Noblesse - Another Popular Webtoon Series Adapted to Anime

The year 2020 is undoubtedly a bad year, to put it lightly. It affected a lot of industries and obviously, the anime industry is one of those. A lot of new anime releases were either put on hold or postponed to next year resulting in great displease of anime fans around the world. But of course, no one can blame the anime companies and studios for that. However, looking at the brighter side, 2020 brought us something new and unique – the adaptation of popular webtoon titles into anime.

The first anime-adapted webtoon released this year is Tower of God, an action and dark fantasy series created by SIU. The said anime was produced by Telecom Animation Film studio launched back in the Winter season. The next anime-adapted webtoon released this year is The God of High School, an action and martial arts series created by Yongje Park. The God of High School, produced by MAPPA Studio, aired its first episode last July 6, 2020, and it is currently airing.

This successive release of the anime adaptation of popular webtoons hyped the fans and expressed their hopes and wishes for their personal webtoon favorites to also receive an anime adaptation. However, many might not remember that there was already an anime adaptation of one of the most popular webtoons way back in 2016.

On February 4, 2016, a 30-minute long OVA adaptation of the WEBTOON series Noblesse, produced by Production I.G., was released. It was titled Noblesse: Awakening and it covered the first 2 arcs of volume one. The staff produced this OVA includes Kenichi Matsuzawa as Director, Shunsuke Tada as Chief Direction, Yoshihiro Ike for Series Composition, Senbon Umishima as Character Desiger, and Akiharu Ishii as Chief Animation Director. Noblesse was launched in the LINE Webtoon platform in Korea in 2007 and globally in 2014, then quickly became one of the biggest titles in the platform.

On August 14, 2020, Crunchyroll announced the debut of another Crunchyroll Original anime adaptation of the WEBTOON series Noblesse written by Jeho Son and illustrated by Kwangsu Lee, but this time a TV anime series. The director of the series is Yasutaka Yamamoto, with Shunsuke Tada as chief director, Sayaka Harada handles the series composition, and the character designs and chief animation supervision is once again handled by Akiharu Ishii. Together with the announcement, they also released a short promotional video for the series which can be watched on their platform.

On September 07, 2020, Crunchyroll released updates and more information about the upcoming series, as well as the airing date of the first episode. They also released a 5-minute preview of the first episode that serves as a sneak peek exclusive for the Crunchyroll premium members together with a new key art.

The synopsis of Crunchyroll is written as: “Raizel awakens from his 820-year slumber.

He holds the special title of Noblesse, a pure-blooded Noble and protector of all other Nobles.

In an attempt to protect Raizel, his servant Frankenstein enrolls him at Ye Ran High School, where Raizel learns the simple and quotidian routines of the human world through his classmates.

However, the Union, a secret society plotting to take over the world,dispatches modified humans and gradually encroaches on Raizel’s life, causing him to wield his mighty power to protect those around him…

After 820 years of intrigue, the secrets behind his slumber are finally revealed, and Raizel’s absolute protection as the Noblesse begins!”

Currently revealed cast includes:
Cadis Etrama di Raizel - Tarusuke Shingaki (Mirio in My Hero Academia)
Frankenstein - Daisuke Hirakawa (Momotaro in Hozuki’s Coolheadedness)
M-21 - Kousuke Onishi (Neinhart in Fairy Tail)
Tashiro Yusuke - Ryota Iwasaki (Inasa in My Hero Academia)
Kase Manabu - Yohei Hamada (Bathin in As Miss Beelzebub Likes it.)

The first episode of Noblesse will air on will air Tuesday, October 6, 2020 at 6:00am PT