The announcement was made on the official website of the Tokyo Babylon 2021 anime project that they would be canceling the production due to the extensive plagiarism that was reported back in December of last year. The initial report was that the character’s costume designs were copied from material that is under copyright law. After an internal investigation occurred, the production committee decided to postpone the start of the series to fix the issues and had set up a compliance team within the committee to ensure strict compliance with the law.
TVアニメ「東京BABYLON 2021」プロジェクト制作中止のご報告https://t.co/b2IgjKGSKN pic.twitter.com/6ClLsEXx8a
— TVアニメ「東京BABYLON 2021」公式 (@tokyobabylon21) March 29, 2021
The statement released by the production committee stated the following:
“After the recent revelation of “copycat plagiarism” by the animation production company, the committee has been reviewing all products to ensure compliance and to prevent a similar situation from occurring again. As a result, unfortunately, we have discovered that there are many other imitation plagiarisms in addition to the two character costume settings that were pointed out to us.
The Production Committee sincerely apologizes to the production company for this oversight.As a result of repeated discussions within the production committee, we have decided that it is impossible to continue production due to the lack of trust with the current production company, and we have decided to suspend production of the “Tokyo Babylon 2021” project. After discussing with CLAMP and the production committee, we have decided to start anew with a completely new production system.We would like to express our deepest apologies to CLAMP, everyone who loves the original “Tokyo Babylon”, everyone who has been expecting and supporting “Tokyo Babylon 2021”, the cast members who have appeared in the series, and all the people who have been involved in this production. We would like to express our deepest apologies to all of you.
We, as a production committee, will make every effort to deliver CLAMP’s “Tokyo Babylon” as soon as possible under a new structure so that the fans can truly enjoy this important work. We sincerely hope that you will continue to support us.”
Dark Horse Comics describes the series as:
It’s 1991, the last days of Japan’s bubble economy, and money and elegance run through the streets. So do the currents of darkness beneath them, nourishing evil spirits that only the arts of the onmyoji—Japan’s legendary occultists—can combat. The two most powerful onmyoji are in the unlikely guises of a handsome young veterinarian, Seishiro, and the teenage heir to the ancient Sumeragi clan, Subaru.
