Good Smile
Company is known for making wallet-emptying figures, but now it wants to do
something bigger: a legacy. The company just revealed the details of Dandivine,
its bid to revive the Reiwa-era robot anime, and the project comes with a team
that isn't exactly improvised. Premiere confirmed for October 2026.
Dandivine isn't just an anime: it's the
first entry in the God of Combined Series initiative, a
long-term plan that calls for releasing a new series of combined robots every
year. The company's president, Takanori Aki, was clear about this:
development for the 2027 and 2028 projects is already underway, and each
delivery will have its own interpretation of the combined robot concept. It's
the most serious bet a figure company has made to build a mecha franchise from
scratch in a long time.
The anime
is being produced by LIDENFILMS and Kayac Animation in
association with Aniplex, Takara Tomy, and Toei.
The story begins twenty years after the legendary combined robot Dandivine
defeated the mysterious Aposdolls. In the present, the robot is just a
nostalgic memory, and the toy company that built its popularity is on the verge
of collapse for having relied too much on that past success. When the Aposdolls
reappear in Tokyo, Gekiha Shijima, a high school student and
grandson of the company's president, is drawn into the conflict and ends up
piloting Dandivine again.
A detail
that screenwriter Toshiki Inoue highlighted during the
announcement: Gekiha is not the typical mecha protagonist destined to become a
hero. He intentionally designed him as an ordinary, graceless boy, and that
characteristic doesn't change. According to Inoue, that's precisely the
interesting thing about the character. For those who don't know: Inoue has been
writing for the tokusatsu genre for decades, with credits on series such
as Kamen Rider Agito and Kamen Rider W, which
gives a very particular approach to the narrative of unconventional heroes.
The opening
will be in charge of Takanori Nishikawa, known as
T.M.Revolution, who stated that he wants to share the culture of Japanese robot
anime with the world through this song. In parallel, a manga adaptation was
announced that will begin serialization in Monthly Dengeki Daioh with
art by TOGUCHI. The toy line will be split between Good Smile
Company and Takara Tomy, with products under the names THE合体 DX Dandivine, MODEROID Dandivine
Action Model and Takara Tomy's TOYRISE line.
The voice cast
- Takuma Terashima as Gekiha Shijima (Shiroe
in Log Horizon and Shiki Granbell in Edens Zero).
- Haruka Shiraishi as Akane Kusumi (Asirpa
in Golden Kamuy and Yuri Honjou in High-Rise
Invasion).
- Saya
Aizawa as Kirei Shijima
Cao Yi is directing, with Toshiki
Inoue handling the series composition and scripts. The original
character design is by Majiro, with adaptation for animation
by robin. The mecha designs are the work of An from
GOD BRAVE STUDIO, and Yoshikazu Iwanami is the sound director.
About
Dandivine
Dandivine —or Beast King Warrior
God Dandivine in its full title— is an original production of Good
Smile Company, the company behind some of the most popular collectible
figure lines on the market, including Nendoroids and figures from the Scale
line. With this project, the company takes an unusual step: instead of adapting
an existing IP, it is building a new franchise from scratch, with the anime and
toy line developed in parallel from the planning stage. The model is
reminiscent of the great mecha projects of the 70s and 80s, where the toy and
anime were inseparable, and that is precisely the nostalgia that God of
Combined Series wants to capitalize on for the new generations.
