Zoe Saldana is teaming up with anime brand Crunchyroll to create her very own franchise.
The upcoming “epic animated space opera” is called Dark Star Squadron, which follows four cadets at a space academy who steal a starship for a joy ride and return to find that their school has been destroyed and fellow students are missing. They must then go on an adventure to find out what happened.
Saldana is stepping away from her usual credits as an actress to produce the work as part of her company, Cinestar Pictures, which she co-founded with her sisters Cisely and Mariel. Her sisters are also on board to produce along with Voltron: Legendary Defender writer Todd Ludy, who they have hired to write the script.
“As true animation and anime fans ourselves, we are so excited for the opportunity to partner with Crunchyroll to bring Dark Star Squadron to a wide audience,” Zoe, Cisely, and Mariel Saldana said about their upcoming project in a statement. “We can’t wait for everyone to meet the crew and follow the journey of our unlikely heroes.”
This news comes following Crunchyroll reaching a huge milestone: five million subscribers and 120 million registered users.
“The tremendous growth of our streaming service is indicative of the growing love for anime and its deserved spotlight in popular culture,” said Joanne Waage, general manager of Crunchyroll. “Zoe and her team are bringing their own anime fandom to their storytelling and we’re excited to be a part of it.”
As of now, there’s no word on whether Zoe Saldana will do work on the series beyond producing, like providing a voice for the series, but her name still holds a lot of weight when it comes to sci-fi works.
While the actress is probably best to know for playing Gamora in the Guardians of the Galaxy and Avengers films, she’s also played Uhura in the modern Star Trek films and Neytiri in Avatar, which has four sequels allegedly coming out in the next few years.
