Nintama Rantarou 2nd Anime Film Announced

The wacky, half-chibi ninjas from Nintama Rantarou will be making another return next year, in a second anime film titled - *take a deep breath* - Gekijouban Anime Nintama Rantarou Ninjutsu Gakuen Zenin Shutsudou! no Dan. This will be the first of two new theatrical adaptations of Soubee Amako's 1986 ninja gag manga Rakudai Ninja Rantarou during 2011, prior to next summer's live-action film directed by Takashi Miike (Crows Zero, Thirteen Assassins, and shamefully Yatterman).



This second Nintama Rantarou anime film is planned for a March 2011 premiere in Japan, and is said to retain the same voice cast as the anime series - which began in 1993 and has been airing ever since, if you can imagine that (it's gone past 1450 episodes this summer!). The previous Nintama Rantarou anime film dates back to 1996, by the way.

The original manga follows the adventures of Rantarou and other ninja apprentices at an elite ninjutsu academy. "The story is set in Japan during the tumultuous Sengoku Jidai (Era of the Warring States). As first-graders, Rantarou and his ninja-in-training friends are called "Nintama" - a contraction of the words "ninja" and "tamago" ("egg")" - as ANN recollects; certainly convenient for my copy-pasting habits.