Written by Mari Okada

February 24th. Opening day of Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms.
It took 5 years since the initial project, and 3 years from when production started. Many people went to the theater to go see it. Thank you all so much!

On opening day, we appeared on stage in Shinjuku, Ueno, and Ikebukuro. Along with me were Iwami, Irino, and Kaji from the cast, rionos, who sang the theme song, and line producer and president Horikawa. It was so moving to hear them talk passionately about their memories working on the film. And seeing Iwami’s beautiful tears… it was all I could do to not run up and hug her!

Over a year before voice recording, we did a table read. Even though there was no footage, the cast performed freely, and the recording made that day was given to the animators, so they could make drawings based on those performances to get a sense of the direction and personalities of the characters. It is often said that the voice recording is the time when life is breathed into the characters, but this time the cast and animators came together at the same time to bring them to life. I was filled with many strange emotions as I listened to Ishii and Iwai talk during the preview tour.
The theme song is “Viator”. We received the demo version at the climax of production, but we all thought it was perfect for Maquia, and it gave us the energy we needed for the final push. Iwami and rionos’s voices are so different, but both seem to overlap quite nicely with Maquia.

Before release, I was asked “what is this film to you?” I had so many feelings about it that I couldn’t settle on just one answer. I discussed it with Horikawa, who said, “why don’t you just say, ‘it’s my Hibiol’?” Kind of an embarrassing answer, I thought at first, but it was actually quite fitting, so I used it.

The people of Iorph all weave a fabric called Hibiol.
This movie was weaved together thread by thread every day by the staff, cast, and everyone who helped out, all so that everyone would see it. Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms is that Hibiol, in which each of you is engraved. And I would be so happy if you weave this movie into your own Hibiol!