The upcoming season of the Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure anime, Steel Ball Run, is set to stream worldwide on Netflix. The announcement came alongside a press release to celebrate the streaming platform’s tenth anniversary in Japan, Deadline reported.
The anime series, based on Hirohiko Araki’s manga, follows the Joestar family bloodline through the generations as they face off against a variety of eccentric foes, including the time-warping Dio Brando. The series’ main cast includes both heroes and villains, using powerful ghosts called Stands , each named after contemporary pop culture groups and each wielding unique elemental powers. There’s a lot of them, and true to its name, it’s bizarre.
It’s also wildly popular. Since its premiere in 1987, it has sold over 120 million copies in total as a series in the manga anthology Weekly Shonen Jump. Manga art has been exhibited at the Louvre and there have even been collaborations with major fashion brands like Gucci and Area.
Steel Ball Race, set in 1890s America, follows two horse racers: Johnny Joestar, a paraplegic former jockey, and his newfound friend Gyro Zeppeli, an enigmatic former Neapolitan performer with the power to manipulate steel balls. After Zeppeli briefly restores Johnny’s ability to walk, he sacrifices himself to join Zeppeli in a cross-country horse race from San Diego to New York City to compete for a $50 million prize.
Said race is less of a Mind Race and more akin to the 1975 cult classic film, Death Race 2000 as it sees other jockeys equipped with special stall powers, adding to the gruesome and dangerous nature of their already exciting race.
Anime staff includes the following issues:
“Is Steel Ball Run a story that depicts heroes running through grand races, speaking their own convictions,” director Yasuhiro Kimura said in a statement to Deadline . “My heart is pounding with excitement to be entrusted with directing this anime adaptation. The entire staff shares this feeling and pours their passion into the daily production. I look forward to sharing our enthusiasm for this work with all of you, and hope that we can ride this journey together.”
Currently, Steel Ball Run doesn’t have a release date, but Animation Studio David Production will reveal more details about the global live-action release on September 23rd.
Here is The Steel Ball Run Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, based on the manga by Hirohiko Araki!
Coming soon, only on Netflix! pic.twitter.com/oz7van0jxb
— Netflix anime (@netflixanime) September 12, 2025
Steel Ball Run is the seventh arc in Araki’s ongoing manga series, serialized by Shueisha from 2004 to 2011. The series heralded a new manga continuity that continued into subsequent arcs, Yajolion and its current arc, Yajoland in the Area. Among diehard fans, Steel Ball Run stands out as a universal favorite of the Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure saga in the Area .
While Jjba isn’t exactly new on Netflix, it may cause flashbacks for anime fans who are still upset about its treatment of the anime’s previous arc, Stone Ocean .
Before the series even made its way to Netflix, fans treated the weekly episodic release of the series “Fifth Circle,” The Golden Wind , as an online holiday dubbed “ Jojo Fridays. ” On Jojo Fridays, fans shared new fan art and engaged in virtual water cooler conversations about each episode’s villain of the week, their weird, pop-song-referenced superpowers, and theorized how the show’s characters would emerge victorious.
In contrast, Netflix’s release of a batch of Stone Ocean episodes that the streamer failed to promote meant that some fans were unaware that the show had more episodes to watch. Stone Ocean’s three-part batch episode releases were essentially cast in the shadows as far as that was concerned, ending Jojo Friday and causing some to miss the show’s conclusion.
Netflix could now go with a weekly release procedure, like popular shows like Dan da dan, but fans will have to wait and see what happens with Steel Ball Run in the area.
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