The official website for the Precure franchise’s latest anime Power of Hope Grown-Up Precure 23! (キボウノチカラ～オトナプリキュア‘23～) opened on March 21, revealing it’s key visual, alongside production staff!
The announcement also confirmed that voice actress Yūko Sanpei is returning to reprise her role as series protagonist, Nozomi Yumehara alongside grown-up versions of the other characters. No other casts were revealed on the teaser website as of this writing. This anime is part of the franchise’ 20th-anniversary project announced by Toei Animation, alongside a sequel to Witchy Pretty Cure! with both series aimed towards adults.
Takayuki Hamana, who directed Prince of Tennis and Sorcerous Stabber Orphen, is the series director at Toei Animation and Studio DEEN. Yoshimi Narita, who worked on several Precure movies and series before is in charge of the series composition. Atsuko Nakajima of Komi Can’t Communicate and Ranma ½ fame is in charge of character design. Lastly, Naoki Satō, who was also involved in several projects in the series including ‘Yes! Precure 5 GoGo!’ is in charge of the music.
The anime series is set to premiere in Japan on October 2023.
▍About Pretty Cure
Also known as PreCure in Japan, it is a franchise consisting of several Japanese magical girl animes usually geared toward young girls. The series has been around for nearly 20 years now with the original series Futari wa Pretty Cure debuting in 2004. The franchise has been adapted into several types of media from films, anime, games, manga series, live-action dramas, and of course toys.
The original ‘Yes! Precure 5’ and its 2008 sequel ‘Yes! Precure 5 GoGo!’ first aired as the fourth and fifth series of the franchise. Both were notable for establishing the characters as a team instead of the precedented setup of having the heroes be a duo. The series moving forward would continue to carry the magical girl themes for its sequel anime, opting for a team of three or more characters as part of the teams.
▍Power of Hope Grown-Up Precure 23 Anime Staff & Production
Original Work: Izumi Todo
Director: Takayuki Hamana
Series Composition: Yoshimi Narita
Character Design: Atsuko Nakajima
Music: Naoki Satō
Animation: Studio DEEN and Toei Animation
Broadcaster: NHK Educational
▍Power of Hope Grown-Up Precure 23 Anime Cast
■ Nozomi Yumehara – CV: Yūko Sanpei