Twisted-Wonderland Anime Adaptation in the Works at Disney+

As part of a massive push of Asian-language content, streaming platform Disney+ announced earlier today a new slate of 27 titles from various Asian countries including China, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia. One of the titles revealed is a Twisted-Wonderland anime adaptation, based on the popular mobile game by Aniplex and Walt Disney Japan.

The Twisted-Wonderland anime was confirmed by the game’s official twitter account, though no further details were released at this time. The smartphone app, which was announced in 2019 and launched in March 2020, centers around characters inspired by Disney villains and is described as a “villains academy adventure game”. It has both rhythm game elements and battles. The main concept, scenario, and character designs are by Black Butler manga creator Yana Toboso.

The game begins when the main character falls through a magic mirror into another world and ends up at Night Ravens College, a prestigious magic training school. As the main character has nowhere else to go, they are offered sanctuary at the school by the mysterious and masked headmaster, and as they try to find a way home, they get to know their peers, which consists of students from seven different dormitories, each based on a different Disney film – Alice in Wonderland, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Snow White, Hercules, The Lion King, and Sleeping Beauty.

A manga adaptation of the game’s main story, featuring art by Sumire Kowono, was published on March 18 in Square Enix’s Monthly G Fantasy magazine. The franchise also has two anthology manga volumes, with stories by various authors, which published in November 2020 and April 2021.

With no further information on the Twisted-Wonderland anime, we can only speculate as to what the plot will be – whether it will adapt the main story of the game, tell the stories in the anthology manga volumes, or be something completely original.

According to Variety, this announcement was made at a pan-Asia content presentation event held live in Tokyo, which was also part of a hybrid event in Indonesia and Korea, and was streamed online in other areas. Disney+ is currently available in Japan, Singapore, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand. It will launch in South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan in November 2021.

“We aim to create fifty original series and shows by 2023,” said Luke Kang, Walt Disney’s Asia-Pacific president. “OTT is quickly going mainstream and Disney Plus is well positioned to take part in that.”

“This is by far Disney’s most ambitious production effort in Asia,” said Jessica Kam-Engle, Disney’s head of content and development in Asia-Pacific.

We can only hope that eventually, Disney+ diversifies its content even more, not just with more local language originals, but making its titles available internationally. From speaking to my friends in other countries, I know that different shows are available on Disney+ than what we are offered here in the United States. There are quite a few of the 27 titles that were just announced that I would love to be able to watch, so I hope Disney+ makes that possible sometime in the near future.

Author: Jamie Sugah

Jamie has a BA in English with a focus in creative writing from The Ohio State University. She self-published her first novel, The Perils of Long Hair on a Windy Day, which is available through Amazon. She is currently an archivist and lives in New York City with her demon ninja vampire cat. She covers television, books, movies, anime, and conventions in the NYC area.

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