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Published Aug 24, 2026, 9:34 PM EDT
Relive Katsuhiro Otomo's landmark anime on the big(gest) screen
Image: Katsuhiro Otomo/TohoSign in to your Polygon.com account
If you missed the 4K remaster of Akira in theaters when it debuted in 2020, you have a second shot this summer. Katsuhiro Otomo's landmark anime movie will return to theaters — for one day only — in 4K and IMAX format in September.
Akira will be rereleased in 4K and IMAX in the United States and Canada on Sept. 4, distributed by Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures Entertainment. The showings of Otomo's cyberpunk classic will be presented both in the original Japanese with English subtitles and in an English dub.
Akira is a must-watch anime classic
Originally released in 1988, Akira tells the story of Tokyo in the distant future of 2019, 31 years after the destruction of the metropolis. The animated epic, based on Otomo's manga of the same name, focuses on Kaneda, the leader of a biker gang whose childhood friend, Tetsuo Shima, acquires powerful telekinetic abilities after a near-fatal accident.
If you've never seen Akira, here's how Crunchyroll describes the film:
As the leader of a group of young robust delinquents, Kaneda spent his nights tearing through the urban wastes, racing his motorbike against rival groups. One night while riding with his gang, his friend Tetsuo suddenly encounters a strange boy― the product of human experimentation— and is injured in the ensuing crash. Shortly thereafter, a military squadron appears on the scene to take the boy and Tetsuo away to an army research facility. Determined to free Tetsuo from capture, Kaneda sneaks into the army research lab. However, a regimen of extreme experimental procedures has awakened a new power in his friend, and now he is consumed by madness…
Tickets for the Akira release are available from the IMAX website and Fandango.
Now, about that Akira TV series... (Where the heck is it?)
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