Fuji as junkyard owner Joseph and Samira Wiley/Takako Honda as a young LAPD recruit.
Details of the plot are fairly vague so far, but we do know that Elle wants revenge and to “kill them all” for something that happened to her, but we don’t know exactly what that is. Perhaps we can figure out a few more hints from the opening to the show that Crunchyroll just shared as well.
Blade Runner: Black Lotus is directed by Shinji Aramaki and Kenji Kamiyama. Shinichiro Watanabe, famous anime director behind Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo, serves as a creative producer.
The show will air on Adult Swim’s Toonami block with an English dub and on Crunchyroll in Japanese with subtitles. Pop singer Alessia Cara performs the opening song Feel You Now.
The show premieres at midnight on November 13 on both platforms.