Speculation that ‘Chainsaw Man’ might release next year has fans alight

You might have heard that Chainsaw Man is coming out next year. Word online is that the highly anticipated anime in production at Studio MAPPA will be released next year. After a year off, Tatsuki Fujimoto’s manga will continue into its second part. 

Both are reasonable time frames for the releases, but the word has spread as if the official word has come out, partly due to hype for the series. On MyAnimeList, Chainsaw Man is the fourth top upcoming anime (behind Attack on Titan, The Rising of the Shield Hero, and Demon Slayer). In addition, Chainsaw Man’s physical releases have consistently made the NYT Best Sellers List. And at Anime NYC, Chainsaw Man was undoubtedly the most popular cosplay on the show floor. 

All the renewed hype traces back to an unofficial news account that updates Weekly Shonen Jump. “Both Chainsaw Man Part 2 & the anime adaptation of Chainsaw Man are scheduled for a 2022 release,” @WSJ_manga shared in a tweet making the rounds. 

While the tweet received over 4,000 retweets and 20,000 likes, the account did not share any sources for the information. Still, fans of the manga and anime on Twitter have run with the news, posting all manner of caps-locked exclamations.

Other fan-run news accounts have run with the alleged release date.

It’s not unreasonable to expect the manga to return from its now year-long hiatus, and the anime has a trailer to run alongside it, but there’s still no official announcement. It’s a rumor at best while we wait on an image of the news somewhere in Weekly Shonen Jump or just a post from Chainsaw Man‘s official Twitter account.

Still, we know the series will have a presence at the annual manga and anime expo Jump Festa, sponsored by Shueisha (owners of Weekly Shonen Jump). Mangaka Tatsuki Fujimoto partook in Viz Media’s Mangaka Mania just yesterday, sharing a timelapse of his drawing the titular character. Unfortunately, there were no announcements tied to the video.

Update Dec. 6, 2021, 8:17 a.m. CT: A representative from Chainsaw Man’s English publisher, VIZ Media, told WGTC the publisher does not have an official update regarding the manga.