Related reads:Goblin Slayer Creator Kumo Kagyu Breaks Down Anime Adaptation of BLADE & BASTARD (EXCLUSIVE)
IGN Otaku Update is IGN India’s original column series exclusively dedicated to covering the animanga fandom and market.
We already spoke to Kumo Kagyu about writing Blade & Bastard, a story built on Wizardry’s oldest promise: adventurers die, get resurrected, or turn to ash, and none of it is treated as unusual. Now, in this edition of IGN Otaku Update, we sit down with the two people responsible for turning that premise into thirty-minute episodes. Tomoki Kobayashi, who previously directed Akame ga Kill! and Remake Our Life!, is directing the anime. Naruhisa Arakawa, whose credits range from Blue Seed and Kamen Rider Kuuga to Chitose Is in the Ramune Bottle, is writing the series composition, the job of deciding how a novel’s chapters become episodes.
Between them, Kobayashi and Arakawa broke down what changes when Iarumas, a memory-wiped adventurer who barely speaks, has to carry a season of television, and why the anime is choosing action over exposition to establish a world most viewers will never have played. Arakawa also explained how he decides where one novel’s story should end and another’s should begin on screen, and Kobayashi explained why he’d rather viewers know nothing going in.
Rayan Sayyed: Please introduce yourself to our readers.
Tomoki Kobayashi: My name is Tomoki Kobayashi, and I am serving as the director of the anime adaptation of BLADE & BASTARD.
Naruhisa Arakawa: My name is Naruhisa Arakawa. I’m a screenwriter, and I’m serving as the series composer for BLADE & BASTARD. I’ve been doing this work for a long time, but whenever I’m working on an adaptation, one of the most difficult questions is always how to translate what makes the original work so compelling into a visual medium.
If you had to introduce Blade & Bastard to someone who knows nothing about it, what would you want them to understand about its world before they watch the anime?
Tomoki Kobayashi: When it comes to people experiencing BLADE & BASTARD for the first time through the anime, I actually try not to tell them too much about what they should know beforehand. Of course, that’s because the original novels and manga have such a richly crafted world and so much appeal of their own. But when watching the anime, I’d love for viewers to go in with as few preconceived notions as possible and experience it with fresh eyes. If people come in with a fixed idea of what to expect, there’s always a chance they’ll think, “This isn’t what I imagined.” And that can take away from the sense of discovery and surprise that makes experiencing a new story so exciting. Personally, when I watch something as a fan, I also prefer to go in knowing as little as possible. So first and foremost, I hope viewers will simply immerse themselves in the energy and intensity of the anime itself. Then, if something captures their interest, they can watch it again, explore the original novels and manga, and dive even deeper into the world. As a creator, nothing would make me happier than seeing people discover their own ways of enjoying the series.
Naruhisa Arakawa: I think it’s enough to start with the basic premise: “This is a fantasy story about adventurers taking on a dungeon.” But more than the dungeon itself, I think what really matters in this story is the question of why these people choose to enter it. If you pay attention to that, I think you’ll find the characters becoming more and more interesting as the story unfolds.
Looking back over the production so far, was there a moment where each of you realised, independently, that the anime had found its own identity rather than simply becoming an adaptation of the novels?
Tomoki Kobayashi: To be honest, there wasn’t a particular moment during production when I consciously thought, “This is what will define the anime,” or deliberately set out to establish a unique identity for it. Whenever I work on a project, my focus is simply on finding the most effective way to express that particular story. I become completely immersed in the work itself. Even after finishing a project, I usually find myself thinking about what I could have done better. That said, through all the trial and error, there are certainly moments when I feel, “This is something only I could have done.” If those choices ultimately help give the anime its own distinct identity and resonate with audiences, that would be incredibly rewarding. We’re still in the middle of that journey, but I hope that by approaching the work sincerely and wholeheartedly, the anime’s individuality will emerge naturally on its own.
Naruhisa Arakawa: With anime, a script becomes a storyboard, then visuals are added, and eventually the characters are given voices. Until all of those elements come together, there are aspects of the finished work that you simply can’t know for certain. So I think the moment when I really feel that the anime has established an identity of its own is still a little further down the road.
The novels spend a lot of time building tension through caution and uncertainty inside the dungeon. What became your biggest directing challenge in keeping that suspense alive in animation?
Tomoki Kobayashi: As you pointed out, the biggest challenge is working within a limited runtime. A novel has the freedom to take its time, gradually building tension through detailed descriptions and careful pacing. Anime, on the other hand, has to work within a fixed runtime. Figuring out how to recreate that same tension and atmosphere within those limits is always a significant challenge. For this adaptation, I see the core tension less as quiet suspense and more as something generated through action. Rather than trying to reproduce the exact pacing of the novel, we’re interpreting the story through a rhythm and structure that are unique to animation. We’re now entering the stage where the visuals will really begin to take shape, so the details of that approach are something we’re still refining. But I want to make sure that the tension comes through in a style of storytelling that only animation can achieve.
When deciding where the anime should begin and end its story, what factors mattered most? Character arcs, emotional payoff or practical episode structure?
Naruhisa Arakawa: Even when an individual novel works extremely well as a complete story, that doesn’t necessarily mean you can simply divide it up into episodes of a television series. Each episode needs its own dramatic progression, and the series as a whole also needs to leave viewers with a sense of satisfaction—that feeling that they’ve reached a meaningful point in the story. Of all those considerations, I think the most important is how far the characters have progressed emotionally. Even if an incident or plotline has reached a stopping point, if the characters are still in the middle of their emotional journey, the audience won’t necessarily feel that the story has reached an ending. Conversely, if the characters themselves arrive at a meaningful point, viewers can feel, “This was one complete story,” even if certain mysteries or problems remain unresolved. So what we look for is a point where three things can come together as naturally as possible: the divisions in the original novels, the emotional destination of the characters, and the structure of the individual episodes.
For readers who haven’t experienced the novels or Wizardry, what aspect of the series do you think best represents its identity?
Tomoki Kobayashi: To be completely honest, this is a work that fundamentally carries the DNA of Wizardry, and there are certainly elements that will resonate especially strongly with people who are familiar with that world. Because of that, it’s difficult to point to any single aspect and say, “This is what defines the series” for newcomers. But if I had to choose one, it would be the sense of adventure that comes from exploring the dungeon itself. For the anime adaptation in particular, we’ve placed a strong emphasis on action. So for viewers who have never experienced either the novels or Wizardry, I believe the excitement of the dungeon adventure and the action-driven storytelling are what best capture the essence of the series.
At what point did you feel you understood the identity of Blade & Bastard as something distinct from other dungeon fantasy series?
Naruhisa Arakawa: I realised it fairly early on. What immediately interested me was the protagonist, Iarumas. He has lost his memories and doesn’t even know who he is. And yet, the one thing he never stops doing is going into the dungeon. In a more conventional story, you might expect his primary goal to be recovering his past. But in this story, the question that remains with you is, “What exactly is this man searching for when he goes into the dungeon?” There’s something slightly unsettling about that, and I felt that quality was also connected to the appeal of the series as a whole. Then Raraja, Garbage, Berkanan, Orlaya, and the others gradually enter the picture, and people who normally seem as though they would never come together end up forming a party. That dynamic between the characters is another thing that, to me, feels uniquely BLADE & BASTARD. Incidentally, Orlaya is my personal favourite.
Blade & Bastard’s world comes from a video game (Wizardry) filtered through Kagyu’s prose first, rather than being a direct game or manga adaptation. Does that extra layer of interpretation change how you approach translating it to screen compared to your past adaptations?
Tomoki Kobayashi: Honestly, my basic approach doesn’t really change from one project to another. Every work has its own unique qualities and appeal, so the way I engage with each story is naturally different. But the core of my job remains the same: first, to fully understand the world of the work, and then to translate it into a visual medium without losing sight of its essence. What makes BLADE & BASTARD particularly challenging is that it’s not enough to understand only what’s written in the novels. You also need to understand the original setting and world of Wizardry that lies behind the story. Creating a coherent animated world that remains faithful to both Kagyu’s interpretation and the foundations of the game is an extremely rewarding challenge. In particular, when it comes to adapting and restructuring the material for animation, our series composer, Naruhisa Arakawa, has played a major role in that process and has put tremendous effort into shaping the story for the screen.
Arakawa, you’ve worked on adaptations across many genres. What immediately stood out to you when you first read Blade & Bastard?
Naruhisa Arakawa: I would say it was the way the story treats death. Normally, the death of a character is an enormously significant event in a story. But in this world, an adventurer dying in the dungeon isn’t necessarily anything extraordinary. Their body is recovered and taken to the temple, money is paid to resurrect them, and sometimes that resurrection fails. All of that is simply part of everyday life for an adventurer. Of course, none of these people want to die, and they fight desperately to survive. But because this isn’t a world where “death means everything is over,” their perception of death is quite different from ours. Corpses are a very familiar presence. Terrible things can happen, and yet the characters sometimes react with far more composure than you might expect. That dry, almost matter-of-fact attitude toward death was one of the things that struck me most when I first read the novels. And yet, the story never suggests that life itself is unimportant. I think that balance gives the series a very distinctive flavour.
Kobyasahi, you’ve spoken before about “scenario density” being one of the biggest challenges when adapting visual novels into anime, because there’s so much story and dialogue to condense. Although Blade & Bastard is adapting a novel rather than a visual novel, it also has its roots in a game. Did you encounter similar challenges when deciding what to keep, condense or leave out for the anime?
Tomoki Kobayashi: First of all, thank you for reading my previous interviews so closely. Deciding what to keep and what to leave out is one of the first major hurdles in any adaptation. However, the nature of that challenge is slightly different when adapting a visual novel compared with a prose novel. With visual novels, a large part of the difficulty comes from deciding which optional events and side content should be included. BLADE & BASTARD, however, is an outstanding novel with a strong narrative backbone, so preserving the central story is comparatively straightforward. The real challenge here lies in elements such as the dungeon systems, the process of exploration, and the game-inspired mechanics. If you wanted to, you could spend an endless amount of time exploring those elements in depth. Of course, if we had unlimited screen time, it would be interesting to delve into every detail. But with a limited number of episodes, it’s crucial to decide what should take center stage. For that reason, we’ve chosen not to focus too heavily on the technical details of dungeon exploration. Instead, we’ve built the series around battles with monsters and dynamic action sequences. Through those intense struggles, we believe the characters’ choices, values, and ways of life will naturally come through. Throughout the adaptation process, we’ve constantly asked ourselves what will work best visually and what will create the most compelling experience as an animated work.
I’ve always been curious about the role of a series composer during an adaptation. On a project like Blade & Bastard, do you begin by studying the novels and discussing them with Kumo Kagyu, or does Director Kobayashi first establish the overall direction before you start shaping the scripts? How does that collaboration actually work in practice?
Naruhisa Arakawa: It varies from project to project, but the series composer doesn’t simply divide up the original work alone and say, “All right, this is how we’re going to do it.” We begin by reading the original work, and then the director, producers, and other key staff discuss how much of the story we want to cover in the anime, how many episodes we have to do it, and what elements of the original we most want to preserve. Once we have that overall direction, my job is to take that material and ask, “All right, how do we turn this into a drama that works episode by episode?” Then we discuss it again with the director and the rest of the team, and when necessary, we ask the original author to review or confirm certain things. We repeat that process over and over. Especially when adapting an existing work, I don’t believe you can simply say, “It’s fine to change something as long as it makes the anime more entertaining.” First, you have to understand why a particular scene exists in the original, and why a particular line of dialogue is necessary. Only after understanding that do you consider the places where the form inevitably has to change because prose and animation are different media. In that sense, the work of series composition may be less about writing scripts than it is about making a continuous series of decisions about how to weave together the perspectives and intentions of everyone involved.
Iarumas is a withdrawn, emotionally flat protagonist by design. From a directing standpoint how do you keep a character like that interesting to watch over a full season?
Tomoki Kobayashi: Because Iarumas is fundamentally a character who doesn’t speak very much, portraying him as the protagonist presents a unique challenge. To make him compelling, we’ve focused on revealing who he is through the characters around him. Since he rarely expresses himself directly, characters like Raraja help bring out different aspects of his personality, while Ainikki has moments that almost feel as though she is speaking on his behalf, giving voice to his thoughts and emotions. In that sense, Iarumas is a character who is shaped not only by his own actions, but also through the perspectives, reactions, and words of the people around him.
Arakawa, were there moments where the novels worked perfectly on the page but needed a completely different approach once they became television episodes?
Naruhisa Arakawa:In a novel, you can spend several pages explaining a character’s inner thoughts or aspects of the world, and as long as the writing itself is engaging, it works. But if you have a character simply say all of that information out loud in an anime, the story can suddenly feel as though it has come to a complete stop. On the other hand, something that takes only a few lines in a novel can become an enormous scene once it’s translated into visuals. So rather than asking, “How do we turn this particular passage into animation?” I often think in terms of, “What did the reader feel when they read this scene, and what can we use in the anime to make the viewer feel the same thing?” Sometimes that means moving a scene to a different point in the story, or combining events that originally happened separately into a single sequence. But organising or restructuring information from the original work is not the same thing as changing what the original work means. That distinction is something I’m very careful about.
Kobayashi, for viewers who’ve never touched a Wizardry game, what visual or tonal choices are you making early in the anime to establish just how unforgiving this dungeon and its rules are?
Tomoki Kobayashi: While Wizardry is certainly the foundation of the setting, it’s important to remember that we’re adapting BLADE & BASTARD, not creating a direct adaptation of the game itself. With that in mind, one of our priorities has been making sure that the overall tone never feels too light. Both visually and emotionally, we’re aiming for a serious, hard-edged atmosphere that reflects the harsh realities of this world. Rather than spending a great deal of time explaining every rule and procedure of dungeon exploration, we’ve chosen to focus on the brutality of combat and the ever-present reality of life and death within the adventure. Given the limited runtime available to us, we felt it was more important to present the mechanics of dungeon exploration clearly and efficiently, while allowing the story to move forward through action and the consequences of survival.
Arakawa, you have written everything from Kamen Rider to Spice and Wolf, what’s a structural trick from tokusatsu writing that you didn’t expect to still be useful on something as dark and slow-burning as Blade & Bastard?
Naruhisa Arakawa: Tokusatsu shows have to fit an enormous number of elements into a limited amount of time. There’s the drama, the incident involving the monster, the action, and in a Super Sentai series, you may have a giant battle on top of all that. So you become very conscious of questions like: “What is the most important thing we want to show in this episode?” “Whose story is this?” and “What kind of emotional note should linger after the action is over?” BLADE & BASTARD unfolds much more quietly than those kinds of shows, but I think the fundamentals are actually the same. Just because a story is quiet doesn’t mean it can remain at exactly the same level of intensity from beginning to end. Even in a scene that consists entirely of dialogue, you need to build up small changes and discoveries. Something has to move forward, even if only by one step, in every scene. When those small steps accumulate over the course of an episode, they eventually create a much larger dramatic peak. So the sense I developed while working on more spectacular hero shows—of making sure that each individual episode works as a complete episode—may actually be even more useful on a series like this.
After so many years adapting different works, what continues to make series composition enjoyable for you? Conversely, what part of the job still feels the most demanding?
Naruhisa Arakawa: The first is when something gets a good reaction during a meeting. I also make a point of attending recording sessions whenever possible, and when I see the actors and the sound staff genuinely enjoying what we’ve created, that’s when I really feel the joy of the work. Those are immediate, honest reactions. On the other hand, one of the hardest parts of the job is also sitting in meetings and listening to all the different opinions about the scripts. Being a screenwriter is a rather difficult profession in that you deliberately go to meetings where people are going to criticize your work. So whenever I manage to make it through that process successfully, I feel an enormous sense of relief.
Rayan Sayyed is the deputy editor for IGN India who writes and speaks on pop culture, spanning from games, anime, manga to films and everything in between. You can reach out to him at rayan_sayyed@ign.com, or find him on Instagram @rayansayyed and Twitter/X @rayanaver
Got any news tips, or want to discuss a possible story? Email us at ign_india@ign.com (to reach out with confidential tips, click here). For the latest on gaming, entertainment, pop culture, anime/manga, follow IGN India on Instagram, X, Facebook, and WhatsApp. For the latest videos, subscribe to us on YouTube.
