Crunchyroll confirmed the anime adaptation of the webtoon Teenage Mercenary,
with a 2027 premiere, as revealed at New York Comic Con. The series, produced by J.C.STAFF, follows a boy surviving a plane crash and becoming a mercenary, based on a popular LINE Manga webtoon.
Crunchyroll officially announced the anime adaptation of the webtoon Teenage Mercenary
during New York Comic Con on October 8, 2026, with a projected 2027 release. The streaming platform revealed a special promo trailer for the series, which is set to debut on its service. The anime, directed by Manabu Ono (Sword Art Online: Alicization) and animated by J.C.STAFF, will be part of a co-production partnership between HAYATE, LINE Digital Frontier Corporation, and Crunchyroll, covering 15 webtoon titles.
Production Team and Story Details
The anime, based on the webtoon by YC and Rakeyon, stars Ijin Yu, a boy who survives a plane crash in a foreign country at age eight and becomes a mercenary. A decade later, he returns to his family after contact with South Korean soldiers. The story, which placed first in LINE Manga’s annual rankings for serialized works in 2023 and 2024, launched on NAVER WEBTOON in 2020 and was later carried by LINE Manga in Japan starting in 2021. The Japanese edition of the webtoon names the protagonist Soma Tatewaki.
Collaboration and Global Distribution
The project is a co-production involving HAYATE, which leads development and production, LINE Digital Frontier, which supplies the webcomics, and Crunchyroll, which will stream the series exclusively in select territories worldwide. LINE Digital Frontier first announced the adaptation in 2025. While the exact premiere date, Japanese broadcaster, and cast remain unannounced, the series is expected to follow the webtoon’s narrative closely, with Koji Haneda (Dandadan) handling character designs and Hiroyuki Sawano (Solo Leveling) composing the music.
No details were provided about the number of episodes or potential seasonal divisions, though previous webtoon adaptations suggest a likely 12–13-episode first season.
More on Teenage Mercenary
https://x.com/Crunchyroll/status/2108316509843919003