Japan Archives | Otaku No Culture

Magazine House Expands Worldwide with Bold 80th Anniversary Celebration

Publisher Magazine House celebrates its 80th anniversary with style—expanding overseas, hosting a bookazine fair at McNally Jackson Books in New York, and releasing English editions of Popeye and Brutus. The event highlights Japan’s lasting influence on print culture, design, and contemporary media worldwide.

Magaazine House Store Front Publisher Magazine House is not only celebrating their 80th anniversary with a special museum exhibit at Ginza Sony Park but also in New York! They are finally expanding, and as Manhattan marks their first step to new shores, let’s hope Canada is next! They recently released English editions of their popular magazines: Popeye looks at men’s fashion and youth culture, chronicling fashion and culture from an urban perspective. And Brutus considers contemporary culture. It explores art, travel, design, and food with a bold editorial voice and leading-edge visual style.

As part of the celebrations, a special bookazine fair was held recently at the Soho branch of McNally Jackson Books. Following strong sales at other branches of Japanese bookstore operations, such as Kinokuniya, the collaboration with this bookseller during Oct. 10 and 11 was met with positive results. Locals got to check out other works and saw what’s being planned next for this company. It also validated the continued popularity of Japanese culture and aesthetics for an eager global audience.

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Mystery Inc. Has Plans To Return In Style in 2026! From Anime-Style Ghosts To A Darker Live-Action Origin Story.

From anime-inspired yokai to a darker live-action origin story, Mystery Inc. and the gang are gearing up for thrilling new adventures that we hope will air in 2026.

Mystery Inc. Complete Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Inc. gang may be taking a brief break before their next adventure. The last series, Scooby-Doo and Guess Who?, wrapped in 2021, and since Velma exists in its own universe, fans—including me—are asking for a proper weekly series to enjoy. Three movies arrived in the past three years: Straight Outta Nowhere: Scooby-Doo! Meets Courage the Cowardly Dog, Trick or Treat Scooby-Doo!, and Scooby-Doo! and Krypto, Too! The last one stood out, and I’d love to see more from that pairing.

Looking ahead, fans can expect an anime-inspired series set in Japan and a live-action origin story from Netflix. Details remain limited, but here’s what’s known.

Go-Go Mystery Machine – Scooby Hits Japan

Cartoon Network and Max have green-lit Go-Go Mystery Machine, an anime-styled Scooby-Doo adventure that sends Shaggy and Scooby across the Pacific. They’ll join a new team featuring Etsuko and Toshiro along with another mascot. Together, they’ll face Japanese monsters and yokai, blending folklore with the franchise’s familiar “unmask the villain” formula.

If you haven’t caught the GeGeGe no Kitaro reference, it’s because you haven’t explored this seminal work, which celebrates yokai culture at its fullest. It nods to Kitaro, a series that helped popularize yokai in Japanese media, signalling that this Scooby-Doo adventure draws on rich folklore rather than simply borrowing visual style.

The art direction leans heavily into Japanese influences, and fans online already call it “the Scooby-Doo anime we always wanted.” No premiere date is set, but industry watchers suggest late 2025, depending on production schedules.

Go-Go Mystery Machine

Netflix Live-Action Origins – A Darker Mystery Inc. (most likely in 2026)

Netflix has ordered an eight-episode live-action reimagining of Scooby-Doo’s origins. The story unfolds during the gang’s last summer at Camp Ruby-Spears, where Shaggy and Daphne discover a supernatural murder. This setup subtly echoes The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, where the focus was on these two characters—a connection that gives fans an Easter-egg-style nod. They’ll either adopt or meet Scoob, and some sources indicate he will appear as a puppy. He’ll be key to a greater mystery that brings Velma and newcomer Freddy into the investigation.

With no casting news and only a few months left in 2025, filming this year seems unlikely. Expect a release in late 2026 or 2027. Showrunners Josh Appelbaum and Scott Rosenberg excel at high-concept reboots, while executive producer Greg Berlanti (Riverdale) brings experience with teen drama and moody reinterpretations. With this team, viewers can expect a darker, more character-driven take. Rumours suggest a Stranger Things-style vibe, a fitting direction now that series has wrapped.

A New Era

From Japanese ghosts to Netflix’s summer-camp mystery, Scooby-Doo continues to show his versatility. A 2026 debut looks more realistic than anything this year. Warner Bros. rarely promotes smaller launches, so a surprise direct-to-video release around Halloween isn’t impossible. Regardless, what’s in progress suggests a strong future for this classic hound.

Sources:

Screen Rant – Scooby-Doo anime project
Reddit r/Scoobydoo – Go-Go Mystery Machine discussion
EW – Netflix live-action Scooby-Doo series
Vulture – They’re Riverdale-ing Scooby-Doo
The Sun – Netflix reboot announcement

Baby Assassins Franchise – Friendship, Mayhem, and the Future of Japan’s Funniest Hitwomen

In what makes the Baby Assassins franchise unique is its blend of over-the-top action with sitcom absurdities, showing how Mahiro and Chisato juggle odd jobs, bills, and bullets. And we talk about its spin-off TV series too!

Well GO USA
Check out the reviews for the second flick, Babies, and the third one, Nice Days.

Now that Yugo Sakamoto’s Baby Assassins 3 is available on home video in North America, watching all three films back-to-back shows just how uniquely fun this franchise has become. Better still, the story isn’t finished. It’s not over yet for the Baby Assassins franchise!; a 12-episode spin-off mini-series aired on TV Tokyo in September 2024. It is available for import through YesAsia, but without English subtitles, leaving fans to hope the North American distributor will secure international rights.

What makes the series stand out is its mix of action, deadpan and comedy. Imagine Laverne and Shirley—if they were professional killers. That’s the dynamic between Mahiro (Saori Izawa) and Chisato (Akari Takaishi). One is outgoing and impulsive, while the other is more laid back and prefers to avoid action unless persuaded. Their partnership feels like a live-action twist on the “girls with guns” formula, with classics such as Dirty Pair and Noir serving as touchstones. The franchise succeeds because these stories balance buddy-cop banter with constant clashes against the criminal underworld, keeping the familiar tropes fresh.

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[Fantasia Film Festival] Transcending Dimensions (次元を超える) To Boldly Go Where No Soul Has Gone Before

Presented here is not a very traditional story about a hitman hired to take out a cult leader and rescue a brother. There’s added layers in Transcending Dimensions which suggest it’s best not to challenge some of these mystics, and here’s why:

Transcending Dimensions poster — **This movie played at the 2025 Fantasia International Film Festival on July 24th, and has an encore performance July 28th. Get your ticket here.**

Transcending Dimensions is less a conventional narrative and more of an immersive sensory experience. While this review delves into its themes and stylistic choices, readers who prefer to encounter the film with absolutely no prior knowledge of its unconventional journey may wish to proceed with caution regarding potential thematic insights.

As an instalment in the series of films by writer/director Toshiaki Toyoda, this latest in his Wolf Mountain series delves further into thematic tones about the perils of human ignorance. Each film concerns the repetition of historical mistakes. This movie is not always straightforward, and some viewers might find it challenging to follow. Shinno (Ryûhei Matsuda), a professional hitman, is the focus here, and everything he will soon experience may well reshape his world view!. Here, his sister, Nonoka (played with quiet charm by Haruka Imô), recruits him to find her brother, Rosuke (Yôsuke Kubozuka). He is apparently brainwashed, and she hopes to rescue him from the cult he is now part of.

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Celebrating 20 Glorious Years at Fantasia Film Festival! Garo Taiga and Reintroducing This IP To A New Generation

Newcomers don’t need to know the franchise to enjoy Garo Taiga. It’s fairly self contained and can be an entry point to this franchise.

Garo Taiga Movie Poster A anniversary is being celebrated early at Fantasia Film Festival! Here, Garo Taiga made its cinematic worldwide debut for its emerald jubilee while fans in Japan must wait until October 17, 2025. Getting an early look is exciting—I’m always eager for any IP known for intense action and visceral body horror. With a few challenges involving some amusing tough guys to defeat–namely a duo whom I like to call the Clockwork Twins–and a foul-mouthed talking ring (wonderfully voiced by Hironobu Kageyama), I couldn’t help but think of Vampire Hunter D, where the protagonist’s left hand also has a sarcastic personality.

When there are transformation scenes as wild as The Guyver, and it sticks to a premise simple enough for younger viewers, it’s a visceral element I can enjoy. Here, our hero, Taiga Saejima (Hiroyuki Watanabe) must retrieve a stolen artifact housing the souls of four elementals. They can help him face his rival, Jado (Toshiki Seto), or hinder him. When this individual is too powerful to face alone, Taiga will need ‌help from other Makai Knights for help.

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Baby Assassins 3 Is Finally Coming to Home Video!

Baby Assassins 3 is headed to North America to satisfy fans of the girls with guns genre, and they got some biggums here!

Well GO USA
Release Date: August 26

After Baby Assassins 3 successful run last year at Fantasia Film Festival, Well GO USA is finally releasing this killer action movie to home video! It’s a fun ride to chart what’s next in the relationship between Akari Takaishi (Chisato Sugimoto) and Saori Izawa (Mahiro Fukagawa), and our movie review can be read here. These girls may seem like today’s answers to the Dirty Pair from long ago, but they have other issues that go beyond being trained by professionals to be the best trouble consultants, often hired to take down targets for one reason or another!

Writer/Director Sakamoto Yugo (A Janitor) and action director Sonomura Kensuke (Ghost Killer) return to keep this franchise going, and in this latest chapter, what they have to deal with isn’t too hard to follow. Continue reading “Baby Assassins 3 Is Finally Coming to Home Video!”