By Allison Watkinson
TLL Reporter
Sky Turtle Nova is launching an officially licensed Ultraman: Ultra Academy book series alongside Tsuburaya Productions’ international division, Tsuburaya Fields Media & Pictures Entertainment.
Intended for a pre-teen demographic, the Ultraman: Ultra Academy book series features a team of six students as they study giant Kaiju to help Ultraman and the Special Science Search Party (SSSP) find weaknesses to defeat the beasts.
The team of students will draw inspiration from earthly problems that are giving rise to the monsters and from Ultraman himself as he attempts to restore balance to the world.
An official preview of the six-book series will take place at the 2024 G-Fest convention in Chicago during the event’s Ultraman in America panel.
The Ultraman: Ultra Academy series is scheduled for launch at retail locations across the United States during spring 2025.
The Sky Turtle Nova x Tsuburaya Fields Media & Pictures Entertainment book series marks the first Ultraman-themed literary work to be released for the North American market.
The announcement of the licensed book series follows the recent debut of the animated superhero movie, Ultraman: Rising, on the Netflix streaming platform.
Ultraman Rising was created as a co-production between Netflix Animation and the Japanese entertainment company, Tsuburaya Productions.
Owned by Tsuburaya Productions, Ultraman is a global science-fiction superhero franchise that originally debuted in the 1966 Ultra Q TV series.
Since its initial creation, the Ultraman franchise has expanded to include a wide range of TV series, films, video games, licensed consumer products and more.
Tsuburaya Fields Media & Pictures Entertainment is a subsidiary of Tsuburaya Productions that is active in the production and distribution of Ultraman entertainment content across North America and other international markets outside of Japan.
Headed by Danny Simon, the new subsidiary will expand the Ultraman franchise’s North American licensing program into additional regions such as the United Kingdom, the European Union, South America, the Middle East and African markets.
A division of Oasis Family Media and Sky Turtle Press, Sky Turtle Nova is a publishing imprint that focuses on genres such as science fiction, fantasy, supernatural thrillers, pop-culture properties, horror and speculative fiction.