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Live-Action Kaiji Actor to Guest-Star in Kaiji Anime
posted on by Crystalyn Hodgkins
Tatsuya Fujiwara (Death Note, Battle Royale), the actor who played the character of Kaiji in the live-action adaptation Nobuyuki Fukumoto's Kaiji gambling action manga will guest star in the last episode of the Kaiji 2 television anime series. Fujiwara will voice one of the series' black-suited men in the series' 26th episode, which is slated to air on September 28 in Japan.
The Kaiji 2 television anime series began airing in Japan in April, three years after the first anime aired. Kaiji 2 is adapting the "Chika Chinchiro" and "Pachinko Numa" stories from the Tobaku Hakairoku Kaiji manga series, which ran from 2000 to 2004.
Fujiwara will again play Kaiji, a gambler 3.49 million yen (about US$36,000) in debt, in the film's sequel, which will open in Japan on November 5. Tōya Satō ( live-action Gokusen, Grave of the Fireflies, and Sexy Voice and Robo) directed both films.
In the first film, actress Yūki Amami (Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, Socrates in Love) plays Rinko Endō, a loan shark (originally a male character in the manga) who convinces Kaiji to board a gambling ship to clear his debt — with his life literally at stake.
Source: Cinema Today
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