Chie Shinohara’s shoujo manga, Red River (Sora wa Akai Kawa no Hotori), is getting a TV anime adaptation in Summer 2026. A teaser visual was released alongside the announcement.
© 篠原千絵／小学館／アニメ「天は赤い河のほとり」製作委員会
Kosuke Kobayashi will be directing the series with Yoriko Tomita as the series composer and Kenji Fujisaki as the character designer. Kimiyoshi Matsumura and Daisuke Yoshida from the Middle Eastern Culture Centre in Japan will be involved in the production as the series’ historical researchers. Tatsunoko Production will be animating the series.
The original manga series was first serialized in Shogakukan’s Shoujo Comic magazine in January 1995 and ran until June 2002 with a total of 28 manga volumes and has sold over 20 million copies in both physical and digital versions of the book combined. It won the Shogakukan manga award for the shoujo category in 2001. It inspired 8 drama CDs, two novels written by the same author, and a stage play by the all-female musical theatre troupe, The Takarazuka Revue, in 2018.
Viz Media has licensed and published all 28 of the manga in English. The synopsis of the first volume of the manga is described as:
Yuri, a pretty Japanese girl, is ecstatic after passing her college entrance exam and having her first kiss with her childhood friend-turned boyfriend. However, her luck soon changes. She starts to notice that water becomes agitated whenever she goes near it. One night, hands appear out of a puddle on the street and drag her into the water! Transported to an ancient village in the Middle East, she is then captured by armed troops and taken to the Queen’s palace for a human sacrifice. Adventure and good-looking boys fill this great first volume!
Source: official X/Twitter, Comic natalie, official website
