Studio Shaft’s Virgin Punk Unveils Cast & Promo to Hype Release Date

Virgin Punk is an upcoming film series made in collaboration with Studio Shaft and veteran animator Yasuomi Umetsu. The series made headways for its striking visual aesthetic and similarities to Umetsu’s previous work, Kite. Shaft has finally unveiled the main voice cast for the series’ first movie, subtitled Clockwork Girl. Actress Saki Miyashita will voice the lead character, Ubu Shinsui, a young bounty hunter who deals with crimes committed by artificial human body technology. Miyashita is best known for her lead performance in the The Detective Is Already Dead anime adaptation from ENGI in 2021. The rest of the cast, provided via Natalie Comic’s latest report, includes Katsuyuki Konishi, Taku Yashiro, Rui Tanabe, Norio Wakamoto, Fuka Izumi, and Sumire Uesaka.

Konishi is a prolific voice actor, best known for his work in Gurren Lagann, Fairy Tail, Bleach, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind, Kill La Kill, and Black Clover. He voices the mysterious Mr. Elegance, who wants to recruit Ubu Shinsui to join his organization of bounty hunters. Yashiro is another prolific voice actor who has appeared in dozens of anime, most recently playing Professor Friede in Pokemon Horizons. Tanabe is an actress best known for her roles in Wizard Barristers, Ai Tenchi Muyo, and Soul Buster. Actor Wakamoto has nearly 50 years of experience in anime and is most famous for portraying Cell in Dragon Ball. Izumi and Uesaka are both actresses with multiple animes in their credentials.

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Why You Should Care About Virgin Punk: Clockwork Girl

Virgin Punk is an original anime series created by Yasuomi Umetsu, a prolific animator who’s worked in the industry since the 1980s. He has worked on many high-profile titles including Megazone 23, Magia Record, Persona 5 the Animation, and Fate/strange Fake. Umetsu previously created the Kite film series, an ultraviolent pair of animated movies about young female assassins. The films were renowned for their extreme violence and their portrayal of sexual assault, with many observers believing the first motion picture took the topic too far. Virgin Punk seems like a spiritual follow-up to Kite, sharing a similar design aesthetic and starring a female killer for hire.

Shaft is a prolific animation studio that has a hand in producing some of the most prominent anime series since the 2000s. One of the company’s biggest properties is Puella Magi Madoka Magica, with a fourth movie coming out this year for the franchise. Shaft shared a new promo image for the new Madoka film during Anime Japan alongside the new promo for Punk Virgin: Clockwork Girl.

H/T: natalie.mu