Takahiro Sakurai

Takahiro Sakurai's recent coverage splits between a new cast credit and the fallout from an older one. In June, planning producer Koji Yamamoto announced his retirement from producing and apologized for how Sakurai's unannounced cameo in the third Mononoke film was handled. Sakurai had been replaced in the role after a 2022 scandal, then reprised the original Medicine Seller without prior disclosure, which drew controversy among fans. That apology is the only story in this set that addresses the recasting directly, and it leaves the dispute attached to the production rather than to any new role.

Three months later, Sakurai appears in the full main cast of Armored Trooper Votoms: The Grey Witch, the Sunrise 50th anniversary film directed by Mamoru Oshii. He joins Shinichiro Miki, Yuki Kaji, Yuichi Nakamura, Tomokazu Sugita, and Sumire Uesaka, alongside the previously announced Miyuki Sawashiro and Mafumi Ando. The film is set at the end of the Hundred Years War, opens nationwide on November 20, 2026, and had a 30-second trailer shown with the cast reveal.

Between those two stories, coverage of Sakurai does not extend to the Jujutsu Kaisen anniversary events or to the Draw This, Then Die! premiere, where other voice actors are named. What the stories establish is a performer carrying an unresolved casting controversy from one production while joining a major anniversary film cast for another. No statement from Sakurai himself appears in any of them.