Japan's Jump Festa to Preview Dragonball Film Footage

Shueisha will be previewing footage from James Wong and 20th Century Fox's live-action film adaptation of Akira Toriyama's Dragonball fighting manga at its annual Jump Festa event on December 20. The footage will be shown during a special Dragonball stage panel from 1:20 to 1:50 p.m. at the Makuhari Messe convention complex east of Tokyo. However, the special footage will only take up a small portion of the panel's entire 30-minute length; the rest of the panel will introduce special guests from the film for a live discussion. Attendees who come early enough to get seats will receive a Medicom Bearbrick — a toy figure shaped like bear dressed in the orange gi uniform of Dragonball's hero Son Goku (Justin Chatwin). The film will open in Japan on March 13 and in North America on April 8.

As it usually does every year, the two-day event will feature 30- to 50-minute stage events for other manga titles in Shonen Jump magazine. The Prince of Tennis manga creator Takeshi Konomi, Bleach's Tite Kubo, One Piece's Eiichiro Oda, Naruto's Masashi Kishimoto, and Pyu to Fuku! Jaguar's Kyosuke Usuta will all appear at the panels for their respective manga creations. Reborn! and Gintama will have panels, but their creators are not scheduled to appear.The main actors from each of these manga titles' anime and musical adaptations will also appear at the panels.