Rooster Teeth’s hit anime-inspired series has come full circle and inspired an anime produced in Japan: BANDAI NAMCO Arts, Good Smile Company and Rooster Teeth announced RWBY: Ice Queendom. Inspired by global hit RWBY, the new series will premiere on Japanese television, with subtitled and dubbed versions available the same day to U.S. audiences on Crunchyroll and Rooster Teeth FIRST. New episodes will premiere weekly.
RWBY: Ice Queendom presents a new RWBY story in beautiful 2D anime visuals, establishing the storyworld before taking viewers on a brand new adventure never seen before. The official trailer is available to watch now.
RWBY imagines a world filled with horrific monsters bent on death and destruction, and humanity’s only hope is dependent upon powerful Huntsmen and Huntresses. Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long are four such Huntresses in training whose journeys will take them far past the grounds of their school, Beacon Academy. Though each may be powerful on their own, these four girls must overcome dark forces and work as a team if they truly hope to become the next generation of Remnant’s protectors.
“It’s difficult to put into words just how honored and thrilled we are to see the show that we imagined into the world inspire a Japanese anime,” said RWBY‘s showrunner, Kerry Shawcross. “I’ve been a fan of anime all my life, so to see RWBY in this new medium is surreal. I can’t wait for fans to see this show, I think it’s going to blow them away.”
RWBY: Ice Queendom stars Saori Hayami as Ruby Rose, Yoko Hikasa as Weiss Schnee, Yu Shimamura as Blake Belladonna and Ami Koshimizu as Yang Xiao Long. The English dubbed version will star the original cast of RWBY: Lindsay Jones as Ruby Rose, Kara Eberle as Weiss Schnee, Arryn Zech as Blake Belladonna and Barbara Dunkelman as Yang Xiao Long.
The core creative team for the new anime is led by Gen Urobuchi (NITRO PLUS, Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Fate/Zero), Tow Ubukata (Mardock Scramble, Tenchi: The Samurai Astronomer, Fafner in the Azure), huke (Black Rock Shooter, chitocerium, Steins;Gate) and Toshimasa Suzuki (Lagrange: The Flower of Rin-ne, Fafner in the Azure: Heaven and Earth), with additional collaboration from Rooster Teeth’s Kerry Shawcross, Eddy Rivas and Erin Winn. The series is produced by BANDAI NAMCO Arts Inc., Good Smile Company, SHAFT, Warner Bros. Japan, KLab Inc. and Rooster Teeth, animated by Studio SHAFT (Monogatari Series, Puella Magi Madoka Magica).
Created by the late Monty Oum (Red vs. Blue), RWBY is one of Rooster Teeth’s most beloved, viewed, and shared series. As the first western-produced anime series to be distributed in Japan, RWBY episodes have accumulated more than 300 million views since the series premiered in 2013. RWBY has a global audience, and has been licensed to create video games, comic books, manga, young adult novels, collectible figures and more.
