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Chou: "Blade Runner" has a different weight to it,
just because of its legacy and its impact on anime in general.
♪♪
"Blade Runner" presented a future where it was very gritty
and it's real world.
Dystopian, dark, noir -- all of these things.
That whole vision actually impacted
this whole genre of Japanese anime called cyberpunk.
A lot of times we call it cool anime,
but it's a cyberpunk anime that people love.
And when you look at a title like "Akira"
and "Ghost in the Shell," which made a huge mark,
and a lot of the sci-fi animated came after that,
you know, "Cowboy Bebop" or any of the titles
that you can think of that takes place in the future,
and where did that come from? It came from "Blade Runner."
Woman:
I actually started producing anime
by getting involved in a project called "Animatrix,"
which was an anime version of "Matrix."
I thought, "Because 'Matrix' was so successful in adapting
a live-action -- successful live-action property into anime,
Okay, what can be the next one?"
And the one that came up, obviously, was "Blade Runner."
So I've been after it for a long time,
and -- probably around 15 years now.
I actually started going in this project about three years ago,
and that's because of the short that we produced
for "Blade Runner 2049" called "Blade Runner: Black Out."
It had such a phenomenal reaction
that, I think, proved to everybody
that there was a potential in this.
And I was just hoping and praying that please, please,
please let this get turned into a series.
Hey! You lost?
I need to see what's inside.
How do I get it open?
You can't.
When it comes to this "Blade Runner" series,
this is actually a full CG animation production --
motion capture with human actors enhanced by human animators.
But at the same time, it's going to look different,
it's gonna feel different.
"Blade Runner" has to kind of live on its own.
What we're trying not to do
is to decide what the CG anime look is
and try to fit everything into it.
We needed to define what "Blade Runner" anime should look like.
Another thing that we thought was very important
for "Blade Runner" is that lighting,
because lighting and background,
that's just huge in "Blade Runner."
That's a character unto itself.
Visually speaking, we needed to get that right.
But if you're doing CG, okay, what can CG do that no other --
you know, that hand-drawn animation can't do?
It's probably how the camera gets handled,
how the action gets portrayed,
you know, a lot of these advantages
that you can actually utilize.
After we put it all together,
we need to arrive at a place where,
"Oh, yeah, you guys did justice
to the 'Blade Runner' universe."
We want to make sure we get it right.
And everybody, I think, has that sense of duty
by being part of this universe
and by being allowed to play in this universe.
It's an opportunity that's not given so easily.
So even though I've been after it for 15 years,
I don't take it for granted.
I just think it's a miracle that it happened.
So I hope that we all deliver at the end of the day
for the fans of the franchise
and for the newcomers to the franchise.
Look up and to the left.
I still can't believe that I'm doing it.
♪ I can feel ♪
♪ Feel you now ♪
♪ I can feel you now ♪