Stunning New Vampire Anime Is The Castlevania Replacement Fans Needed

With Castlevania: Nocturne having come to an end in early 2025, anime fans have been caught in a vampire drought over the last year, which is unfortunate, as the genre as come back full force thanks to the success of massive live-action properties like Nosferatu and The Vampire Lestat breaking into the mainstream. Just in time for 2027, a collaboration from ZERO-G x Liber is coming to save anime fans and bring vampires back to the forefront of the medium. Dropping a trailer, key visual, character art as well as full staff and cast information, ZERO-G x Liber has announced an anime adaptation of Kyo Shirodaira and Yuri Kimura’s The Record of a Fallen Vampire.

The series follows an ancient vampire king, King Akabara “Red Rose” Strauss, who lost his vampiric empire and queen after she was sealed away by humans. Akabara has spent thousands of years searching for his lost love, and as the story begins, he encounters the 49th Black Swan — a powerful entity who inhabits the body of a human woman, bestowing her with the power to defeat the vampire king and his queen.

The Record of a Fallen Vampire Has a Star-Studded Production Team

The Record of a Fallen Vampire hasn’t received a firm release date outside of its 2027 window just yet, however, ZERO-G x Liber have revealed who will be working on the series, and the production staff is just what the series needs to bring it to life. At the helm of the project working on series composition and lead director is Mankyu, who previously worked on the 2023 anime adaptation of Migi & Dali; character designs for The Record of a Fallen Vampire will be handled by jimao, who worked on previous Liber projects like The Ice Guy and His Cool Female Colleague, and an original soundtrack from Evan Call, famously known for his work on Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and Violet Evergarden.

Yuma Uchida will be taking the lead role as the vampire King Akabara, who has previosuly been heard in massive series like Jujutsu Kaisen as Megumi Fushigoro, Fruits Basket as Kyo Soma, Blue Lock as Reo Mikage, and Banana Fish as Ash Lynx. Taking on the role of Bridget Irving Frostheart, the Black Swan bestowed with the power to slay Akabra is Aino Shimada, best known for her role as Takeko Nishino in Classroom of the Elite, and Bee in the Japanese dub of Bee and Puppycat.

King Akabara’s Story Is A Classic Brought To Life After Decades Of Waiting

Originally published in 2003 in Square Enix’s Monthly Shonen Gangan, The Record of a Fallen Vampire is a beautifully illustrated dark fantasy manga that ran for four years, concluding in 2007 with a sequel series that just began serializing in October 2026, returning to Monthly Shonen Gangan titled The Record of a Fallen Vampire: A Dog’s Song For Dogs. The original series has since been collected into nine volumes, and has been previously licensed by Viz Media and Yen Press for English publication.

The story itself is filled with interpersonal conflict between mortals, half-vampires called dhampirs, and vampires themselves, all through the lens of the ever-omnipotent King Akabara, who has seen the world grow and change through over the course of thousands of years as he tries to track down his queen. His stoic worldview gives the audience an outside looking in perspective to the lives of human beings constantly trying to survive in a world ravaged by the whims of bloodthirsty beings trying to hunt them down.

The old school gothic art style used in the manga creates lush paneling and stunning set pieces the new anime adaptation has potential to draw from as well, meaning that ZERO-G x Liber have the opportunity to create something truly special with their take on The Record of a Fallen Vampire.

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