The first live-action film adaptation of Wataru Watanabe's Yowamushi Pedal manga series will open in Japan on August 14. Ren Nagase of the idol group King & Prince will star as Sakamichi Onoda, and has been bicycle training since December.

The film will also star Kentaro Ito (Ride Your Wave, live-action Kyō Kara Ore wa!!, pictured below left) as Sakamichi's rival Shunsuke Imaizumi and Kanna Hashimoto (live-action Gintama, The Disastrous Life of Saiki K., Assassination Classroom, Kaguya-sama: Love is War, below right) as the cycling team manager Miki Kanzaki. Kōichirō Miki (live-action Anonymous Noise, Shokubutsu Zukan: Unmei no Koi, Hiroimashita) is directing.

The story of the original manga centers around Sakamichi Onoda, an otaku at Sōhoku High School in Chiba. He loves anime and games so much, that he would ride his commuter bicycle to and from Tokyo's Akihabara shopping district in a 90-kilometer (about 60-mile) round trip over steep slopes after school. Onoda's life changes when he encounters his high school's cycling team, and he ends up joining the competitive sport of bicycle racing.

Watanabe launched the original Yowamushi Pedal manga in Akita Shoten's Weekly Shōnen Champion magazine in 2008, and Akita Shoten will publish the manga's 65th compiled book volume on February 7. The manga has over 25 million copies in circulation. Yen Press is releasing the manga in English.

The first season of the television anime adaptation premiered in 2013. The second season premiered in Japan in 2014 and ended in March 2015. Yowamushi Pedal New Generation , the series' third season, premiered in January 2017. Yowamushi Pedal Glory Line , the fourth season, premiered in January 2018. Crunchyroll streamed all four seasons as they aired.

The manga also inspired several anime movies, an original video anime, a live-action television adaptation, and 14 stage play productions.

Source: Comic Natalie