Anime Staff Acknowledge Possible N. Korean Involvement, to Redo Scenes



The official website of the anime series Dahlia in Bloom recently announced that certain scenes suspected to have been animated in North Korea will be redone by the staff. An investigation revealed that some work from anime production studio Typhoon Graphics was outsourced to a Japanese company, which then subcontracted the work to a Chinese company. Despite requests for a list of staff involved in each episode, one company did not provide the information, leading to suspicions that a North Korean company may have been involved in the production process.
The X/Twitter account for the anime confirmed that the series will still debut in July as scheduled. This decision comes after a report by 38 North in April raised concerns about the potential involvement of North Korean animators in the production of Dahlia in Bloom.
Additionally, 38 North discovered files related to the anime series and another project at the Hokkaido-based anime studio EKACHI EPILKA on a cloud server with a North Korean IP address. The files contained animation instructions and were translated into Korean from Chinese, indicating involvement from a third-party company. While the exact North Korean animation studio was not identified, it is speculated to be April 26 Animation Studio, which has been sanctioned by the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
The report also mentioned concerns raised by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and the FBI regarding North Korean IT workers posing as non-North Korean nationals to secure employment in fields such as graphic animation. This revelation has raised questions about the extent of North Korean involvement in various international projects, including animated series like Invincible and Octonauts.