Kingdom delayed the premiere of the fifth season of the anime to January 13. The season was scheduled to start on January 6 on NHK (Japanese national broadcaster). The official reason wasn’t given, but Japan is currently recovering from a 7.5 magnitude earthquake, which took over 100 lives. 3i4m30
Kenichi Imaizumi is directing the fifth season, with Noboru Takagiwa on the series composition. Hisashi Abe is once again credited with character designs. Hiroyuki Sawano and Kohta Yamamoto are composing the music. Studio Pierrot and Signpost are animating Kingdom Season 5 after previously working on the fourth season. Theme songs include “Douka” by DeNeeL and “RULERS” by Nove Core.
Kingdom is based on a shounen manga by Yasuhisa Hara, which started serialization in Weekly Young Jump in 2006. The anime adaptation by Pierrot and IKIF+ premiered in 2012. Pierrot animated the second season and was ed by St. Signpost for the third. The third season of Kingdom was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic by a whole year: although it initially premiered in April 2020 only four episodes aired before the lockdowns started affecting the production schedule. The third season returned in April 2021 and was followed by the fourth in April 2022.
Although it’s a long-running and successful series, the manga still hasn’t been licensed in English. Crunchyroll is streaming the series and describes the plot as:
Shin and Hyou are war-orphans in the kingdom of Qin. They dream of proving themselves on the battlefield until the day Hyou is captured by a minister. The boy manages to escape and return to his village, but he is badly injured. Shin then meets a mysterious youth who bears an eerie resemblance to Hyou—a boy who will one day become emperor!
Source: Official Website
©Yasuhisa Hara / Shueisha / Kingdom Production Committee