Two pop culture titans are making headlines today, and I'm not talking about Batman and Superman. Netflix and Legendary Television are teaming up to expand the Skull Island and Tomb Raider universes with two anime series. Hot damn! It's almost as if presenting Castlevania as a gripping animated series was a brilliant idea. I'm not saying it paved the way for this announcement, but then again, I totally am.
Skull Island will establish a new chapter in Legendary’s Monsterverse franchise, with the show taking cues from the 2017 Jordan Vogt-Roberts- directed movie Kong: Skull Island. You know what that means, don't you? It means that we're going to shipwreck some unfortunate souls and then let an overwhelming amount of dinosaurs and one world-famous skyscraper-scaler do their worst. At this point, 2021 might as well be labeled The Year of the Kong, seeing as how the kaiju-sized icon is due for another film, Godzilla vs. Kong, on March 31st. It's all Kong all the time, baby, and Hollywood's not going to stop shining a spotlight on the legendary monster until the world runs out of bananas.
Brian Duffield (Underwater, The Babysitter) will write and executive produce the anime series alongside Jacob Robinson who will executive produce through his Tractor Pants studio. Heh, Tractor Pants. Great name. Anyway, the studio in charge of animating the series is … Wait for it … Powerhouse Animation, the company behind Castlevania and Blood of Zeus! See, what did I tell you?
As for Tomb Raider, the anime series will follow the intrepid Lara Croft, the world-famous adventurer at the center of the Square Enix video game franchise. The series will take place after the events of the latest video game reboot trilogy, and feature Lara doing what she does best, solving ancient mysteries whilst arbitrarily destroying priceless pottery without a care in the world. This will mark the first time that the character is getting her very own animated series.
In charge of writing the Tomb Raider anime is Tasha Huo (The Witcher: Blood Origin, Red Sonja), who will executive produce with dj2 Entertainment Founder and CEO Dmitri M. Johnson (Sonic the Hedgehog) as well as Stephan Bugaj and Howard Bliss. Jacob Robinson will also act as an executive producer via Tractor Pants.
What else is there left to say other than my body is ready? Let's go!