Anime of classic baseball manga's sequel premieres April 7

The official website for the anime of Takuya Mitsuda's Major 2nd baseball manga revealed more cast members for the anime on Wednesday. The additional cast members include:

Kana Hanazawa as Mutsuko Sakura, the story's heroine

Natsumi Takamori as Izumi Shigeno, the protagonist Daigo's older sister

Yuko Sasamoto as Kaoru Shigeno, Daigo's mother (reprising role as Kaoru Shimizu from the first Major anime)

The anime will premiere on NHK E-TV on April 7 at 5:35 p.m. (3:35 a.m. ET).

Previously announced cast members include:

Natsumi Fujiwara as Daigo Shigeno

Showtaro Morikubo as Goro Shigeno

Kōtarō Nishiyama as Hikaru Satō

Masakazu Morita as Toshiya Satō

Ayumu Watanabe ( Doraemon films, Space Brothers , After the Rain ) is directing the anime at NHK Enterprises. Michihiro Tsuchiya, Kenji Konuta, Mitsuyo Suenaga, and Kenichi Yamashita are penning the scripts. Kenichi Ohnuki ( Gundam Build Fighters Try , Gurazeni , Golden Kamuy ) is designing the characters. Kotaro Nakagawa ( Code Geass , Cross Game ) is composing the music.

Mitsuda launched the manga in Weekly Shonen Sunday in March 2015 as the first new installment in the manga series in five years. Shogakukan published the manga's 12th compiled book volume on Thursday. The sequel manga inspired an animated commercial in December 2015.

The sequel series follows Daigo, the son of the protagonist of the first Major manga.

Mitsuda serialized Major in Weekly Shonen Sunday from 1994 until 2010. Shogakukan published 78 compiled book volumes for the series. The story begins when Goro Honda's father, a professional baseball player, dies in an accident. This gives him the motivation to try and become a pro baseball player himself.

The manga inspired its first television anime series in 2004, and the sixth television anime series ran in 2010. The manga also inspired an anime film titled Major: Yūjō no Winning Shot in 2008.

Source: Comic Natalie