Animation studio MAPPA has kept itself pretty busy ever since it opened in 2011, and 2022 was an especially big year for it. Along with working on the second part of the final season of Attack on Titan, the company also released Chainsaw Man, Dance Dance Danseur, and brought Jujutsu Kaisen 0 stateside. 2023 looks to be an even more packed year for the studio, and it recently released new trailers for two of its upcoming projects.
The first trailer is for MAPPA’s new series Hell’s Paradise: Jigokuraku. Based on Yuji Kaku’s 2018 manga, the anime focuses on an assassin named Gabimaru the Hollow who gets caught while on assignment and realises he can’t be executed. Believing the assassin to be kept alive by his love for his wife, Gabimaru’s executioner Sagiri tasks him with joining a group of fellow death row inmates and their respective Yamada (guardians/parole officers) to find the elixir of life. In typical MAPPA fashion, it looks very good and very bloody; the new trailer offers a look at the other characters joining Gabimaru on his journey and features the show’s opening song, “Work” by Millennium Parade.
MAPPA also released a new look at the first half of the third part of Attack on Titan’s last season. The one-hour special will see a new regiment of Survey Corps scouts fight against Eren Jaegar and his army of Colossal Titans as they attempt to destroy everything outside of Paradis’ borders. The new trailer also revealed the special will feature a new opening song, “Under the Tree” from the band SiM, which also had an opening for Part 2.
For the rest of 2023, MAPPA also has the currently in-progress second season of Vinland Saga, the second season of Jujutsu Kaisen, and another new series in the form of Campfire Cooking. (This isn’t even counting the movies for Yuri on Ice!!! and Zombie Land Saga that are supposedly still in production.) 2023 is still young, and it’s likely that the studio has several other projects lined up for this year and beyond.
The one-hour special for Attack on Titan: Part 3 will premiere on Friday, March 3, with the second and final half set to hit later in 2023. Hell’s Paradise: Jigokuraku will arrive on April 1, and both series will be available to watch on Crunchyroll.