Though it’s been years since we’ve heard anything about the Akira live-action movie, it seems the film is finally happening under director Taika Waititi.

The long-rumored live-action adaptation of Katsuhiro Otomo’s legendary 1982 manga and its 1988 anime film has been stuck in development hell for years.

Waititi was attached to the film way back in 2017, during that time he was working on Thor: Love and Thunder and postponed work on Akira to finish up Thor. Now, it seems Waititi is hellbent on making the film be his next project – according to Deadline reporter Justin Kroll.

“Since everyone is wondering where his STAR WARS film is, if I were a betting man my guess is Taika’s next movie is his Akira movie at Warner Bros., which he put on shelf to do L&T,” Kroll said on Twitter. “He never left the film and word is script should be into studio soon.”

He added a clarification, “Again nothing set in stone as the film would go through regular process before greenlight including figuring out a budget but sounds like all his focus is on that project”

The Akira film was supposed to premiere in 2021 but due to scheduling conflicts it got pushed back and eventually removed from Warner Bros. schedule completely.

This is Niche Culture. In this column, we regularly cover anime, geek culture, and things related to video games.