For many, the wait for information on the Attack on Titan live-action film has been an ordeal. There’s been little information released, and people have been debating how the cast would look, or even whether the costumes would change that familiar, iconic look.
As of yesterday, the wait is finally over.
News sites like Eiga.com and Sanspo showed off the first key visuals from the film, which show 13 major characters in full costume.
The cast breakdown is as follows:
- Eren: Haruma Miura
- Mikasa: Kiko Mizuhara
- Armin: Kanata Hongo
- Hans/Hange: Satomi Ishihara
- Sasha: Nanami Sakuraba
- Jean: Takahiro Miura
- Shikishima (Movie-Exclusive): Hiroki Hasegawa
- Hiana (Movie-Exclusive): Ayame Misaki:
- Souda (Movie-Exclusive): Pierre Taki
- Kubal (Movie-Exclusive): Jun Kunimura
- Fukushi (Movie-Exclusive): Shu Watanabe
- Sannagi (Movie-Exclusive): Satoru Matsuo
- Lil (Movie-Exclusive): Rina Takeda
As you can see, there are seven characters tagged with “Movie Exclusive” in the list above. They are new to the film, and Sanspo reports that Shikishima in particular holds the key to the film’s story as “humanity’s strongest man.” How the others play into the plot have yet to be seen.
Producer Yoshihiro Sato remarked that he didn’t pay much attention to how a character looks in comparison to the original cast. Rather, he stated that, “[a]fter many discussions with Isayama-sensei, we cast people only on the ability to carry over the spirit of the character.” This consisted of several conversations between director Shinji Higuchi regarding their roles before filming began.
According to Higuchi, the cast members “carried out their roles splendidly. One part would have no less than three costume meetings, camera tests, etc. Details on the 3-D gear and costumes were custom made so that each character matched their manga counterpart.” Apparently, the cast and crew did their job well, since “Isayama-sensei was a bit embarassed when came to the set and saw the military drills for the first time with the cast in costume. He gave them his stamp of approval.”
Attack on Titan will be the first of two films that will be produced with the supervision of Isayama. Yuusuke Watanabe (Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, 20th Century Boys) is handling the scripts, along with creator Hajime Isayama and film critic (and friend of Isayama) Tomohiro Machiyama. Both films will hit Japanese theaters in Summer 2015.
