CONTINUE Devotes Whole Issue to Mamoru Oshii's Votoms: The Gray Witch
The magazine arrives the day before the film, so Ohta is selling production context and cast access in print while the only other public material is the theatrical release itself.
Key Facts
- CONTINUE SPECIAL Armored Trooper Votoms: Gray Witch goes on sale November 19 from Ohta Publishing at a tentative price of 1,980 yen including tax.
- The issue runs 80 pages in full color in B5 variant format, with ISBN 978-4-7783-4169-5.
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Gray Witch opens nationwide in Japanese theaters on November 20.
- Miyuki Sawashiro plays Ash Vamps and Asami Ando plays Maki Stauffenberg in Armored Trooper Votoms: Gray Witch.
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Gray Witch is a two-part theatrical series produced as a Sunrise 50th anniversary project, with the second part's release timing to be announced.
Reporting from 2 sources: Denfaminicogamer, KAI-YOU.
Ohta Publishing will release CONTINUE SPECIAL Armored Trooper Votoms: Gray Witch on November 19, a single-issue magazine built entirely around Mamoru Oshii's theatrical anime of the same name. The volume runs 80 pages in full color, priced at 1,980 yen including tax, in B5 variant format. It carries a long interview with Oshii, who directs the film, and a talk between Miyuki Sawashiro, who plays Ash Vamps, and Asami Ando, who plays Maki Stauffenberg. Sumire Uesaka, cast as a young maintenance soldier, contributes a feature on her attachment to the Votoms series, and the magazine includes a complete commentary on the original Armored Trooper Votoms. The film opens nationwide in Japan on November 20, one day after the magazine. It is a two-part theatrical series, with the first part arriving on that date and the second part's release timing still to be announced.
The magazine lands one day before the first film opens nationwide on November 20. The film is a Sunrise 50th anniversary project with Ryosuke Takahashi credited as original creator and supervisor, and Kenji Kawai composing the music.
Sumire Uesaka has said she watched "Armored Trooper Votoms: Pailsen Files" in high school, which got her into the appeal of ATs. She also called Votoms her favorite anime of her life. Mamoru Oshii said at the production announcement that he was a huge fan of the original Votoms, a work he admired and wanted to make something like someday.
The story is set at the end of the Hundred Years War, which the TV series also depicted. It follows Ash Vamps, an AT pilot called a "witch" for surviving and returning from any battlefield, and Maki Stauffenberg, a female officer investigating her secret. The original Armored Trooper Votoms aired from 1983, produced by Sunrise with Ryosuke Takahashi as original creator and director, and is known for ATs shown as mass-produced weapons that soldiers abandon, with a realistic portrayal set against war. OVAs and side stories have continued since.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 2 cited sources below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.