New Votoms Film Pair Casts Miyuki Sawashiro and Mabuki Andou
Mamoru Oshii directs the Sunrise and Production I.G films, with original Votoms creator Ryōsuke Takahashi supervising.
The two new Armored Trooper Votoms films revealed their cast, character designs, and a 30-second trailer on Friday. Miyuki Sawashiro voices Ash Vamps, while Mabuki Andou plays Maki Stauffenberg.
The official website for Sunrise and Production I.G’s two new Armored Trooper Votoms films announced the cast and unveiled character designs on Friday. It also released a 30-second trailer.
The films are titled Armored Trooper Votoms: Die Graue Hexe (Sōkō Kihei Votoms Haiiro no Hexe), which literally means Armored Trooper Votoms: The Grey Witch.
Miyuki Sawashiro voices Ash Vamps, a notorious, feared AT pilot known as the Grey Witch. Mabuki Andou plays Maki Stauffenberg, an officer secretly tasked with investigating Ash’s past.
The character visual places Ash on the left and Maki on the right. English romanizations of the character names remain unconfirmed.
Mamoru Oshii directs both films, with Ryōsuke Takahashi supervising. Takahashi directed the original 1983 Armored Trooper Votoms anime and created its original concept.
The staff credits include:
- Original character design concepts: Kazuchika Kise (xxxHOLiC, Made in Abyss, Fate/Grand Order The Movie Divine Realm of the Round Table: Camelot)
- Character design: Shingo Ogiso, Takashi Kojima, Tetsuya Nishio
- Original mechanical designer: Kunio Ōkawara
- Mechanical design: Jū Ishiguchi, Wataru Inada
- Costume design assistance: Katsuya Terada
- Art design: Satoshi Takabatake, Yasumitsu Suetake, Kazushige Kanehira
- Art director: Yūshi Honjō
- Color key artist: Nagisa Abe
- Compositing director of photography: Yūki Kawashita
- CG directors: Yōta Tasaki, Toshihisa Yokoshima, Jō Nakajima
- Editing: Aya Hida
- Sound director: Kazuhiro Wakabayashi
Mechanical designers also include Shinobu Tsuneki and Yoshiro Sōno, the manga artist behind Sōkō Kihei Votoms: AT Stories. Tsuneki’s credits include:
- The Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These
- Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
- Kaiju No. 8
Kenji Kawai composes the score. He previously collaborated with Oshii on projects including Ghost in the Shell and Patlabor 2: The Movie.
The 1983 Armored Trooper Votoms anime is a landmark of the “real robot” mecha subgenre pioneered by Mobile Suit Gundam. These stories feature mass-produced military robots with operational limits resembling actual war machines, alongside gritty, grounded accounts of warfare and its bitter costs.
The original takes place as a century-long war between the Gilgamesh Confederation and the Balarant Union winds down. Battlefields are dominated by VOTOMS, short for Vertical One-man Tank for Offense & Maneuvers.
These powerful but highly vulnerable mecha are known for both their firepower and their pilots’ high casualty rates. Thin armor and inadequate safety measures leave their operators exposed.
Protagonist Chirico Cuvie serves in an elite Gilgamesh VOTOMS unit. A sprawling conspiracy turns his unit into a pawn, brands him a traitor to Gilgamesh, and brings him into contact with a mysterious woman.
Section23 Films’ Maiden Japan label handled the original anime’s most recent Blu-ray Disc releases in 2019 and 2020.
The original series spawned several anime spinoffs:
- Armored Trooper Votoms: The Last Red Shoulder
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Big Battle
- Armor Hunter Mellowlink
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Red Shoulder Document - Roots of Treachery
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Pailsen Files
- Armored Trooper Votoms: The Heretic Saint
- Armored Trooper Votoms: Alone Again
Armored Trooper Votoms: Alone Again premiered in 2011 and remained the franchise’s latest entry until these new films.
Sources: Sōkō Kihei Votoms Haiiro no Hexe anime's website via ANN
