Lollipop Chainsaw Adds a Live-Action R-Rated Prequel Film, a PS5 Sequel and an Anime

The Lollipop Chainsaw franchise is heading to the big screen. A live-action feature film was announced during Tokyo Game Show 2026, with Deadline reporting the project on September 18, 2026 and several outlets confirming the production team the same day.

Related reading: GTA VI Has Already Booked About $630 Million in Pre-Orders · Skydance Merges Paramount Games Studio and Warner Bros. Games Into One Division.

The news arrived in a franchise that is suddenly busy across three formats at once. A new console game is set for 2027, an anime adaptation is already in the works, and now a film is being assembled by a group of producers drawn from Japan, Europe and North America. Keeping track of which project is which has become part of the story.

Three Lollipop Chainsaw projects, not one

The film is a live-action feature, not an animated one. Anime News Network reported that Nada Holdings founder Joe Teng described the movie as live-action and said it is separate from the previously announced anime plans. Bloody Disgusting likewise framed the film as coming in addition to an animated series.

The second project is a video game. Lollipop Chainsaw 2 Back2Back is being developed for the PlayStation 5 with a 2027 release window. Final Weapon reported that the film was revealed during the stage show for that sequel at Tokyo Game Show, tying the two announcements to the same presentation.

The third is the anime, which predates both. Nada Holdings and Dragami Games said in July 2025 that their plans for the franchise included a new game and an anime adaptation.

What the film is

According to Deadline, the movie is set before the events of the original game and is envisioned as an R-rated action comedy. Its protagonist is Juliet Starling, a San Romero High School cheerleader born into a family of zombie hunters. When a zombie outbreak overruns her school, she has to fight through the undead to save her friends, protect her family, and keep her boyfriend Nick close.

The project is produced under license from Dragami Games. The production team is international: Nada Holdings boss Joe Teng, former ZDF Studios drama chief Robert Franke and his Orange Chariot label, Throne Inc managing director Takafumi Yuki, Ambitious Entertainment's Kirk Shaw, and Non Stop TV's Patricio Rabuffetti. Shaw's credits include an associate producer role on The Hurt Locker, per Anime News Network.

Dragami Games president Shohei Sato framed the film as a milestone for the property. "We are truly excited to see our vision take another important step with the franchise's first live-action feature film," he said, according to Bloody Disgusting. Franke described the movie's approach: "Longtime fans will recognize the attitude, irreverence, and glorious excess they love, while newcomers can simply enjoy an unforgettable action-horror comedy."

Anime News Network reported that Shaw and Franke have expressed an intent to make a "Hollywood" film aimed at worldwide audiences. That ambition lines up with the R rating and the prequel premise. The film is not being positioned as a niche adaptation for people who already know the game; it is being described as a standalone action-horror comedy that can travel to viewers who have never heard of Juliet Starling.

Deadline also reported the creators' stated ambition for the project: a "new model for building globally recognized entertainment franchises from Asia." That line is a mission statement rather than a business plan, but it helps explain why a cult game is being spread across film, television and games at the same time.

The producers bring different pieces to that model. Franke is the former vice president of drama at ZDF Studios, with producing credits including Concordia and Benidorm Is Murder, per Anime News Network. Shaw's credits include an associate producer role on The Hurt Locker. Yuki manages Throne Inc. Teng runs Nada Holdings, the company that has been driving the franchise's new projects since 2025. The group is deliberately cross-border, combining Japanese rights holders with producers who work in international film and television finance.

The 2012 original and the James Gunn question

Lollipop Chainsaw launched for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in June 2012. Grasshopper Manufacture developed it, and Kadokawa Games and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment published it. The game was a collaboration between the director Goichi Suda, the designer known as Suda51, and the filmmaker James Gunn, who wrote it. It went on to sell more than 1.5 million copies worldwide, according to Deadline.

The rights have since changed hands. Dragami Games, led by former Kadokawa Games CEO Yoshimi Yasuda, acquired the intellectual property after the original publisher's games business was restructured in 2022. Kadokawa Games divested part of its business to the new company Dragami Games in May 2022, and Anime News Network reported that Yasuda said at the time that his company purchased the IP after the game's status was in limbo, with Warner Bros. supporting the transfer.

A remaster, Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, launched digitally in the Americas and Europe in September 2024 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch and PC via Steam, and a Switch 2 version debuted in May 2026. That steady re-release schedule is part of why the franchise has an active audience for a film to reach.

Gunn's name does not appear in the film announcement. Cosmic Book News noted that the 2012 game was written by Gunn while reporting that the film materials make no mention of him. No writer or director for the movie has been announced. That gap is worth stating plainly: fans of the original may assume the film carries the same creative lineage, and the available reporting does not support that assumption.

The sequel game and the anime

Lollipop Chainsaw 2 Back2Back was announced at Tokyo Game Show on September 17, a day before the film news. Anime News Network reported that Final Fantasy XV director Hajime Tabata is directing the game, with his JP Universe company developing, that original Lollipop Chainsaw writer Masahiro Yuki is writing the story, and that original character designer NekoshowguN is also involved.

The Game8 write-up on September 19 described the film as an R-rated horror-comedy and repeated the Kirk Shaw and Robert Franke producing credits, matching the other outlets.

Placing the anime requires going back further. Nada Holdings first outlined its Lollipop Chainsaw plans in July 2025, describing a new game and an anime in partnership with Dragami Games. The anime has not been dated in the current announcement cycle.

Why a cult hit is now a multi-format bet

The timing is tied to Tokyo Game Show itself. Anime News Network reported that the 2026 edition drew 257,642 attendees, and the Lollipop Chainsaw projects were among the announcements clustered around the show's stage presentations.

For a property that spent more than a decade as a single game and a remaster, the spread is notable. Film adaptations of games have become more common as studios look beyond a handful of mega-franchises, and mid-sized titles with committed fan bases are now part of that search. Lollipop Chainsaw fits the pattern: modest by blockbuster standards, distinctive in tone, and old enough to have a nostalgic audience without being so old that the IP has faded.

There is also a commercial logic to the timing. A 2027 game gives the franchise a fresh release to build around, and a film can raise the profile of that game rather than the other way around. The producers' choice to call this a first step, rather than a one-off, suggests the movie is meant to serve the wider slate.

The structure carries its own risks. Splitting one property across three formats with a consortium of producers spreads the financial exposure, but it also divides responsibility. Game adaptations that work tend to have a single clear creative vision and a studio committed to it. Whether a film assembled by five production companies can deliver that is an open question, and the absence of a named director or writer leaves the central creative role unfilled on paper.

It also raises a scheduling question. If the film, the game and the anime are meant to reinforce each other, their release order will shape how much they actually lift one another. The game has a 2027 window. The film has no date, and the anime has no date in the current cycle. A coordinated launch is possible, but nothing announced so far commits to one.

What is not known yet

Several basics remain unannounced. There is no release date for the film, no distributor, no director, no screenwriter and no cast. The production team has been named, but the movie has not been described as having started shooting. Whether the film and the 2027 game will be released in any coordinated sequence is also unclear.

The one firm distinction readers should hold onto is that the live-action film, the PlayStation 5 game and the anime are three separate projects. They share a universe and some key personnel behind the franchise, but they are not the same release. For now, the film is an announced project with a named production team, a tone, a premise and a license holder, and little else confirmed.

Cover image: "E3 Expo 2012 - Lollipop Chainsaw school bus" by The Conmunity - Pop Culture Geek, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.