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Kemono Friends Director Tatsuki Posts 2nd New Anime Short

Kemono Friends anime director TATSUKI and his Irodori team posted a second new anime short on his official Twitter account on Monday. TATSUKI said in the post, "Because it's fall."

The short continues the story from the anime short TATSUKI released in August. In the video, what appears to be part of an abandoned city arrives at the entrance to a Shinto shrine in the sky. A girl and her manta ray companion go into the city. The girl uses her rod to search for something, while the manta ray apparently remains skeptical. The pair arrive at a room full of containers with glowing objects inside. They take two of the objects and leave the city before it departs again.

The short is TATSUKI's first new anime since the announcement that he is no longer working on the new Kemono Friends anime project. Irodori is the three-person independent animation group that worked with the studio Yaoyorozu to produce the Kemono Friends anime. Besides TATSUKI, the members include Yūko Shiromizu and Yoshihisa Isa, the art director and animation director on Kemono Friends.

TATSUKI last posted on Twitter on October 9 when he said:

(Hello, I don't have anything in particular to report, but the three Irodori people are alive and well. Thank you to everyone who showed concern and kept in contact. It was encouraging. I don't know what kind of work I'll be doing but I plan to keep on working as an anime creator.)

TATSUKI reported on September 25 that, per a notification from publishing and production company Kadokawa, he is no longer working on the Kemono Friends project.

Nexon's original Kemono Friends app game launched in early 2016 and ended service on December 14 — before the Kemono Friends anime even aired. The 12-episode television anime then premiered on TV Tokyo and TV Osaka on January 10 and ended on March 28. Crunchyroll streamed the series as it aired.

The anime received an unofficial "episode 12.1." Kemono Friends is also getting a new game, a new stage play, and a "new screen project" (separate from "episode 12.1"). An official guidebook for the anime confirmed in July that a second season is in the works but it "will take some time."

Bushiroad's Kemono Friends Pavilion smartphone game is slated to launch this year.

[Via Otakomu]