Maki Stauffenberg

Armored Trooper VOTOMS: Die Graue Hexe is a brand-new theatrical anime in the long-running VOTOMS science fiction franchise. "Die Graue Hexe" is German for "The Grey Witch." The project was announced in January 2026 as part of a set of works celebrating the 50th anniversary of Sunrise, the famous studio behind Gundam and many other robot anime. It is being released in two parts. The first part opens in Japanese theaters on November 20, 2026. The date for the second part has not been announced yet. The film has a very well-known director: Mamoru Oshii. He made the classic Ghost in the Shell film, the Patlabor movies, and Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer. Sunrise is producing the film with help from Production I.G. The music is by Kenji Kawai, who has worked with Oshii for many years, including on Ghost in the Shell. Kunio Okawara, the designer of the original VOTOMS robots, is credited for the original mechanical designs, while Shinobu Tsuneki and Yoshihiro Sono are the mechanical designers for the new film. To understand why fans are excited, it helps to know the original. Armored Trooper VOTOMS first aired in 1983. It was created and directed by Ryosuke Takahashi. It is set in the Astragius Galaxy, where two powers, the Gilgamesh Confederation and the Balarant Union, have fought a war for about a hundred years. Both sides use Armored Troopers, also called VOTOMS. These are not giant, shiny super robots. They are small, cheap, mass-produced fighting machines that soldiers ride into battle and often lose. This style is called "real robot" mecha, because the machines are treated like real military tools, such as tanks, instead of heroes. The old series followed a quiet soldier named Chirico Cuvie, who is caught in a secret military plan and then hunted by his own side. Die Graue Hexe is a new story, not a remake. The main characters are Ash Vamps, voiced by Miyuki Sawashiro, and Maki Stauffenberg, voiced by Mabuki Ando. A large supporting cast includes Shinichiro Miki, Yuki Kaji, Yuichi Nakamura, Tomokazu Sugita, Daisuke Ono, Takahiro Sakurai, and Sumire Uesaka. The official tagline speaks of an endless battlefield ruled by madness and of a witch who will surely rise again. The first teaser shows a battle in a forest at night. Beyond this, the makers have kept the plot quiet, so it is best to go in knowing just the basic setup. The film brings together two big names in Japanese animation history: the hard, gritty world of VOTOMS and the thoughtful, moody style of Oshii. For fans of serious military science fiction, it is one of the most interesting anime films of late 2026.