Viz quietly announced a new division called Viz Productions, which will tackle producing and licensing live action films based on anime and manga.  They’ve stated that Viz Productions will act as the U.S. liason between Japanese property-owners and studios, production houses, and agents to produce films or license them to other companies.

To read more, check out http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/12947.html

In other news,  Lucy Liu announced she’ll be joining the cast of Afro Samurai: Resurrection, the sequel to the highly succesful anime starring Samuel L. Jackson.  Resurrection is going to be a 2-hour animated film that will premier on Spike TV in January of 2009.  Liu will play Sio, a seductive and sadistic mastermind out to destroy Afro, the lead character and bad-ass motherfu**er.  Legendary voice actor (oh yeah, he played Luke SkyWalker too) Mark Hamill will also join the cast as Sio’s protector.

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