SWORD OF WIND
Western Outlaw Star fans have posted about two Outlaw Star sequels for
a long time but didn't delve very far. The first is Outlaw Star 2:
Sword of Wind which was intended to be a direct OVA sequel to the
anime. The second is Outlaw Star 2: Retaliation, assumed to be a manga
sequel but little information is available aside from a few pictures of
the
XGP and a city. For that reason you'll find Retaliation and any other
manga information in the manga section.
Sword of Wind was planned by Morning Star Studios in 1998 as an OVA
sequel to the anime. Although Takehiko Ito was involved with the anime
adaptation a lot of the manga's story and its theme was changed
heavily. He only had limited creative control. This time, however, he
planned this sequel entirely on his own and presumably with other staff
in his studio.
In 2002 he started sharing some information about this planned OVA
online. It's also to be assumed that during these years Morning Star
liaised with Bandai as they're more flexible than Sunrise Studios who
produced the anime, whereas Bandai held the license.
Unfortunately, in the same year that Takehiko Ito shared this media his
project was shut down. It could be a coincidence but we simply don't
know. You might however consider this fortunate as you might not like
Sword of Wind's storyline. (At least, a good few people on Outlaw Star
Nexus felt that way.) This is a full (perhaps with a few
inaccuracies) translation of the original webpage created by Takehiko
Ito. He had this to say about the project's demise:
"Hello. My
name is Takehiko Ito. I can speak a little English. You looks project
in my site contents. It's plan for Outlaw Star 2. But, that title is
only plan and frozen yet. We planning new and different project now.
Sorry. I love Outlaw Star too. Maybe I continue Outlaw Star by comic.
Thank you!"
If you've read the PDF you'll know the basic gist of
the story; Fred goes to the Oracion system and tries to arrange a
business deal with the Links group but is refused. His transport ship
explodes. Gene is no longer working with Jim, and to make matters worse
Melfina isn't either as she's gone to college and has become a
supporting character. Now three years after the end of Outlaw Star,
Gene is working with a spacecraft engineer called Dr. Sputnik who
happens to be
working on a ship called the Sword of Wind that even surpasses the
XGP's capabilities. He has a daughter called Diva who Jim is attracted
to. That's a summary of what we knew with only two low-res images in
that PDF. Good news, though! That was 2011. Since then we found one of
Takehiko
Ito's doujinshi which contains some extra concept art... (More further
on, too!)
 
|
