The classic CLAMP manga Magic Knight Rayearth will be getting a new anime adaptation.
The original manga ran from 1993 to 1996 and dealt with three schoolgirls being transported to the world of Cephiro and becoming Magic Knights in order to save Cephiro from collapse.
Each of the Magic Knights, that of Hikaru Shidou, Fuu Hououji and Umi Ryuuzaki, represented the elements of Fire, Wind and Water. With each able to summon a Rune God (or Mashin) mecha. Fuu and Umi got the Windam and Selece, and Hikaru got the titular Rayearth.
Following the success of the manga, an anime series was made and was similarly popular. CLAMP’s gorgeous art style mixed with proper 90s 2D animation resulted in a genuinely great anime and one that still has a serious following.
More recently, Magic Knight Rayearth was included in both Super Robot Wars T and Super Robot Wars 30 and was similarly very well received. This also resulted in a very nice Riobot toy of the Rayearth from Sentinel back in 2021 and a bunch of decent Moderoid model kits from Good Smile Company.
No doubt all of those sold well, as TMS and CLAMP have announced a new anime adaptation (shown below) to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the original 90s anime series.
Not much is known at the moment, but my only real concern is how the animation will hold up in this new series. The original 90s Rayearth anime series and subsequent OVA had some serious production value behind them, which was entirely necessary considering how well wrought the host manga was.
Either way, Rayearth fans have a lot to hopefully look forward to and it’s nice to think we’ll be getting a decent isekai anime for a change.
If you want to check out the original Magic Knight Rayearth anime from the 90s, it’s available on both Blu-ray and streaming via Crunchyroll.
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