From our other sites
The story
Actor Terunosuke Takezai, appearing on the ABEMA show “Uraaka Uraraka” streamed on the 17th, said of live-action manga adaptations: “If you’re going to compromise because you don’t have the budget, I’d rather you didn’t do it at all,” and “Respect for the source material is absolutely essential.” The 5ch thread that followed wasn’t just agreement — plenty pushed back with arguments like “If you’re just going to make it faithfully, you might as well read the original” and “If the director has no creative vision of their own, there’s no point adapting it,” citing specific works like Attack on Titan, Chiikawa, and Look Back as the debate grew into one about what “respect” for the source material actually means.
Terunosuke Takezai on live-action manga adaptations: “If you don’t have the budget and have to compromise, don’t bother” — “Respect for the source material is absolutely essential”
Actor Terunosuke Takezai appeared on the ABEMA variety show “Uraaka Uraraka” (Saturdays, 11:00 PM), streamed on the 17th, and spoke about his approach to live-action adaptations of manga.
Hosted by Kirin’s Akira Kawashima, the talk show has top celebrities post anonymously to a show-exclusive “secret account,” airing out their everyday frustrations and honest feelings.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Wait, so that guy was Terunosuke?
> "Respect for the source material is absolutely essential"
"If it's just going to be the director injecting their own personal feelings, like 'I did it this way because real humans are acting it out' — they're better off not doing it at all."
Agreed.
The moment they start changing things on their own whim, that's already ignoring the source material.
Once a few minutes of trailer footage drop, you'll be able to tell roughly how it turned out.
Then just make an original work.
Nagano (the creator): 'Please watch the anime too! (smile)'
Did it actually respect the source material though?
Entertainment exists to make money. Of course you get creative and inventive to do that.
If the original creator doesn't like it, they can just turn the offer down.
And honestly, whether something 'respects' the source material is 100% subjective to whoever's watching anyway.
Your counterargument also sounds like a middle schooler who just wants to disagree with whatever a celebrity says.
'Fits' or 'doesn't fit' is just your own subjective opinion though.
Machiyama Tomohiro, who the original author personally picked to write the screenplay, first wrote a script that followed the manga closely, but the author rejected it and asked for 'an original story the film can call its own, not just a retread of the manga.' That's how it ended up the way it did. And the author was the one who was happiest watching the finished film — so in a way, this adaptation showed the original creator maximum respect.
Attack on Titan
JoJo
Fullmetal Alchemist
Bleach
lol
Guess they've stopped doing those reckless live-action versions now.
I thought the Stands in the JoJo movie actually looked great. The casting itself was just impossibly hard to begin with.
Apparently the original creator was satisfied with it.
Take Look Back, where the anime made 2 billion yen but the live-action version flopped hard at just a few hundred million. The director's fans kept repeating things like 'actually, the live-action project got moving earlier' — maybe so, but to audiences it just looks like they took something already turned into an anime and live-action-ified it anyway, so saying that doesn't really change anything… that's the vibe. It's honestly startling how live-action defenders assume every single viewer already knows all these insider comments from people involved.
Fukunaga's just a better character in the drama version anyway.
The Naruto stage play is really good too. Everyone matches the anime not just in looks but in voice, so it's easy to get into. Before watching it I was like 'eh, a 2.5D stage play (live theater adaptations of anime/manga)…' but the direction was great too.
Isn't it precisely because that acceptance hasn't happened that they keep flopping across the board?
Background and Key Points of the Debate
Takezai’s remark was just one comment on the ABEMA show “Uraaka Uraraka” and didn’t name any specific titles. What split the thread was how to even measure “respect for the source material.” Against those who championed faithful reproduction, others pushed back by pointing to the live-action Attack on Titan film, where the screenwriter added bold original developments at the original creator’s own request — and the finished film ended up being the thing the creator was happiest with — arguing that “faithfulness” doesn’t automatically equal “respect.” On the other hand, cases like the Chiikawa anime, which gets called out for being so faithful to the source that “you might as well just read the manga,” show there’s no simple right answer for what respect should look like. Criticism of casting popular talent purely to draw an audience also came up, but in places it veered from critiquing the work itself into attacks on individual actors’ looks or acting ability, so those portions have been left out of this article.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News+) thread “[Entertainment] Terunosuke Takezai on live-action manga adaptations: ‘If you don’t have the budget and have to compromise, don’t bother’ — ‘Respect for the source material is absolutely essential’.”
Leave a Reply