We've all
experienced that immense excitement when a studio confirms the continuation of
our favorite series. However, that initial joy can quickly turn into
frustration as the years go by and production teams don't share a single new
sketch. Although the recent announcement that Youjo Senki II will
finally be released in July 2026 showed us that patience sometimes pays off,
the reality is that the industry is full of anime projects that
were announced in style and then mysteriously disappeared from viewers' radar,
leaving thousands of fans in a state of total uncertainty.
The long
silence of Ufotable and the crisis of Gainax
One of the
most obvious cases of this situation is the anticipated film adaptation
by Katsugeki Touken Ranbu. When the TV series came to an end in
2017, a promotional video was immediately released promising a film that would
continue the story. Nine years later, the information is still completely null.
Although the Ufotable studio briefly included this title in a video of future
projects in February 2026, there is still no real release window.
On the
other hand, the situation of Top or Nerae 3 is even more
worrying. This continuation of the classic series of the late eighties was
announced with great enthusiasm in September 2018, but after the media
bankruptcy of the Gainax studio last year, the survival of this work is a real
mystery and many fear that the project has been quietly shelved.
The long
wait for the return of Chisato and Takina
Desperation
is not exclusive to old franchises. In the summer of 2022, Lycoris
Recoil became an absolute success and a sales phenomenon thanks to the
incredible dynamics of its protagonists. Taking advantage of the big moment,
the production team hosted a special event in February 2023 to confirm that a
new animated project was in development. The problem is that since that day,
details about the format or the central story are conspicuous by their absence.
Although the Lycoris Recoil Friends are thieves of time series
of shorts aired in April 2025, fans know perfectly well that this was a side
project, which means that the real main course is still stuck at some point in
the creative process.
The only
advantage of all this corporate silence is that, in the absence of an official
cancellation, the hope of seeing these productions materialize is still alive.
Knowing that scheduling issues and internal changes in studios often greatly
delay modern productions
