#GoHands Sues King Records Over Unpaid Tokyo Babylon 2021 Costs

Animation production studio GoHands (Project Scard: Scar on the Praeter, W’z, K, Mardock Scramble) has sued record company King Records over unpaid costs of roughly 450 million yen (~US$4.1million) for its cancelled production of Tokyo Babylon 2021.

According to Asahi Shimbun (via Anime News Network), the lawsuit stated that GoHands had agreed to a contract in which it would deliver 13 episodes by late November 2020. The production cost would be paid in installments between December 2020 to August 2021, with the total amounting to 314.6 million yen (~US$2.87 million). 

However, it seems that the contract was cancelled unilaterally in January, with only the first installment being paid. The lawsuit involves the remaining sum of 281.6 million yen (~US$2.57 million) as well as 171.82 million yen (~US$1.57 million) for Tokyo Babylon 2021‘s 14th to 21st episodes. 

In the case of episodes 14 to 21, the lawsuit says that a formal contract had not yet been signed. 

The Tokyo Babylon 2021 troubles began in December 2020, when it was announced that the anime would be delayed from its then-April 2021 release date due to “imitation issues” involving the main characters’ costume designs. The production was later shuttered in March 2021 as further plagiarism was discovered through an investigation, with an announcement stating that the production committee had lost trust with the show’s animation production company.

The March announcement had also stated that Tokyo Babylon 2021‘s production would receive a fresh start, although it did not say which animation production company would take over.

Tokyo Babylon 2021 was meant to be a new anime adaptation of CLAMP’s Tokyo Babylon manga series from the early 90s. The manga had previously been adapted into a two-episode OVA, with the first episode released in 1992 while the second episode was released in 1994.