The Solo Leveling anime adaptation recently released its second episode, and with it came the debut of its impressive opening and ending animations, which can be viewed on Aniplex’s YouTube channel.
The opening sequence, which contains delicious action animation, credits Korea’s STUDIO PPURI for production assistance. The studio has worked on animated trailers for games like Blue Archive and Honkai Impact 3. Choi Inseung storyboarded and directed the animation.
Meanwhile, the experimental psychological thriller-like ending sequence is directed by Production I.G’s Hiromu Oshiro (“THE BINARY – Tadashii Kanjou” music video). Oshiro, who has motion graphics credits in Solo Leveling and shows like Tengoku Daimakyou and Sword Art Online: Alicization – War of Underworld, is also credited with the 3DCG, compositing, editing, and grading.
Solo Leveling premiered in Japan on January 6 (effectively January 7 at 12 AM JST) and is streamed by Crunchyroll, Bilibili, and Netflix overseas. It was initially announced with a 2023 release date.
Solo Leveling originated as a Korean web novel written by Chugong and illustrated by Dubu, which later inspired a webtoon drawn by the latter. H-Goon is credited with adapting Solo Leveling in the later volumes of the webtoon’s Japanese publication.
Staff
• Director: Shunsuke Nakashige (Mother of the Goddess’ Dormitory)
• Series composer: Noboru Kimura (Healer Girl, Amaim Warrior at the Borderline)
• Character designer: Tomoko Sudo (Fragtime)
• Sub-character designer: Chiaki Kozumi (Engage Kiss) as sub-character designer
• Action director: Yoshihiro Kanno (Sword Art Online Progressive co-action animation director)
• Monster designer: Hirotaka Tokuda (Warlords of Sigrdrifa director)
• Music composer: Hiroyuki Sawano (Attack on Titan Final Season co-composer)
• Animation production: A-1 Pictures
Cast
• Taito Ban as Jun Mizushino/Jinwoo
• Genta Nakamura as Kenta Morobishi/Yoo Jin-ho
• Reina Ueda as Shizuku Kousaka/Cha hae-in
• Daisuke Hirakawa as Shin Mogami/Choi Jong-in
• Hiroki Touchi as Taiga Shirakawa/Baek Yun-ho
• Banjou Ginga as Kiyoomi Gotou/Go Geon-hui
• Makoto Furukawa as Akira Inukai/U Jin-cheol
Source: Aniplex YouTube channel
