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Funimation to Stream Live-Action Prison School Drama
posted on by Karen Ressler
Funimation Entertainment announced on Monday that it will begin streaming the live-action Prison School TV series beginning with the first two episodes on November 3 at 12:11 p.m. EDT. New episodes will launch on Tuesdays at 11:11 a.m. EDT.
Funimation accompanied the announcement with an English-subtitled trailer. The official website for the drama streamed the video without English subtitles earlier this month. The video features rock band Good on the Reel's theme song "Searchlight."
The series premiered in Japan on MBS on October 25 at 24:50 (effectively on October 26 at 12:50 a.m.), and then on TBS on October 27 at 25:11. Noboru Iguchi (The Machine Girl, Nuigurumaa Z) is directing the late-night series at the production studio ROBOT.
The show's cast includes:
Taishi Nakagawa (Minami-kun no Koibito ~my little lover) stars as the male lead Kiyoshi
Hirona Yamazaki (live-action As the Gods Will, Orange) plays Mari Kurihara, the underground student council president who brings together the female students with beauty and power
Aoi Morikawa (Fatal Frame, Sprout) plays Hana Midorikawa, the underground student council's secretary
Asana Mamoru (Garo: Makai no Hana, Million Arthur, Ghost in the Shell Arise stage play) plays Meiko Shiraki, "the underground student council vice president who wields a whip on the boys and has jiggling dynamite boobs."
Tokio Emoto (Garo: Makai no Hana, Shinya Shokudō movie) plays Takehito "Gakuto" Morokuzu
Masato Yano (2012 GTO, Legal High) plays Shingo Wakamoto
Comedian Galigaligalixon plays Reiji "Andre" Andō
Former kickboxer Dyki (Daiki Miyagi) plays Jōji "Joe" Nezu
Masahiro Takashima (live-action Bloody Monday, Nobunaga Concerto) plays the Hachimitsu Academy Chairman
Rena Takeda (live-action Assassination Classroom) plays Chiyo, who harbors feelings for Kiyoshi
Yūko Araki (Aoi Tori, Kamen Rider Wizard) plays Anzu, who harbors feelings for Shingo
North American publisher Yen Press prints the Akira Hiramoto's original manga in North America, and it describes the series:
Hachimitsu Private Academy was a revered and elite all-girls' boarding school on the outskirts of Tokyo...once upon a time. But with the new school year comes a revision to school policy: Boys are to be admitted into the student body for the first time ever. But on his first day at Hachimitsu, Kiyoshi Fujino discovers that he's one of only five boys enrolled at the school. Their numbers overwhelmed by the thousand girls in the student body, is it heaven or hell that awaits these five (un)fortunates?!
Hiramoto launched the manga in Kodansha's Young Magazine in February 2011, and it has 6 million copies in print. The 18th volume shipped on August 6. The manga won the Best General Manga award alongside Yūji Moritaka and Keiji Adachi's Gurazeni manga at Kodansha's 37th Annual Manga Awards last year.
The manga also inspired a 12-episode television anime, and Funimation streamed the anime as it aired.
