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Samuel L. Jackson is attached to topline and co-produce a live-action feature to be adapted from the Japanese comic franchise Afro Samurai, created by Takashi Okazaki.
Variety says the film is a joint production of Japanese animation studio GDH K.K. Gonzo, Fuji TV and Mosaic Media in Los Angeles. Jackson is already signed to lend his voice to an animated Afro Samurai TV series set to premiere on Spike TV next year.
Afro Samurai is the tale of a black samurai futuristic, yet feudal Japan who is on a mission to avenge the wrongful death of his father. Jackson stars as "Afro," a warrior who travels a solitary path encountering a myriad of enemies, friends and challenges beyond imagination.
Production of the film is set to begin in 2006, with a U.S. release targeted for 2007.
In 2009, Soulja Boy tweeted this fact: "I'm a fan of Anime ^_^." A year later, he dropped the track "Anime," referring to the Japanese cartoons so beloved by American geeks, with lyrics like: "anime, drop pants; anime, wrist and chains; anime, and everything; anime." It's a bit jarring, the casual throwing-together of bling and nerd culture: "Pikachu diamonds, anime floskas."
Anime blogs and forums heralded the rapper's otaku-coming-out as the end of American anime fandom, usually thought of as the domain of white geeks. At the same time, diehard Soulja Boy fans were wondering when swag and anime fell into bed with one another. The critics were overcome by cognitive dissonance.
Soulja Boy, for his part, didn't acknowledge crossing any invisible boundaries. "Bitch, I look like Goku," he said, referring to the popular anime Dragonball Z's protagonist, a fair-skinned, spiky-haired fighter.
Actually, Soulja Boy doesn't look much like Goku. In fact, the only black character in Dragonball Z was a puffy-lipped slave named Mr. Popo (later recolored blue for American television). But at the height of Dragonball Z's popularity, black fans breathed life into "black Goku," using Photoshop to darken the anime character's skin and proliferating his likeness throughout the internet.
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