Toshiyuki Kubooka

Guts, an immensely strong sword-for-hire, has little direction in his life, simply fighting one battle after the next. However, this all changes suddenly when he meets and is bested by Griffith, a beautiful and charismatic young man who leads the Band of the Hawk mercenary army. After Guts joins the Band and the relationship between the two men begins to blossom, Casca, the tough, lone swordswoman in the Band of the Hawk, struggles to accept Guts and the influence he has on the world around her. While the two men begin to fight together, Griffith continues to rise to power, all seemingly in order to reach his mysterious, prophesied goals. What lengths will Guts and Griffith go to in order to reach these goals, and where will fate take the two men?

Six interlocking stories reveal Bruce Wayne's earliest adventures as Batman and the steps he took to become the grim avenger of Gotham City.

One year has passed since Guts left the Band of the Hawk and Griffith was imprisoned by the Kingdom of Midland for treason. In the dead of night, at a camping site where they hide, the Band of the Hawk is attacked by Bakiraka assassins led by Silat. When all seems lost, Guts returns from his journey. "You destroyed everything." Crying that Griffith is nothing without Guts, Casca and Guts are joined together body and soul. Griffith is imprisoned in the oldest building in Wyndham Catle, the Tower of Rebirth.

The Band of the Hawk and their enigmatic leader Griffith continue winning battle after battle as their prestige throughout the kingdom of Midland grows. But their latest task is one that has seen failure from everyone who has attempted it: the subjugation of the impenetrable fortress of Doldrey.

On a future Earth, war between the Kingdom of Honneamise and its rival, The Republic, is inevitable. As evolving technology creates new ways to wage war, a small group seeks to propel mankind into space in their world’s first spaceflight program. For astronaut candidate Shirotsugh Lhadatt, it’s a personal odyssey as he grows from an aimless young man into a leader willing to put everything on the line in order to move the human race forward and away from the brink of Armageddon.

The seven short films making up GENIUS PARTY couldn’t be more diverse, linked only by a high standard of quality and inspiration. Atsuko Fukushima’s intro piece is a fantastic abstraction to soak up with the eyes. Masaaki Yuasa, of MIND GAME and CAT SOUP fame, brings his distinctive and deceptively simple graphic style and dream-state logic to the table with “Happy Machine,” his spin on a child’s earliest year. Shinji Kimura’s spookier “Deathtic 4,” meanwhile, seems to tap into the creepier corners of a child’s imagination and open up a toybox full of dark delights. Hideki Futamura’s “Limit Cycle” conjures up a vision of virtual reality, while Yuji Fukuyama’s "Doorbell" and "Baby Blue" by Shinichiro Watanabe use understated realism for very surreal purposes. And Shoji Kawamori, with “Shanghai Dragon,” takes the tropes and conventions of traditional anime out for very fun joyride.

It is 300 years into the future. Earth's environment had been devastated by mankind's own foolish plans and humankind is beleaguered by the sentient forests which they have awoken. The world balance is tipped when a young boy named Agito stumbles across a machine that glowed in a strange blue hue inside a forbidden sanctuary.

Lupin squares off with two criminal families and Inspector Zenigata's new female patrol to track down a hoard of biblical-era treasure.