One of the most popular shonen action series of 2020 was Jujutsu Kaisen. It was so popular that it took home the prize for Anime of the Year at the latest Crunchyroll Awards. With that much positive buzz behind it, it's absolutely no wonder why it got a movie announcement so quickly after the final episode aired.
At the close of the 24th television episode, they revealed that Jujutsu Kaisen will get a movie adaptation titled Jujutsu Kaisen 0 this winter, which will adapt the 4 chapter Tokyo Metropolitan Magic Technical School prequel manga. Studio MAPPA is returning to produce the animation.
The trailer doesn't reveal much, but the story for the prequel follows an entirely new set of characters in a seemingly familiar situation. In this story, the main character is a boy named Yuuta Okkotsu who is haunted by the vengeful spirit of his childhood friend Rika, who died in a car accident. Instead of being the sweet girl that he knew before though, she's transformed into a dangerous monster who attacks people that dare to come close to Yuuta.
When the Jujutsu sorcerers arrive to help, Yuuta asks to be put in isolation so that no one else will get hurt but instead they enroll him in Jujutsu High School and start training him to control Rika and work together with her to defeat other evil spirits who wish to do harm to others.
The prequel manga originally ran in Jump GIGA magazine in 2017. Shueisha and Viz Media eventually collected and released it in both Japanese and English, respectively. Meanwhile, the anime adaptation was produced by studio MAPPA and directed by Seong-Hu Park. They worked off scripts penned by Hiroshi Seko. The series debuted on October 3rd, 2020, and was simulcast by Crunchyroll.
While I never got into Jujutsu Kaisen myself (as has long been established, I tend to shy away from shonen fight series), it's nice to see a series making a splash. Maybe not as big a splash as Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, but a splash nonetheless.
Sources: Yaraon, MyAnimeList
Related: How Do Curses Work in Jujutsu Kaisen?
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