Yanno, YouTube idols are totes a thing, so they can work this angle.

On Saturday, the official IDOLiSH7 Twitter account announced that the franchise will receive a spinoff anime series. The short-form show will stream exclusively on YouTube as a “YouTube Original” project.

A 23-second teaser video for the project started streaming on Bandai Visual’s YouTube channel, which you can check out below.

As of press time, details remain scarce on the release schedule. The first episode, TRIGGER ~before The Radiant Glory~, will tell the origin story of in-franchise idol group TRIGGER.

TRIGGER is a three-person idol group, consisting of the following members:

  • Gaku Yaotome: Wataru Hatano
  • Ten Kujō: Sōma Saitō
  • Ryūnosuke Tsunashi: Takuya Satō

The core IDOLiSH7 anime series will air on January 7. Well, technically, the first two episodes will air as a special on Tokyo MX on January 1, at 20:00 (1/1/2018 at 8:00PM). The January 7 airing will start with the show’s third episode.

The Idolish 7 anime is part of a multimedia project from Bandai Namco. Makoto Bessho (El-Hazard: The Wanderers, Armitage: Dual-Matrix) is directing the series at Troyca, with Kazumi Fukagawa providing character designs. Ayumi Sekine (Baka and Test – Summon the Beasts, Utano☆Princesama Revolutions) is in charge of series composition for the title. Ei Aoki is credited as a supervisor for the project

The confirmed voice cast includes:

IDOLiSH7

  • Iori Izumi: Toshiki Masuda
  • Yamato Nikaido: Yusuke Shirai
  • Mitsuki Izumi: Tsubasa Yonaga
  • Tamaki Yotsuba: KENN
  • Sougo Osaka: Atsushi Abe
  • Nagi Rokuya: Takuya Eguchi
  • Riku Nanase: Kensho Ono

Trigger

  • Gaku Yaotome: Wataru Hatano
  • Ten Kujō: Sōma Saitō
  • Ryūnosuke Tsunashi: Takuya Satō

Takanashi Agency

  • Tsumugi Takanashi: Satomi Sato
  • Otoharu Takanashi: Susumu Chiba
  • Banri Ogami: Kazuyuki Okitsu

Yaotome Agency

  • Sosuke Yaotome: Katsuyuki Konishi
  • Kaoru Anesagi: Yoshihisa Kawahara

Crunchyroll describes IDOLiSH7 as:

A group of aspiring idols gather at Takanashi Productions and are entrusted with the company’s future. The seven men who have just met represent a variety of totally different personalities. However, they each have their own charm and possess unknown potential as idols. Forming a group, they take their first step together as “IDOLiSH7.” Their brilliantly shining dancing forms onstage eventually begin captivating the hearts of the people. In the glorious but sometimes harsh world of idols, they aim for the top with dreams in their hearts!

Source: Ota-suke