2019 Premiere of Yuri!!! On Ice Anime Film Postponed

Sad news for fans of gay skating anime series Yuri!!! On Ice: the official website of the franchise’s first movie Yuri!!! On Ice Movie: Ice Adolescence (Yuri!!! On Ice Gekijou-ban : Ice Adolescence) has just announced that the film’s opening date has been postponed. The anime film was originally slated for a 2019 opening, with no specific month set.

According to the announcement, the production committee plans to announce a new opening date once details have been smoothed out. They also stated that the reason for the postponement is “in order to substantially scale up the content more than originally planned.”

The movie was first announced in April 2017, during a special stage event. This January, during a marathon event in Japan, it was revealed that Ice Adolescence will focus on 17-year old—and still sporting long silver locks—Viktor Nikiforov. It got fans really excited, because teenager Viktor! In his first ever Olympic season!! But alas, our fate is to wait. Let’s all just hope this will all be worth it.

Yuri!!! On Ice is an original anime series produced by MAPPA and directed and written by Sayo Yamamoto and original scripts written by Mitsuro Kubo. It aired from October to December 2016 with 12 episodes, and was arguably one of the most-talked about anime series during that season as well as garnering record BD sales in Japan that year. It also got the attention of international figure skaters, with some of them noting their likenesses to the characters or even performing routines from the show.

Crunchyroll, which streamed the series as it aired in Japan, describes the series as thus:

“Yuri Katsuki carried the hope of all Japan on his shoulders in the Figure Skating Grand Prix, but suffered a crushing defeat in the finals. He returned to his hometown in Kyushu and hid away in his family’s home, half wanting to continue skating and half wanting to retire. That was when the five-time consecutive world champion, Viktor Nikiforov, suddenly showed up with his teammate, Yuri Plisetsky, a young skater starting to surpass his seniors. And so the two Yuris and the Russian champion Viktor set out to compete in a Grand Prix like none the world has ever seen!”

Source: Anime News Network