Yume Miyamoto and Akira Sekine Lead the Fairy-Tale Whodunit
Yume Miyamoto (Rikka Takarada in SSSS.Gridman) voices Red Riding Hood, reimagined in this series as a detective who unravels the crimes she stumbles into while traveling the fairy-tale world. In her comment accompanying the announcement, Miyamoto said she is delighted to play a character she has known since childhood, and promised a world quite different from the Grimm fairy tales everyone grew up on. She added that the cases Red Riding Hood runs into kept surprising her as a reader, and she wants fans to look forward to how the girl handles each one.
Akira Sekine (Princess in Princess Principal) plays Pinocchio, the assistant along for the ride. Sekine described Pinocchio as a character who visibly grows through the journey, learning and deepening his bond with Red Riding Hood as they travel. True to the title, though, she warned that plenty of incidents are waiting for them.
The teaser trailer, up now on Pony Canyon's official anime YouTube channel, works in Red Riding Hood's signature line from the novels, which translates roughly to "Why is your criminal plan so sloppy?"
A 600,000-Copy Series With a Netflix Record Behind It
According to a report from Japanese entertainment news outlet Oricon News, the anime is based on Aito Aoyagi's Red Riding Hood series, published under Futabasha's Futaba Bunko paperback imprint. The novels cross classic Western fairy tales with traditional puzzle-style mysteries, and the series has passed 600,000 copies in circulation, with a media-mix rollout that already includes a manga adaptation.
The biggest piece of that rollout so far is the 2023 Netflix live-action film Once Upon a Crime, starring Kanna Hashimoto, which became the first Japanese film to take the No. 1 spot on Netflix's weekly Global Top 10.
Aoyagi celebrated the news in his comment, framing the anime as a grand adventure of riddles and deduction starring the great detective Red Riding Hood and her scatterbrained assistant Pinocchio, up against the distinctly fairy-tale tricks of cunning culprits. He called it "a fantasy mystery no one has ever seen," and said he hopes people all over the world enjoy it.
BENTEN Film Animates, Itsuro Kawasaki Directs and Writes
Animation production is handled by BENTEN Film, with Itsuro Kawasaki serving as both director and screenwriter. Kawasaki said he devoured mystery novels in his youth and always hoped to adapt one into animation someday. Now that the dream project is real, he admitted the genre brings its own headaches: on top of the usual character work, there are tricks to explain and staging to coordinate, and the team is still pushing through production.
Manami Minakata and Yuko Yahiro handle character design as part of the announced main staff.
The teaser visual puts a grinning Red Riding Hood front and center, with Pinocchio peeking out of her basket and motifs from upcoming cases scattered around the pair.
Looking Ahead
The TV anime is set to air in 2027 in Japan. No season, month, episode count, or broadcast network has been announced yet, and there is no word on international streaming. No English edition of Aoyagi's novels has been confirmed either, so for now the most accessible entry point for international fans is the live-action Once Upon a Crime, which streams worldwide on Netflix.
The teaser trailer is available on Pony Canyon's official anime channel, so fans can get a first taste of the show's storybook-crime-scene mood today.