Trivia / Knights of the Zodiac

• Approval of God: Masami Kurumada was frequently consulted by the filmmakers during production, and gave input on the design of the film's armors. After the film's release, he is said to have enjoyed it.
• Box Office Bomb: Budget, $60 million. Box office, $6.4 million. After its long development cycle ballooned the budget, the movie was panned by critics upon its release, received only a brief limited release in North America, and died quickly on the vine in theaters.
• Direct to Video: Whilst the film was initially supposed to have a UK theatrical release on the 28th July 2023, to point where it was still listed as such on some cinema's websites right up until the day of release, it was silently cancelled and instead the film made it's UK debut on DVD a few months later on 9th October.
• Multiple Languages, Same Voice Actor: In the Japanese dub, Mackenyu dubs himself as Seiya.
• Role Reprise: In the Latin American Spanish dub, Carlo Vázquez, María Fernanda Morales and Marcos Patiño reprise their roles as Seiya, Sienna and Ikki/Nero from both the anime adapatations and, in Vazquez' case, from Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac's second season.
• Saved from Development Hell: The film was in development as far back as 2015, but didn't receive so much as a casting announcement until September 2021. This ended up causing the 2019 Netflix reboot, which took elements from the film's story, to release before it did.
• Short Run in Peru: Ahead of the film's American release, Japan got the film first on April 28, 2023, and it was also released in Latin America and other European territories throughout early May.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Early script versions stuck closer to the source material, with Seiya training in Sanctuary as a child, and the other Bronze Knights (who are otherwise Adapted Out of the final film) being part of the cast. These elements were dropped for the sake of simplifying the story for a general audience, while the Bronze Saints were "tragically" cut due to the lack of time and budget needed for each of them to be properly depicted.
  • Nero was originally intended to be the primary villain, but after the filmmakers felt they wouldn't have enough time to properly explore his depth and motivation, Guraad was created as a simpler, less-mystical threat. One version of the script even cut Nero out entirely, before he was added back in for the sake of the story.
  • Guraad was originally conceived as a man (and a business partner of Alman Kiddo), but following the character's poor reception in Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac (which was based on the film but came out first) and the addition of Famke Janssen to the cast, the character was changed to female.

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