Reinventing Anime Aesthetics: Junpei Mizusaki & Shinji Takagi Talk Low-Poly and “Yuragi” in Ninja Batman vs. Yakuza League

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“Ninja Batman vs. Yakuza League” has been available on various platforms since March 21st. Following the previous work “Ninja Batman”, Kamikaze Douga is producing the animation, Kazuki Nakashima is writing the script, and Noriyuki Okazaki is in charge of character design. In a complete departure from the previous work in which DC Comics’ Batman traveled back in time to the Sengoku period, the members of the Justice League appear as Yakuza in this work. The work is also full of playful gimmicks, such as an enka part by Wonder Woman and a nostalgic hand-drawn animation-style “Bat Phoenix” sortie part (sung by Mitsuko Horie). This work also uses new visual expression that makes use of the fluctuations created by low polygons. We asked director Junpei Mizusaki (CEO of Kamikaze Douga) and Shinji Takagi about the behind-the-scenes production of “Batman Ninja vs. Yakuza League,” the similarities between the TV series “Pop Team Epic” and “Batman Ninja” produced by Kamikaze Douga, and the intentions behind the first cut of this film. (Interview and composition: Kotaro Gosho/Anime Hack editorial department)
■ “Batman Ninja” in the previous film, in which the characters wore “full armor”
— The previous film, “Batman Ninja,” was made seven years ago.
Mizusaki: We started production around 2016, so it’s been more than nine years.
— “Batman Ninja” was the first feature-length film for Kamikaze Douga, which has mainly worked on short films and music videos. Looking back on the previous film, what do you think?
Mizusaki: Now that you’ve asked me, I suddenly remember that at the time, I still wasn’t 100% confident about making a 90-minute feature-length film. Can we really make a feature-length film? And with the desire to rush through without diluting the visuals for a feature-length film, we took on the challenge of Part A, with Takagi-san as a part director. Part A is about Batman, who travels back in time to the Sengoku period, trying to confront the Joker using modern weapons, but is easily outmaneuvered and defeated once, but I thought it would be interesting to cut out just this part as a dividing point in the story. In the unlikely event that the feature-length film is not completed, we could make a name for ourselves by making Part A the first of the short films, so I had arbitrarily divided it into two parts, saying that I would make the next one after this part was completed. When I made Part A with Takagi-san while thinking about this, I felt a great response, and thought, “Ah, this is possible,” and was able to continue making the feature-length film. Well, I’m sure that our client, Warner (Brothers Japan), would be in trouble if the feature-length film wasn’t completed (laughs), but for us, if there was a time to take a risk and pull it off, I thought it would be here. –So at the time of Part A, you were so intent on creating the ideal footage that you weren’t even thinking about what would come next.
Mizusaki: Part A was about 30 minutes long, which was just the right size for a TV show. Even so, it was on the longer side for Kamikaze Douga at the time. If you could make it this far without compromising, you could make it to the end, so you decided to stop there as your initial goal.
–Screenwriter Nakashima Kazuki is an indispensable member of the “Batman Ninja” series, but how did Nakashima and Kamikaze Douga first come together?
Mizusaki: You first met on “Batman Ninja.” I think it was the first time everyone met, including character designer Okazaki (Noshi).
–Was that the decision of animation producer Satomi (Tetsuro)-san (ed. note)?
Mizusaki: That was definitely Satomi-san. The same goes for sound director Iwanami (Miwa) and music composer Kanno (Yugo). In old film terms, they were the “Satomi team.” The staffing was in the palm of Satomi’s hand.

Editor’s note: Satomi Tetsuro is the animation producer representing Burnham Studios. He is also the CEO of the animation production company LIDEN FILMS.

–In a past interview, Satomi said that “Ninja Batman” was a project to “use Kamikaze Douga for peaceful purposes.”

Mizusaki: (laughs)
–I thought that a project like “Ninja Batman” was appropriate for Kamikaze Douga, a studio that creates amazing images, to make a feature-length film.

Mizusaki: It seems that Satomi thought that Kamikaze Douga had a very unique and interesting side to it. Satomi had been in contact with me for a while before “Ninja Batman,” and we had some contact, and I think he has a strong ability to see through the characteristics and shortcomings of studios and creators. In order to get Kamikaze Douga to steadily produce feature-length films, he probably thought that if he could assemble such a strong lineup, including the planning team, he would be able to reach his goal. That lineup included screenwriter Nakajima-san and character designer Okazaki-san, and I think that “Ninja Batman” was created while they were equipped with full armor.
■Words Takagi-san said to me 20 years ago
–When did Takagi-san and Kamikaze Douga first come into contact?
Takagi: Mizusaki-san and I had occasional contact for quite some time. We would often meet at events such as seminars and drinking parties in the CG industry, and we would talk a little and then part ways.
Mizusaki: I think the first time we met was during the production of “Steamboy” (2004) (Takagi-san was in charge of directing “Steamboy”). I think it was around the time Kamikaze Douga made the promotional video for “Number Five I” (written by Matsumoto Taiyo), which was serialized in “IKKI”. That was about 20 years ago.

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Takagi: I was very interested in the attempt to create interesting 2D anime-like images with 3DCG using the amazing technology called “Kamikaze Shader”. After that, I started working more in a producer-like position, and on one project I asked Kamikaze Douga to let me work with them as a creative supervisor. After that, Mizusaki asked me to direct a part of “Ninja Batman”. At first, I was surprised to hear what it would be like, and I was a little speechless (laughs), but when I heard what they were trying to do, it was very interesting. I like to do new things, and like “Steamboy” and “New SOS Great Tokyo Explorers” (directed by Takagi), I like to challenge myself to do things that no one else has done. With “Batman Ninja,” I was interested in the fact that it was Kamikaze Douga’s first feature film, so I participated. When I actually participated, I thought that working with Kamikaze Douga was interesting. It was a lot of fun. In the producer-like work I had done before that, there were many ties, and it was quite a tough situation. It was the same with “Hotarake no Shima: Haruka and the Magic Mirror” (2009) by Production I.G, where I participated as animation producer. Even then, rather than being fun, I was in a role where I had to say strict things.
Mizusaki: In the position of producer, there are times when you have to say strict things.
Takagi: That’s right. So, “Batman Ninja,” which I participated in creatively, was a job that really felt like heaven. Of course, there were difficult times, but everyone at Kamikaze Douga had a strong desire to “make good pictures” and “make something good,” so you could say that we were able to work on the same vector. I can’t say it was stress-free, but it was a lot of fun, and I think I did a good job.
Mizusaki: Of the “perfect lineup” that Satomi-san laid out that I mentioned earlier, Takagi-san was the one I asked to work on. I thought that if I asked Takagi-san to do Part A, we’d definitely be able to reach the finish line. If we could get that far, the rest would be fine, but from Part B onwards it got all weird (laughs). Part A is really solid.
Takagi: (laughs). I wonder… Well, maybe it is.
–It’s true, from Part B onwards big robots appear and so on.
Takagi: The script was incredible. Part A was incredible, but it just kept developing into more and more incredible things.

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Special release of footage from the movie “Batman Ninja” (castle fusion)

Mizusaki: Since we have the opportunity, can I talk a little more about Takagi-san? As I mentioned earlier, I first met Takagi-san when I was working on “Steamboy” and was taken to the Sunrise “Steamboy” studio by Ando (Hiroaki). At that time, I brought along footage of “Number Five: I” and said, “We’re trying something like this now.” At the time, I was a little scared that the people above me in 2D animation might have a negative impression of CG. Maybe it was because I often heard such comments, and in fact, I was sometimes told things like “This is nothing.” In the midst of all this, Takagi-san, a senior in the animation industry, was very kind and looked at our footage. “It’s great that you can do this. But if you do this more, it will go well with hand-drawn animation.” He said this casually and it really stuck in my head. I still repeat the words that Takagi-san gave me back then to my staff.
–What kind of advice did Takagi-san give you at that time?
Mizusaki: The brain gets nervous because something unexpected happens in one cut of movement. If the same movement continues with a certain rhythm, the brain can predict it and gets bored. Humans are creatures that can predict, so you can put random frames or still frames in the movement, or suddenly put in two frames of movement. When you do that, the brain instinctively thinks, “Oh, I have to keep watching this.” That’s why animation is interesting, he said casually after looking at the footage we brought with us. At the time, there weren’t many seniors in the industry who looked favorably on the CG images we made, which were just imitations of hand-drawn animation, so Takagi-san suddenly became a big presence in my mind and became an unshakable position. Then, as Takagi-san said, I often met him at CG seminars and events, and he is a person who greets people very well — greetings are important, aren’t they — and that’s how I ended up having him help me with “Batman Ninja.” Another thing is that when Takagi-san was working as a producer, he was given the job at Kamikaze Douga, and although I couldn’t say this at the time, I thought he was a little lost at the time.

Takagi: (wry smile)

Mizusaki: “Huh? Is this person the type to be a producer? I thought he might be the type to work with us at a desk.” Of course, he has always had a side as a producer, and I think there are good things about that, but I also wanted him to return to working on site. After building a relationship of trust over such a long period of time, we started working together on the previous film, “Batman Ninja.” Even so, I was a little worried that he might get angry about the content of “Batman Ninja” (laughs), but he ran through it to the end, so I thought it would be fine this time too.
■ Giving character movements “wavering” information using low polygons

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–As you mentioned in other interviews, when you finished making “Batman Ninja,” you suddenly heard from the screenwriter Nakajima that “Batman Ninja” was going to be a trilogy. After that, when the planning for the second film, “Yakuza League,” started moving, why did the motif become the Yakuza?
Mizusaki: I often had interviews with Nakajima, and he said from the first film that “after ninjas, it’s yakuza.” I didn’t know why he chose the yakuza (laughs). However, the existence of ninjas from the Sengoku period is widespread as something that is globally understood in Japanese culture, and in the same way, the word yakuza seems to be surprisingly globally understood in the world of movies and games. Nakajima said something like, “Everyone knows it.”
Takagi: I’m quite close in age to Nakajima, and many of the movies that our generation watched in our teens were period dramas and yakuza movies that left lasting memories, so I think that may have had an influence on me.

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–“Yakuza League” is Kamikaze Douga’s second feature film. While there are parts that follow from the first film, I think there were many new challenges in animation. When I saw the film, I felt that it was a new challenge in the character design of the Yakuza League members. I thought this was the so-called “shadowless drawing” in hand-drawn animation.
Mizusaki: (nods)
–I was watching and thinking how amazing it was to express the wrinkles on Wonder Woman’s neck with just one line. At first glance, the filming didn’t look like it was thickly layered, and I thought that the characters were moved with simple lines, which is what is particularly different this time.
Mizusaki: What you just said is exactly what is new and unique to this film. We made a few music videos for songs from Sturgill Simpson’s album “Sound & Fury” (2019), and we used technology developed by Director Mizuno Takanobu of “The Duel” to create the characters using so-called low-polygons.
–When you say low-polygons, do you mean something like the original “Virtua Fighter”? (Editor’s note)
Mizusaki: That’s it in simple terms. The characters are made using low-polygons, and we don’t give much information about the composite (filming). Furthermore, the vertices of the characters aren’t fixed in place, so the CG is put together in a way that creates a wobble when they move. For “Sound & Fury,” Okazaki also drew the characters for us, and instead of simply reproducing Okazaki’s drawings, we created them with a subtractive approach, saying things like “This kind of expression is interesting,” and “This kind of expression might also be possible,” and Okazaki was very pleased with it. He said that he appreciates the reproduction of his own drawings, but is also happy when a skilled person makes some slight adjustments to create a dynamic expression. So when he realized that “this expression was possible in Okazaki’s drawings,” he thought that it might be good to have some characters like that in “Yakuza League,” and I think that was the beginning of incorporating low-polygon expression. This expression has many advantages, but the number of polygons cannot be reduced automatically, but must be reduced tastefully. Low-polygons are actually quite difficult.
Editor’s note: Polygons are polygonal shapes made up of points (vertices) and lines (edges) that are used to express 3DCG on a computer. In 3DCG, various shapes are created by combining polygon models. Low-polygons refer to a small number of polygons, and to use an analogy from the interview, the latest “Virtua Fighter 6” has a significantly higher number of polygons than the original “Virtua Fighter.”
*At this point, Mizusaki showed us a video of “Sound & Fury” that he had prepared in advance on his laptop (the video embedded below is a clip from the Netflix film “Sturgill Simpson: Sound & Fury,” which is a compilation of multiple “Sound & Fury” animated music videos produced by Kamikaze Douga).

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–Looking at this, it’s easy to see that this is the basis for the low-polygon expression of “Yakuza League”.
Takagi: I also helped with “Sound & Fury”, but it was difficult to know how to subtract.
Mizusaki: It requires drawing skills to draw the characteristics of a character by limiting the number of vertices, but I thought that our in-house staff had enough of that ability, so I thought we could do it. So, for the Yakuza League characters, we subtracted Okazaki’s drawings and sculpted them with low polygons. The biggest advantage of doing this is that the data becomes lighter. Also, even with animation, the animation labor hours are actually low in the sense that the characters look good even if they don’t move much because the fluctuations are given in advance. I had the idea that by mixing this low animation labor hours into the whole, we could reproduce Nakajima’s epic volume of script.

3DC CG model of Wonder Woman
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–In the previous film, “Batman Ninja,” there was an idyllic part that depicted the Joker’s sad past with hand-drawn animation. I wondered if there was an intention to express that part in 3DCG.
Mizusaki: We had done low-polygon expression in “Sound & Fury” before the idyllic part, so I don’t think that was the case. As for the idyllic part, it didn’t feel strange to have that part in a feature-length film, and I realized that the viewers would get properly involved in the story, which was a big factor. That part was a part that many great animators were involved in.
–Indeed, in the audio commentary included in the Blu-ray of “Batman Ninja,” you said that it was a gamble to see how the idyllic part would be received until the audience saw it.
Takagi: It was the same with “Steamboy,” which I participated in as a director, but it’s very important to balance the amount of information when creating a work. Also, if you don’t give the characters some amount of information, they will be overwhelmed by the amount of information in the background. Basically, the background is detailed and realistic, so if you reduce the number of lines for the characters on that background, you then have to increase their movement, and so you have to increase the amount of information somewhere. The method that Mizusaki used in “Yakuza League” was to reduce the number of polygons, but by adding fluctuation to compensate, a good, mysterious movement was created, and I think it was a method that achieved a balance in terms of the total amount of information.
Mizusaki: Because the animation preview is light, I think it also allows the animators to do more trial and error.
Takagi: That’s another benefit, isn’t it?
Mizusaki: I think that this method of creating low-polygon character design and character movement is a step toward new expression.
Takagi: In “Yakuza League,” the characters were created using two shaders: the fluctuating shader I just mentioned and the dense shader used in the previous work, and the characters in the style of the previous work were a bit heavy to work with (laughs).

Editor’s note: A shader is a program that displays people and objects created in 3D space on a 2D screen.

Mizusaki: That’s right (laughs). Both rendering (ed. note) and compositing.

Editor’s note: Rendering is the process of processing and calculating data to draw videos and images. The heavier the original data is, the longer it takes to render.

Takagi: I think we made it quite light at the time, but looking at it now, the data is quite complex and there are an incredible number of layers, so I thought it was difficult. The images are very good, but we had some trouble handling the data.

Mizusaki: When we were working on “Ninja Batman,” we even drew Okazaki’s drawing style into the characters.
Takagi: What’s even more amazing about Mizusaki is how he links the low polygon technique to the existence of the characters. The Yakuza League characters are depicted as unstable because they are from a different dimension than Batman and the others.
–I see. So that’s how well he thought about it.
Takagi: That’s right. Batman and the others can see them because they are affected by the distortion of space-time, but they are very unstable characters who exist in the multiverse, so they are drawn that way.
–Indeed, there was a line in the work that said something like “their existence has not been determined.”
Takagi: I thought Mizusaki’s idea of linking the setting in the work with the animation expression was amazing. This method was also used in the previous work, “Ninja Batman,” and the background until Batman and the others recover after being defeated by the Joker is made to look like a Japanese painting. The depiction of the sky is distinctive, and it is made to look like a Japanese painting by mixing in lines like cloud patterns, but from the point where Batman awakens and confronts him, the expression of the background changes. I think you could say it’s an applied version of that.
Mizusaki: When I was working on “Ninja Batman,” I wanted to do the “when in Rome, do as the Romans do.” Batman brought in Gotham City equipment and tried to force his way to victory, but he lost once. But the moment he decided that he had to get his feet firmly on the ground, his perspective changed.
–So you’re linking the story to the visuals, right?
Mizusaki: I like that kind of thing.
Takagi: In animation, the art style and drawing style are usually not changed from the start, but by linking it well with the story, the expression method can be changed as well. In “The Yakuza League,” the Yakuza League members are drawn with a fluctuating look, but when they finally get back on their feet and try to help everyone, they change to the same look as Batman and the others. In this way, the changes in visuals are also designed to link with the story.

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“Batman Ninja vs. Yakuza League” Batman Family Character Clip

–In “Yakuza League,” are the 3DCG models of Batman and the others following those of the previous work? Although not as much as the Yakuza League, Batman and the others also seemed to have slightly less shadow.
Mizusaki: The models of Batman and the others are the same. We want to use the resources from the previous work as they are. However, we may have slightly reduced the shadows so that the difference with the Yakuza League is not too great.
Takagi: It is basically the same as the previous work, but I think there have been some adjustments. As Mizusaki said, when they are shown on the same screen as the flatly drawn Yakuza League members, they will look a bit out of place if they are the same as before, so we have made some adjustments to make them look just right.
Mizusaki: The difference in the background may also have an effect on how the whole thing looks. In the previous film, “Batman Ninja,” the art was done in 2D by Bihou (the name of the background company, pronounced “Bihou”) from start to finish, but in “Yakuza League,” the CG for Yakuza Tokyo was made with Unreal Engine (ed. note).

Editor’s note: Unreal Engine is a real-time 3D production tool from Epic Games. It is known for its use as a game engine in game development, and in recent years it has also been used in domestic animation production.

–I see. I was wondering when I saw the end credits, but Unreal Engine was used there.

Mizusaki: Batman and his friends’ Gotham City side is 2D, while the Yakuza League’s Yakuza Tokyo side is made with Unreal Engine CG, so the backgrounds are also differentiated depending on the world.

Takagi: We used two types of shaders for the characters, and the backgrounds were both hand-drawn 2D and Unreal Engine CG, so it was really difficult to achieve the overall balance. It was quite nerve-wracking and an exciting task.
–From the perspective of the creator, it’s not that “mixing is dangerous”–
Takagi: It’s definitely “mixing is dangerous” (laughs). In my previous work, I tried to avoid mixing those elements as much as possible, such as stuffing, but with “Yakuza League,” they were mixed from the beginning, so I was a little hesitant.
Mizusaki: However, Kamikaze Douga has surprisingly mixed them up until now.
Takagi: I know very well that that’s the Kamikaze Douga way of making things (laughs). However, in order to match the two types of characters and backgrounds well, we made careful calculations, such as making changes to the light here on the timeline, so it’s okay to make changes.
Mizusaki: It’s good to have two directors like that. One who says “We can do it,” and one who says “No, we have to do it properly,” so we can take completely opposite approaches.
■Similarities between “Ninja Batman” and “Pop Team Epic”
–I think I understand now why there are two directors. Specifically, how do you and Mizusaki-san divide up the work?
Mizusaki: As you can sense from what we’ve said so far, I’m on the planning side, the side that tries to get the ideas out on film. Takagi-san is the side that puts it into practice on location, so he was closer to the location in terms of vector. There are some silly parts along the way, but I’m in charge of those so as not to bother Takagi-san.
Takagi: I leave those parts completely up to Mizusaki-san. The normal parts are normal parts, and there’s a lot of material and a lot to do, so I’m in charge of those, and when it comes to changing the flavor a little, Mizusaki-san is free to use his ideas to his heart’s content.
Mizusaki: I’m in charge of the parts that don’t require much attention to the overall balance, like the opening, the pop-up picture book and rake parts, the enka parts, and the retro animated “Batman Phoenix” part.
Takagi: Kamikaze Douga has a lot of excellent directors, so Mizusaki chose from among them and moved forward.
Mizusaki: It’s like “Pop Team Epic” (laughs)
–Kamikaze Douga used various kinds of animation, such as sand animation, and individual creators, like an animation exhibition, in the TV series “Pop Team Epic” and “Gyaru to Dinosaur”. I felt the same approach in “Yakuza League”, but do you have a desire to include animation with various expressions?
Mizusaki: I feel that way too. Also, the world of animation tends to be dominated by the director, so when we were working on “Pop Team Epic”, we had the idea that it would be nice to have an opportunity to showcase the work of various creators, including our staff and young people. I thought it would be nice to have a place where everyone’s films could be broadcast on terrestrial TV. This was possible because of the strong creative power of Okawa Bukubu, and we knew that with such a strong and solid original manga, no matter what creators did, they would not be able to jump out of the world of “Pop Team Epic”, so we were able to do that. Nakashima Kazuki’s script for “Batman Ninja” is also very strong, isn’t it? Even if it’s a script, no matter what other creators do, it can’t come out of Nakajima’s hand. In that sense, with both “Pop Team Epic” and “Batman Ninja,” Nakashima does try to avoid any accidents, but I think that his experience has taught him that if there is an original story or script with a strong core of the author’s personality, this is what you can do.
— In the old TV series and OVAs, it was interesting that the directors and animators would say whatever they wanted without choosing their words, and it would end up on the screen as it was. It feels like that’s becoming more and more difficult to do that now.
Mizusaki: That may be true. You can’t ruin the drawings either. –As for the parts of “Yakuza League” that you were in charge of that had a different feel, I’m not sure if I can call it a playground, but is it like you set things up and directed them to a certain extent because this is the concept, and then let the creators create what they like?

Mizusaki: When I watch high-quality animation and TV series these days, I really feel that it’s becoming very important to maintain things like not changing the character’s drawings. Moreover, if the original is a manga that is popular worldwide, it’s wonderful to not change the worldview and do it with a true craftsmanship. I think that’s also the foundation of the current boom in Japanese animation. On the other hand, I also feel like it’s okay to have a little fun, and especially with American comics, various artists use various expressions based on one original work. I’ve loved “Tom and Jerry” since I was a child, and that work has a variety of drawings. I don’t know if the individuality of the director or animation director is respected, but I remember watching the show as an elementary school student and thinking, “Oh, it’s this person’s drawing today,” when there was a strangely gaudy Tom. I’ve come this far thinking that a certain degree of inconsistency is acceptable, so maybe that’s why I’m okay with images with different styles in “Pop Team Epic” and “Yakuza League.” As I said at the beginning, I don’t deny the importance of stabilizing the drawings, and I think that’s what’s good about Japanese anime these days, which is trusted around the world, but I do think it’s good to have people like this (laughs).

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–One of the good things about 3DCG animation is that if you create a model of the character, the image won’t collapse like hand-drawn animation. I think that the fact that they deliberately bring in the concept of fluctuation with low polygons is also an interesting thing that is typical of Kamikaze Douga.
Takagi: The points where the different tastes of the parts in “Yakuza League” are included are carefully selected. This is a turning point in the story, so it’s okay to make it a long shot like a PV, or it’s a part where there’s explanatory dialogue, so they make the video in a different taste so that the audience doesn’t get bored. Because it fits into the story without any breaks, I think that even if the video has a different taste, it can return to the original without any sense of incongruity.
Mizusaki: Especially in the case of “Yakuza League,” it’s also big because it’s the second movie. The biggest thing about Batman being a ninja is that he’s allowed to do it. I think that the creators felt that they were allowed to do a lot of things because they started out feeling that they had been given permission.

■Enka part: “Japanese people make California rolls”
–How much of Nakajima’s script was written into the part where Wonder Woman sings enka?

Mizusaki: …I guess it wasn’t in the script.

Takagi: No, it wasn’t. It was the same with the “Bat Phoenix” part, but I think it was only one line.

Mizusaki: With “Yakuza League,” I want to do it without cutting back on Nakajima’s script. That was my big theme at the start, but when I actually started, I couldn’t hold back at some point and I wanted to mess around a little in a good way (laughs). When I thought about the balance when it became a video, Nakajima’s script has very interesting explanations of the story, but there are people who are willing to listen to those explanations, and there are also people who find the explanations difficult. In those places, I thought that if I changed the picture a little, such as putting in a picture book or a rake, the viewers would listen to the lines properly.
Takagi: Even though it’s a feature-length film, it’s only about 90 minutes long, so if you try to fit the whole story into that, there are bound to be parts that need explaining. For the scene where Robin and Alfred are talking at the sushi bar, we thought about how we could make the viewer listen to the information necessary for the film without getting bored, and we constructed the scene while being creative.

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[Go! Bat Phoenix!!] “Batman Ninja vs. Yakuza League”

–When I saw the “Bat Phoenix” scene, I thought a different anime had suddenly started, and I almost fell off my chair in the screening room.
Everyone: (laughs)
Takagi: That scene is also a turning point where Batman heads back to Yakuza Tokyo, but it’s a gag, isn’t it? They deliberately recreated the old anime, and did all sorts of things, like adding pops and rattles.
Mizusaki: Let’s change the subject a bit, but changing the texture of the Yakuza League members is a creative idea, but it’s also from a managerial perspective. They give various reasons, such as because the time and space are different, but it’s also because of costs. Going along those lines, the “Bat Phoenix” part was the first to be completed in “Yakuza League.”

–Really? (laughs)
Mizusaki: Not a single cut had been done for the others (laughs). That’s because we had to fill in the (production) lines of our in-house team, and that was the only part we could do without a CG model. So that part was completed first, and normally we would show the client the finished part, but if we showed that part to DC first, they might get angry and say, “The picture is different,” so we decided not to show it to them for a while (laughs).
Takagi: Even if we showed them “This is all we’ve done!”, they might misunderstand and say, “What are you guys making?” (laughs)

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Mizusaki: I wanted to include the enka part from the beginning. The previous work was watched a lot overseas, so I thought this one would also be watched because of the Yakuza theme, so I had a strong desire to include Japanese enka, which is disappearing. I wanted to include the first verse of the enka in full, and even the second verse, but I was stopped (laughs). But I think I could have made it to the second verse. That’s because in episode 5 of “Mobile Suit Gundam THE ORIGIN” (※ “V Clash at Loum”), there is a scene where (Claure) Hamon, who is sad about the war, plays the piano a lot and sings, and he sings up to the second verse. When I was watching it, I thought, “Eh, he’s going to sing up to the second verse?”
Takagi: There was also the matter of the length… Mizusaki: In “Yakuza League,” I made it a gag at the end, but I had them confidently sing up to the first verse. Because in “Gundam THE ORIGIN,” they sang up to the second verse, so I thought the first verse would be too short (laughs).
–The enka scene reminded me of the old movie “Shurayukihime.”
Mizusaki: It’s common for enka to be included in movies like that.
Takagi: “Kill Bill” was made by (Quentin) Tarantino, who was a fan of “Shurayukihime,” out of respect for the film, but “Yakuza League” feels like we, the original Japanese, tried to make something similar.
Mizusaki: It was the same with the previous film, but “Ninja Batman” itself is like a Japanese person making a California roll (laughs). We went abroad once and tried our best to make something that was “this is what it’s like.”
–What kind of orders did you give to create the kind of visuals you wanted for “Bat Phoenix”?
Mizusaki: That scene doesn’t suddenly change the worldview or characters, it’s just “…that’s the way to ride video”, and the theme was that it was an animation made by Alfred, the grandfather, so it turned out that way. That part was done by Sanshiki (Daisuke), and he seemed to be really into it, and I remember him showing it off with a big show of pride (laughs).
Takagi: Sanshiki also did a lot of mecha-related designs for other parts.
■Kizaki Fumitomo’s image boards, and Roma no Fu Higa’s achievements
–From the previous work “Bat Ninja Batman”, Kizaki (Fumitomo), known for “Basilisk (The Koga Ninja Scrolls)”, has been involved in image boards and storyboards.
Takagi: He also drew a lot of key pictures for the previous work. It is characterized by anime-like pictures and composition, and scenes are divided into frames like American comics.
Mizusaki: It’s a (manga) name, isn’t it? Following the previous film, we asked them to do the same for “Yakuza League.”

Image board drawn by Fumitomo Kizaki
DC LOGO, BATMAN and all related characters and elements(C) & ™ DC. (C) 2024 Warner Bros.

Image board drawn by Kizaki Fumitomo
DC LOGO, BATMAN and all related characters and elements(C) & ™ DC. (C) 2024 Warner Bros.

Takagi: There is no original work for “Ninja Batman.” At first, there is only Nakajima’s text-based scenario, so we ask Kizaki to draw what it would look like if it were an American comic. We take the good parts from that and reconstruct it as a storyboard in a film-like connection. This worked really well for the previous work. Even when directing, we could go back to the image board drawn by Kizaki and make choices like, “I think this part is cool, so I’ll put it in the layout.” In terms of the process, there was also the advantage that we could settle on a good taste while suppressing the variation by having Kizaki draw the image board first, rather than immediately turning Nakajima’s scenario into a storyboard.
Mizusaki: We also wanted to reduce retakes of the storyboard. I felt that if we went straight into the storyboard from Nakajima’s script and tried to faithfully reproduce what was written in the scenario, it would end up being a bit stiff, so we were able to create standards between the lines of the scenario, saying, “It’s okay to have some fun with it,” using Kizaki’s board. When the board was drawn, Takagi and I would make various requests, such as “I want this scene to be like this,” or “It’s not in the script, but I want him to wear these clothes.” One of the things that came out of this was putting Nightwing in a brightly colored suit like a gaming PC, and the goal was to visualize those parts that weren’t in the script in the form of an image board.
Takagi: We had them draw pictures, including ideas that weren’t in the script, and then they went through the storyboard and became the final footage.
Mizusaki: It may seem like a lot of work, but in the end, it reduced the number of retakes in the storyboard, and there were no table-flipping incidents at the storyboard stage.
Takagi: The reason there were few retakes in the storyboards is because Roma no Fu Higa and others have been working on it since the previous film, but having Kizaki’s image board was a big help.
Mizusaki: The storyboard artist Roma no Fu Higa also made a big contribution.
Takagi: Roma no Fu Higa is very knowledgeable about DC works, and when we were storyboarding, he would draw things like “This part pays homage to past works,” which was very helpful. We weren’t able to use all of that, but I think it was very important to have someone with that kind of knowledge participate.
■Intention hidden in the first cut
— “Yakuza League” is a work with a lot of information, and I think there are many points that you wouldn’t notice on first viewing. Please tell us what is interesting to watch from the second time onwards.
Takagi: The first cut that starts after the DC logo is probably something that the viewer doesn’t know what they’re going through. I drew the storyboard for that part, and the camera passes through clouds and other structures at high speed and finally zooms in to Robin’s bedroom, but it’s actually passing through the Yakuza Tower in Yakuza Tokyo.
–Oh, I see.
Takagi: Lars goes to the Yakuza Tower and tries to bring Robin back to him, right? That’s how he tries to drag her in, and that’s what we see in the first cut.

DC LOGO, BATMAN and all related characters and elements(C) & ™ DC. (C) 2024 Warner Bros.
–I see! That’s why Robin’s hairstyle has changed.
Takagi: That’s right. It actually depicts Ra’s, who was searching for Robin from the Yakuza Tower, finding out where Robin is.
–You wouldn’t understand this at first glance.
Takagi: I don’t think you’ll understand it even if you watch it for the first time or no matter how many times you watch it (laughs), but that was the intention.
–Mizusaki, if you have anything to say, please let us know.
Mizusaki: I’d love for you to find out which part of Shinjuku is the motif for the scene where Flash and Red Robin are chased. The underground parking lot and the vending machines there are also modeled after real places (※After the interview, it was announced at the Shinjuku Subnade official site that the Shinjuku Subnade parking lot is the setting).
–Is the shrine-like place Hanazono Shrine?
Mizusaki: That is Hanazono Shrine. We got permission to use it.
–Speaking of locations, the “Iseya” sign that appears when Batman and Robin arrive at Yakuza Tokyo at the end of the opening scene is…
Mizusaki: It’s Kichijoji (※Iseya is a long-established izakaya near Inokashira Park in Kichijoji). Yodobashi Camera and Parco also appear, but I think Kichijoji is the only place in Tokyo where they can be found.
Takagi: We chose Kichijoji to have Oana (※Wonder Woman) and the others be a little away from Tokyo, where the Yakuza Tower is. We made the Inokashira Pond as large as possible, like a lake, and there is a shot where you can see the whole view from above. In the end, we made it so that everyone heads from Kichijoji to Shinjuku, and we also created a map that shows the general streets they should take, such as Nakano-sakaue.
–Finally, please tell us how you feel after finishing making “Yakuza League.”
Takagi: I enjoyed the previous work, but I wasn’t involved in all the parts, so I enjoyed it as a single work, but there were some parts that I think I might have done differently. This time, I was involved in “Yakuza League” as a director, so I was able to include what I would have done in the whole project, and I felt a sense of satisfaction that I had accomplished something. It was also fun to create the images together with the excellent staff at Kamikaze Douga, while making use of the know-how I had cultivated in the works I had done up until now. On the other hand, it was difficult because we were hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, and we were unable to work well with some of the external staff, so we had to take over some parts, which is something I regret.
Mizusaki: The regret that Takagi mentioned was that our control was weak. Normally, we would visit the external companies many times to get the foundations right in the early stages, and we would become close friends and move on to the second half, but because of the COVID-19 pandemic, all of our conversations had to be done over the monitor. There were some parts where we misjudged the overall volume of the work, and the production itself took much longer than expected, which was also difficult.
Takagi: It was pretty tense at the end. I don’t think viewers would understand, but there were many parts towards the end where we were just brute-forcing the pictures on set (laughs).
Mizusaki: There were a lot of good scenes in the parts that Takagi worked hard on at the end. If we were to make a trailer after the release, there are a lot of cuts that I would like to include.
Takagi: You and Mizusaki never clashed in opinion until the very end. Strangely enough, we were thinking in the same direction, and some might think that one person would be enough as the director, but I think it was great that we were able to work with two horsepower. We would both check it, and if one of us said it was good, the other would not object, and we would just say, “That’s right,” and move forward in most cases. Well, with two directors, it may have been difficult for the staff, since there were twice as many opinions…
Mizusaki: As a result of the checks, there were times when twice as many retakes were handed down, so I think it was difficult for the staff.
Takagi: Even when the two of us had our own opinions, we were able to release them with the same line of thinking without any clashes, so I think that was good, but overall we may not have had to compromise much.
–Finally, Mizusaki, please tell us your thoughts on releasing your second feature film as the representative of Kamikaze Douga.
Mizusaki: Takagi mentioned some things he regrets, but we can’t say that we were able to create perfect images in every detail. There are many things we wish we had done more of, or that we could have done this way, but I think we were able to reach the best possible conclusion as something we made based on someone else’s IP and within a deadline and budget.It will be enjoyable for first-time viewers who are unfamiliar with the DC worldview, and we have a strong feeling from the first screening at “Tokyo Comic Con” that it will be fine to see how well it will reach those who love DC works and know them well. We still have a few things we wish we could have done differently, but we are confident in the sense that we were able to make it as enjoyable as possible for fans. We hope you will watch it over and over again on streaming.