Ken Watanabe Joins Detective Pikachu Live-action Film's Cast

Watanabe joins Ryan Reynolds, Justice Smith, Kathryn Newton

The Hollywood Reporter reported on Friday that Ken Watanabe (Legendary's Godzilla) is joining the cast of Legendary Entertainment's live-action Pokémon movie Detective Pikachu. Watanabe will play an original character named Detective Yoshida.


As previously revealed, Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool, pictured below) will play Detective Pikachu. Justice Smith (The Get Down) will star as the main character, a teen who teams with Pikachu in order to find his missing father, and Kathryn Newton (Big Little Lies) will play the "sassy journalist" Lucy.


Rob Letterman (Shark Tale, Monsters vs. Aliens, Goosebumps) is directing the film, with scripts by Alex Hirsch (Gravity Falls) and Nicole Perlman (Guardians of the Galaxy).


The film is slated to start production in London in mid-January. TOHO will distribute the film in Japan, while Universal Pictures will distribute the film outside of Japan.


The film is based on the Detective Pikachu Nintendo 3DS game, which debuted in Japan in 2016. THe game will get Western release on March 23.

Legendary Entertainment acquired the live-action film rights for the Pokémon franchise in July 2016. The Hollywood Reporter reported in April 2016 that Legendary Entertainment, Warner Bros., and Sony were engaged in an auction for the rights. Warner already released several of the animated Pokémon films, starting with Pokemon: The First Movie in North American theaters in 1999. Warner then released Pokemon 2000 - The Movie and 2001's Pokemon 3 - The Movie.