Netflix has just added another original anime series to its growing library. Tekken: Bloodline will be released later this year, and the series was announced with a one-and-a-half-minute “official teaser” trailer. There’s no word on a release date or how many episodes there will be, but the blurb teases that it will center on Jin Kazama, who first appeared in Tekken 3.
Unlike several other late-nineties video game franchises that have sold over 50 million copies, the Tekken series has only had a few efforts at adapting the tale for film or television. Among those attempts was a wholly uninteresting 2010 live-action film that is famous for being one of 43 films on Rotten Tomatoes with a score of zero percent based on critic reviews. “We were not able to supervise that movie; it was a horrible contract,” Katsuhiro Harada, the producer, and director of the Tekken games tweeted at one point. “I’m not interested in seeing the film.”
As Harada asked fans to check out the new trailer, the circumstances around this adaptation may be better. The show will tie together The King of Iron Fist fighting tournament, which includes control of a powerful corporation as a prize, the intergenerational power struggle of the Mishima family, which runs the corporation and the tournament, and the supernatural powers/corruption of the Devil Gene mutation shared by Heihachi Mishima (who also appears in the trailer), his son Kazuya Mishima, and Kazuya’s son Jin Kazama, if it follows the games.
Jun Kazama, Jin’s mother, was a character in the games, and the clip looks to show her training him before they’re assaulted by the enormous Ogre, another game boss. These events will bring him to a tournament filled with known faces — faces who may or may not be wearing jaguar masks the entire time — and flashes in the video reveal at least some of the people we may expect to see.
“Power is everything.” Jin Kazama learned the family self-defense arts, Kazama-Style Traditional Martial Arts, from his mother at an early age. Even so, he was powerless when a monstrous evil suddenly appeared, destroying everything dear to him, changing his life forever. Angry at himself for being unable to stop it, Jin vowed revenge and sought absolute power to exact it. His quest will lead to the ultimate battle on a global stage — The King of Iron Fist Tournament.
Netflix continues to adapt anime and games for new content, despite failing to deliver a live-action Cowboy Bebop that it felt worthy of a second season. The Witcher live-action TV show has done well enough to earn a third season, a second anime movie, and upcoming kids show. Its League of Legends-based anime series Arcane received rave reviews here (even if its Dota 2-linked anime Dragon’s Blood did not), while The Witcher live-action TV show has done well enough to earn a third season, a second anime movie, and upcoming kids show. A live-action remake of One Piece began filming earlier this year, and Netflix is now developing anime adaptations of Scott Pilgrim and the Terminator franchises.
