Pluto Anime's New Trailer Reveals October 26 Debut; More Cast, Staff (Updated)

Netflix announced during its panel at Anime Expo on Saturday that the animated series of Naoki Urasawa's Pluto manga will debut on October 26. The event also revealed the full cast and staff.

© Naoaki Urasawa, Takashi Nagasaki, Osamu Tezuka, Shogakukan, Viz Media

The anime's full staff includes:

• Executive Producers: Masao Maruyama, Taro Maki, Yuji Yamano
• Directed by: Toshio Kawaguchi
• Character Design, Supervising Animation Director: Shigeru Fujita
• Creative Advisor: Naoki Urasawa
• Animation Directors: Kazunori Aoki, Itaru Saito
• CG & SFX Director: Takahiro Miyata
• Art Director: Chikako Shibata
• Cinematography by: Mitsuhiro Sato
• Sound Direction by: Masafumi Mima
• Music by: Yūgo Kanno
• Animation Production by: Studio M2
• Produced by: GENCO

The Japanese cast members are:

• Shinshū Fuji as Gesicht
• Yōko Hikasa as Atom
• Minori Suzuki as Uran
• Hiroki Yasumoto as Mont blanc
• Kōichi Yamadera as North No.2
• Hidenobu Kiuchi as Brando
• Rikiya Koyama as Hercules
• Mamoru Miyano as Epsilon
• Toshihiko Seki as Pluto

The Pluto manga is Urasawa and producer Takashi Nagasaki's seinen drama re-imagining of the world depicted in Osamu Tezuka's manga Astro Boy. The series ran in Shogakukan's Big Comic Original magazine from 2003 to 2009, and it has eight compiled book volumes. The manga has been translated and published in 20 countries including France and the United States. Viz Media, which released the manga in North America, describes the story:

In a distant future where sentient humanoid robots pass for human, someone or something is out to destroy the seven great robots of the world. Europol's top detective Gesicht is assigned to investigate these mysterious robot serial murders - the only catch is that he himself is one of the seven targets.

Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment acquired the film rights from Tezuka Productions for a planned live-action/computer-graphics (CG) hybrid film of Pluto in 2010.

Update: The anime will have eight 60-minute episodes. Sources: Animation Business Journal (Tadashi Sudo), Netflix Japan's Twitter account

Sources: Netflix panel at Anime Expo (Egan Loo), Netflix's YouTube channel