Toei Shopping 'Sailor Moon' Anime

Toei Animation is offering 200 refurbished episodes of the Sailor Moon Magical Girl anime at the MIPTV market that will be held next week in Cannes. MIPTV is a worldwide content market at which producers such as Toei offer their wares to representatives of TV networks and syndicators of electronic entertainment from more than 100 countries. In addition to the Sailor Moon episodes Toei is also offering the rights to the 243 episodes of the 1980s TV anime Dr. Slump, which is based on the manga series by Dragon Ball-creator Akira Toriyama.

The 200 episodes of Sailor Moon would presumably include all the Sailor Moon TV anime series including the original series (46 episodes), Sailor Moon R (43 episodes), Sailor Moon S (38 episodes), Sailor Moon Super S (39 episodes), and Sailor Moon Stars (34 episodes, the only episodes that have never been available in the U.S.).

4KIDS Has "Tai Chi Chasers"

Look Familiar?

4Kids Entertainment has acquired worldwide rights (excluding Asia) for the 39-episode anime series Tai Chi Chasers, which was produced in 2007 by Toei using a mixture of cel and computer animation. Tai Chi Chasers is the first anime series that 4Kids has acquired since Dinosaur King, which debuted here in the U.S. in 2008, and the acquisition represents a first step toward taking 4Kids back to its original business model . 4Kids is currently offering the Tai Chi Chasers series at MIP-TV 2010 for broadcast in all countries outside of Asia starting in the fourth quarter of 2011.

For those familiar with Yu-Gi-Oh!, Tai Chi Chasers has a familiar look. A fantasy adventure series with an overlay of Oriental mythology and at least the potential for exploitation as a CCG, Tai Chi Chasers is the story of a young lad named Rai who discovers that he is the last descendant of the Tigeroids, a race of beneficent beings locked in a struggle with the evil and ruthless Dragonoids. In a parallel universe the Tigeroids and Dragonoids attempt to recover 500 lost tai chi symbols, which if possessed would yield ultimate power. Rai has to hone his innate tai chi card skills in order to fight the Dragonoids and become one of the champion Tai Chi Chasers

Worldwide "Sailor Moon' Revival Spreads Worldwide

A resurgence of interest in the Sailor Moon property has led to a return of the classic magical girl anime series on the Japanese airwaves last fall. Now Toei Animation is hoping to revive the property on a global scale starting in Italy. Toei is partnering with Backstage, which will handle the property’s rights in publishing, TV, and merchandising. Mediaset has acquired the TV rights to the 200-episode anime series and plans to begin broadcasting it in Italy in the fall of 2010.

Toei Animation’s Kanji Kazahaya told Global License: “We are certain that strategically Italy is the ideal country to initiate a global re-launch of the classic Japanese animated series such as Sailor Moon. The Italian public has traditionally been passionate about anime.”

No word yet on a possible North American revival of the property. DIC introduced the series (in a bowdlerized form) to American TV, while Pioneer and ADV released uncut versions of various elements of the extensive library of Sailor Moon anime. Tokyopop released the Sailor Moon manga here, but the licensed lapsed before it could issue the new revised editions that were issued in Japan starting in 2003.