The Disney+ collaboration between Lucasfilm and seven anime studios pays tribute to the Japanese influence on “Star Wars” — and throws out the canon.
What would happen if some of the most creative animation studios in Japan were let loose in a galaxy far, far away? In the anime anthology series “ Star Wars: Visions,” Jedi warriors battle enemies with faces like oni (a kind of Japanese demon), and straw-hatted droids inhabit feudal villages straight out of Akira Kurosawa’s classic samurai film “Yojimbo.” There are Sith villains and rabbit-girl hybrids, tea-sipping droids (OK, it’s really oil) and sake-sipping warriors. Lightsabers are lovingly squirreled away in traditional wrapping cloths called furoshiki and in red lacquer boxes. And this being anime, there are over-the-top action sequences, stunning hand-painted backgrounds and computer-generated wonders. And of course, there’s plenty of “kawaii,” the distinctly Japanese form of cuteness. The series, which premiered Wednesday on Disney+, consists of nine short films by nine different directors from seven different Japanese animation houses, each film with a vastly different animation style. The films include a rock opera (“Tatooine Rhapsody”) and an eco-cautionary tale (“The Village Bride”), as well as a psychological drama (“Akakiri,” heavy on the blood spray) and a meditation on family, as seen through the lens of classic yakuza films (“Lop and Ocho”). It is the first time outsiders from any country have been given this sort of access to the themes, ships, characters and even signature sounds of the Star Wars franchise. “I really wanted to use the original lightsaber sounds,” said Kenji Kamiyama (“Napping Princess”), the director of “The Ninth Jedi,” the fifth episode in the series. “Kids all over the world mimic that very distinctive sound effect when they play Jedi, and I felt we couldn’t change that sound in our short.” But it is also the first time outsiders have been allowed to go “off-canon” in such a dramatic way, with stories that exist outside of and separate from a cinematic universe that has been lovingly created over six decades — and cherished by generations of zealous fans often resistant to even the smallest changes. “We had concerns of: How do we make this work?” said James Waugh, the series showrunner and Lucasfilm’s vice president of franchise content and strategy. “There were a few moments where I had to go, Can we really do a rock opera in ‘Star Wars’?” In many ways, this mash-up of the hugely popular worlds of anime and “Star Wars” is a natural. George Lucas has been open about his creation’s debt to Japanese culture, crediting Kurosawa’s 1958 period drama “The Hidden Fortress,” with its charismatic hero, spirited princess and two quarreling and comical peasants as a primary inspiration for his first “Star Wars” film, from 1977. And then there are the kimono-like robes, the lightsaber duels (Mark Hamill and John Boyega trained with kendo experts to prepare them for their onscreen battles) and even the Force itself, with its elements of Buddhism and Shintoism.
