Netflix's JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run is returning with its second and third stages, with weekly episodes resuming from 25 September following a two-part premiere in March. Director Yasuhiro Kimura, speaking to Polygon, discussed how the anime builds on the manga's Spaghetti Western setting and hinted that the story's already eccentric tone will become even stranger as it progresses, sustaining momentum for one of the franchise's most acclaimed instalments.

Steel Ball Run follows paraplegic ex-jockey Johnny Joestar and Gyro Zeppeli as they compete in a gruelling 1890s cross-continental horse race across North America with a $50 million prize, while a hidden conspiracy unfolds around them. Kimura, who previously directed episodes of Golden Wind, explained that the team used careful colour design and art direction to evoke the vast, dusty atmosphere of classic Westerns, and detailed a hybrid technique combining 3D skeletal movement with hand-drawn surface animation to realistically depict horses without overburdening individual animators.