Anticipation for the new Tsubasa OADs Mount!
(*May Contain spoilers)
We watched in awe at the end of 2007 and the beginning of 2008 as Tokyo Revelations by Production I.G was created. Covering the Tokyo arc, "Revelations" was by no means a misnomer. These three OADs (original anime dvds), including "the Magician's Message" (November 16, 2007), "The Boy's Right Eye"(January 17, 2008) and "The Dream that the Princess Envisioned"(March 17, 2008), were truly stunning. The graphics, the art, and the storyline, all held true to chapters 107-135 of Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle, and contained the pure essense of CLAMP.
The two seasons of Tsubasa Chronicle were enjoyable, and although some Tsubasa fans may have been disappointed in the number of filler episodes, many were still more crestfallen that a third season had not been planned. Tokyo Revelations was just the kind of reality that otakus around the world had dreamed of.
At the conclusion of "The Dream that the Princess had Envisioned", the same feeling of unrest settled among Tsubasa fans. As of right now, Japan has published books 1-24 of Tsubasa and, though it would seem the series is coming to a close, there are still many unanswered questions. Even Amaterasu, Tomoyo's older sister, said during the Nihon/Nippon country arc: "The journey is far from being over." As that journey has continued, we anticipated Tokyo Revelations, three impressive OADs that were well worth the wait. In fact, we loved the OAD's so much we couldn't help increasing our demand for more.
Tsubasa fans, the suspence is over! After reading manga online and watching as R!Syaoran, Yuui, and Kurogane confront the past, there is now news that another OAD, containing 2 parts, is in the process of being made.
It has been announced now that the new Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle OADs will be available separately with the completion of books 26 and 27, which will be released in Japan on the 17th of March and April in the upoming 2009 year. These 2 DVD's are titled Tsubasa Shunraiki, meaning "Spring Thunder". Nanase Okawa of the CLAMP team is the screen writer of this project, so of course these DVDs look promising.
Tsubasa Shunraiki is actually part of a joint Tsubasa/XXX Holic bundle project, meaning that there will be OAD's for the later chapters of XXX Holic being made for next year as well. These will be titled XXX Holic Shunmuki (Spring Exposure), and will be released with the publication of books 14 and 15 of the XXX Holic manga series.
The Tsubasa Shunraiki OADs attract the interest of viewers for several reasons, some of which include: the beauty of viewing the characters in full color moving across a screen, the heart wrenching, twisted, storyline, the inspired original music by Yuki Kajiuri, the talented voice of Maya Sakamoto in the beginning theme song "Sonic Boom", and the 3D visual effects directed by Makoto Endou.
*According to IMDB, the Japanese cast list is as follows--
Miyu Irino (Syaoran), Yui Makino (Sakura), Tetsu Inada (Kurogane), Daisuke Namikawa (Fai), and Mika Kikuchi (Mokona).
*Cast list may be incomplete.
Do the above names look familiar? These voice actors also played their respective parts in Tokyo Revelations and the animated series that ran for two seasons.
Although these OADs appear to be the sequel to the Tokyo arc, they happen to skip over the Celes and Infinity arcs, jumping right into Kurogane's Japan (the Nihon/Nippon arc). As you may recall, the Infinity arc concerned the live chess game in which the tension between C!Sakura and R! Syaoran continued to grow. The epic Celes arc featured the desperate attempt to rescue C!Sakura's body and face off against Ashura. The Nihon/Nippon arc covers chapters 169 (The Witches Gift)- 180 (Where the Princess Lies) of the Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle manga.
Both sagas previous to this one were essentially important to the plot, so why move past them? No matter how it is debated, this question continues to be a target of great speculation.
More information can be found on the official Kodansha website (Japanese):
http://kc.kodansha.co.jp/tsubaholi/
