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JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 7: Steel Ball Run Anime's '2nd Stage' Begins on September 25 (Updated)

Warner Bros. Japan announced during its Anime Expo panel on Friday for the STEEL BALL RUN JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure anime that the "second stage" will begin on September 25. New episodes will stream every week on Fridays. There will be 11 episodes in total for the second and third stages. The company unveiled an English trailer, and it will stream later on Friday. Update: Trailer added.

Japanese-dubbed version

English-dubbed version

The company also introduced new characters Mountain Tim (voiced by Tomoaki Maeno), Funny Valentine (voiced by Tomokazu Sugita), and Hot Pants (voiced by Yōko Hikasa).

Warner Bros. Japan also announced a pop-up shop event tour that will start this fall and will have locations in Los Angeles, Seattle, and Phoenix, among other locations to be announced in the future.

Netflix stated that the series will have a split-cours" (quarter of a year), which usually means an anime airs for roughly three months, and then takes a break for three months or longer before returning for another three-month run.

The anime stars:

• Shōgo Sakata as Johnny Joestar
• Yōhei Azakami as Gyro Zeppeli
• Kaito Ishikawa as Diego Brando
• Rie Takahashi as Lucy Steel
• Kenta Miyake as Steven Steel
• Masaaki Mizunaka as Sand Man
• Kenichirō Matsuda as Pocoloco

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind co-directors Yasuhiro Kimura and Hideya Takahashi are directing the anime at david production. Toshiyuki Kato (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean director who has also worked as a storyboarder and more on the other series in the franchise) is the series director. Yasuko Kobayashi is returning from the other series in the franchise to oversee the series scripts, and Daisuke Tsumagari (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind animation director) is designing the characters. Yūgo Kanno is again composing the music, and Yoshikazu Iwanami is returning as the sound director. Sub-character designers include: Yui Kinoshita, Grand Guerilla, Minoru Murao, and Chii.

Viz Media has licensed the manga in English, and released the first volume digitally and in print in May 2025. Viz Media describes the first volume:

Riders from around the world gather in the Wild West for the race of the century! Johnny Joestar, a former jockey paralyzed from the waist down, comes to spectate, and momentarily regains the ability to walk while watching a duel fought by Gyro Zeppeli. Desperate to learn more about this power, Johnny joins the race alongside Gyro and embarks on the most epic and bizarre race to ever cross the American frontier!

Araki launched the manga in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump magazine in 2004, but the manga moved to Ultra Jump in 2005. The manga ended serialization in 2011, and had 24 volumes (consisting of volumes 81-104 of the overall JoJo's Bizarre Adventure manga).

david production's anime adaptation that started by adapting Part 1 of the manga has covered the manga through Part 6, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean. Netflix debuted the first 12 episodes of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean globally in December 2021. The second part of the anime consisting of episodes 13-24 debuted in September 2022 on Netflix. Netflix then debuted the third and final part, consisting of episodes 25-38, in December 2022.

Araki launched The JOJOLands manga, the ninth and latest part of his JoJo's Bizarre Adventure manga series, in Ultra Jump in February 2023.

Other recent entries in the franchise include video games, a stage musical, and live-action adaptations of Araki's spinoff manga Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan (Kishibe Rohan wa Ugokanai).

Sources: Email correspondence, Warner Bros. Japan's Anime Expo panel (Kalai Chik)