Yeon Sang-ho heads back to Parasyte with Netflix’s Tamiya

Netflix is reopening the body-snatching world of Parasyte, with Yeon Sang-ho back on board for a new live-action series centered on Ryoko Tamiya.

The project, titled Parasyte: Tamiya, will star Shioli Kutsuna and is scheduled to stream in 2027, according to Variety. It extends Yeon’s work with Netflix after Hellbound and the Korean live-action spin on the franchise, Parasyte: The Grey.

Yeon developed the new series and wrote it with Ryu Yong-jae. Wowpoint, which also worked on Yeon’s Human Vapor and Parasyte: The Grey, is producing.

Directing duties are being handled by Kakimoto Kensaku, known for Glass Heart, and Nakagawa Kazuhiro, whose credits include Double and Bullet Train Explosion.

A fan-favorite parasite gets the spotlight

Parasyte: Tamiya shifts attention to Ryoko Tamiya, a character from Hitoshi Iwaaki’s manga. In the original story, Ryoko is a parasite who occupies the body of a high school teacher.

Variety reported that the character begins as violent and indiscriminate, then changes as she absorbs more from the human world around her. After seeing a parasite and a human exist within one body, she starts to consider whether survival for her kind may depend on coexistence rather than war.

The Netflix series will tell the story from Ryoko’s point of view. Its focus spans the woman whose body is taken, the parasite living inside her and the being that emerges between those two identities.

Kutsuna, whose credits include Sanctuary, Deadpool 2 and Gundam, is taking on all three sides of the role: the human Ryoko, the parasite after the takeover and the creature trying to understand people.

Yeon says Ryoko carries the heart of Parasyte

Yeon told Variety that Ryoko’s questions about her own existence are what push Parasyte beyond a straightforward youth manga. He described her anguish as central to the meaning of the franchise.

Asked about casting Kutsuna, Yeon said the part would have been a major acting challenge and praised her work in showing a non-human creature slowly grasping both humanity and its own identity.

Yeon also said he selected Kakimoto and Nakagawa because their styles are so different, and because he wanted to see what their collaboration would produce.

Kutsuna called Ryoko Tamiya the toughest role of her career, according to Variety. She said the series came together through the commitment of the cast and crew, who helped one another through the production’s challenges.

Sato Yoshihiro, Netflix Japan’s manager of live action creative, said the questions raised by Parasyte more than 30 years ago, including what defines humanity and whether people can live alongside beings unlike themselves, feel more urgent now because non-sentient AI is widely available.

The new series follows a strong Netflix showing for Parasyte: The Grey. Variety reported that the 2024 release spent four weeks on Netflix’s Global Top 10 Non-English TV chart and reached No. 1 in 34 countries.

Iwaaki’s Parasyte manga, published by Kodansha, has already been adapted as live-action films, an anime and the Korean drama Parasyte: The Grey.

This story draws on original reporting from Variety.