Two New Rurouni Kenshin Movies Starring Takeru Satoh Announced

The successful movies series staring the Kamen Rider Den-O actor will have two more films next year.

It was revealed earlier this week that two new films are scheduled to go into production to adapt the final chapters of Nobuhiro Watsuki’s Rurouni Kenshin manga for release in summer of 2020. As of this article, the individual titles of each of the two movies have yet to be announced.

The report states that actor Takeru Satoh will reprise his role as the film’s lead, Himura Kenshin. Satoh commented that he always puts all of his effort into his projects and that he has a special feeling about these new films.

Otomo Keishi, who is returning to direct the next two films states that the reasons behind the five year gap between the previous trilogy and these new films is due to the need to prepare a scenario that is better than the previous movies and to find a new cast that everyone agrees with, and also to put distance between the memories of how hard filming was on those previous movies.

The plot of the two new movies is said to cover in more detail the story of how Kenshin received his trademark cross-shaped scar, which was briefly touched upon in the first movie. Along with that development will come the revelation of a mysterious weapons merchant that supplied Makoto Shishio with his weapons through mainland China, hinted to be Kenshin’s final rival from the manga, Enishi Yukishiro.

The first three movies, which were released between 2012 and 2014, went on to gross 12.5 billion yen at the Japanese box office. In 2016, the films were released by Funimation in the United States as Rurouni Kenshin: Origins, Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno and Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends.

In addition to the Rurouni Kenshin trilogy, fans of tokusatsu know Satoh best as the main character Ryotaro Nogami in 2007’s Kamen Rider Den-O. He has since gone on to become a successful actor, appearing in several live action movies such as BECK, Inuyashiki and Bakuman to name a few. Satoh recently made a surprise return to the franchise in 2018 with Kamen Rider Zi-O‘s winter movie, Kamen Rider Heisei Generations FOREVER.

Source: Mantan Web