Anthony Bourdain’s 2012 graphic novel Get Jiro is coming to Adult Swim as a new animated series, bringing its enigmatic chef protagonist to the screen in a dystopian world governed by culinary rules.
The adaptation has been nearly a decade in the making, involving years of conversations and approvals, a writers’ strike and two years of production. The series was completed after Bourdain’s death in 2018.
Created by filmmakers Alessandro Tanaka and Brian Gatewood, Get Jiro is set in a future Los Angeles where economic collapse has left food as the only major non-virtual experience. As a result, cooking has become the world’s dominant business, and chefs are revered like gods.
A dystopian Los Angeles ruled by chefs
Reservations at the most prestigious restaurants have waiting lists stretching for years, while scarce ingredients have become highly valuable. Hospitality groups operate like crime syndicates, fresh-produce suppliers are treated like drug dealers, and fish markets conduct quiet business using blacklists.
Armed chefs patrol their territories in veste de chef uniforms, threatening anyone who attempts to grow ingredients at home. In this cutthroat society, class divisions separate the Inner Rim, home to the city’s most exclusive restaurants, from the lawless Outer Rim.
That is where Jiro, a mysterious sushi chef voiced by Brian Tee, arrives from Japan to open a restaurant. Despite the city’s rigid social hierarchy, Jiro is determined to serve pristine sushi at the highest level — without soy sauce.
“The spirit and the energy of Bourdain loom very large on this series.”
The first two episodes, viewed at Get Jiro’s SXSW London premiere in June, showcase the series’ detailed animation, editing, cinematography and sound design from the opening scene. The show uses Bourdain’s original concept as a starting point while developing its own visual style, retaining his fascination with both the beautiful and the grotesque.
Clean lines and visceral sound effects make the preparation of salmon, the cooking of rice and the plating of nigiri intensely tactile. Viewers who enjoy kitchen dramas such as The Bear, Boiling Point and Chef, or cinematic food series such as Chef’s Table, may appreciate the attention given to these sequences.
“Obviously, we had to get the food right, because it’s Bourdain,” said series co-creator Tanaka at SXSW. He added that the production recruited Bourdain’s friend Matt Goulding as a food consultant. “He was basically our food guy. Every script, every animatic, every rough cut of every episode went through him,” he said.
Anthony Bourdain’s influence on the animated series
Bourdain’s presence remains central to Get Jiro despite the series being produced after his death. The show includes cameos from chefs David Chang, Eric Ripert and José Andrés, while one major storyline focuses on a rival vegan chef’s empire and features severe commentary on meat substitutes.
Bourdain’s graphic-novel co-writer Joel Rose also joined the writers’ room and wrote an episode of the series.
“He was kind of always there to make sure that we were doing right by Bourdain,” said Tanaka. “The spirit and the energy of Bourdain loom very large on this series.”
The show also reflects Bourdain’s love of cinema, as well as Tanaka and Gatewood’s interest in film. Its references range from the Japanese cinema of Akira Kurosawa and Yasujiro Ozu to George Miller’s Mad Max films. Each episode is designed around a different genre.
“Bourdain was a huge cinephile. Brian and I also love movies, and so for us, we wanted to explore different genres,” said Tanaka. “We’re constantly making references to movies, cinema history, and to other filmmakers,” he said.
“We have an episode that’s coming up that is a prison episode, and we did it all as one take, which in live action, you see it a lot — you don’t often see that in animation. We use a lot of the tools from film in order to make the show.”
When does Get Jiro premiere?
Get Jiro will premiere with two episodes at midnight on Oct. 3 on Toonami on Adult Swim. The series will then stream on HBO Max beginning Oct. 4. The original graphic novel is available on Amazon.
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Update: Aug. 28, 2026, 9:56 a.m. GMT. This article was first published following Get Jiro’s SXSW London premiere in June and republished after the trailer’s release in August.
