My friend made a little live action Akira Short a little over a year ago, just for fun and to build up his portfolio. Maybe some of you guys will like it and some of you may really hate it. Anyways, enjoy!
http://vimeo.com/8938970

Jay Chou as Kato was crap.

“British actor James Purefoy walked out in his role in V For Vendetta after struggling to wear a mask for the entire film.”

You should see how they portray Caucasians in most Asian films.

Frankly, I'm happier not having Asian actors tainted by association with another likely mediocre collage of a great property. If they did justice to Akira, I'd be happy regardless of whether they kept it ethnically authentic.

you mean as bungling imperialist jackasses? portrayed by actual caucasians? i wonder where that perspective comes from. then you also know how the japanese are portrayed in chinese films and vice versa. i don't see how this relates to wanting to prevent the whitewashing of akira.

i quite agree. a good movie will be a good movie regardless, and conversely a bad movie can't be saved merely by authenticity.

i also agree that jay chou was crap. america doesn't have a monopoly on terrible actor-wannabe's they should have stuck with stephen chow.

My 2 cents. It doesn't matter who they cast or who the director is or how it's produced. It's going to be terrible. Hand's down terrible. You cannot fit the story into a 2-3 hour time frame. It's impossible.

If the said a mini series? I might be down but I'm going to pass and read it over again.

True dat son!

I agree. I just watched the anime again last night and I couldn't see how they could make it live action and good--unless they changed how a lot of things are done, which would probably suck. I mean, it's anime with all it's anime pacing and freedoms. there's a lot of stuff that just wouldn't work well live I think.

mini series would be great--if animated and directed by Otomo.

Good news. The re-make is dead, and probably won't be revived. It's a good thing too, I can't believe they would touch Kaneda's bike.

More info here: http://io9.com/5819440/one-reason-to-be-glad-the-live+action-akira-movie-is-dead

This is great news... I do agree with Vombie about the Mini series, even Live action would have been good, if say HBO grabbed it and made it for an immature/mature audience... Thank God it's out of the Hood though...

Best news I've heard in awhile. I regret my last post. No mini series. No movie.

It is a great anime read. It should stay the way it is. Some books should never transfer to other mediums.

Necropost! This actually looked pretty amazing.

http://youtu.be/t1GO-93Nt3c