Warner Bros. is currently going with Jaume Collet-Serra to director the live-action Akira. Collet-Serra is known for his movies Unknown, starring Liam Neeson, and Orphan. Thanks to ICv2 for this report.
Akria Cast Questioned
Akira is facing the same question that arose with the cast of The Last Airbender. Akira is being looked at for a live action movie from Hollywood. At this time Warner Bros. is wanting the location of the story changed from Tokyo to New York. By doing this they are also recasting the movie with Anglo actors, instead of casting actors with an Asian background. The question is why does Hollywood feel the need to change the ethnicity in a story to make a movie? Even with the location changed to New York, we are the United States where all ethnic backgrounds are to be blurred. Check out the full story at ICv2’s site linked below.