What does さわれないというか mean?

Question

I'm a huge Slam Dunk fan and I was reading an interview from Inoue about the new voice actors for the movie "The First Slam Dunk". I have some problems with this sentence, especially the last sentence.

This is the source with the full interview: https://www.oricon.co.jp/news/2259281/full/

そして、テレビアニメ版からキャストを一新したことについて触れ「だからこそ、連載していた頃にテレビアニメがあり、声優さんたちがいらっしゃったけど、自分としてはそこにはさわれないというか」と告白。

The whole sentence confuses me, but that verb seems to be the issue. I know 触る means "to touch" (I guess that's the verb but there's no kanji). Is that the meaning here? Is it figurative? I know it can also mean "be involved" or something. So would it be "I cannot be involved"? The というとか should be a way to end a sentence in softer way, I think.

So would it be: "That is why there was the anime when I was doing the series and there were the voice actors but I would say I cannot touch it"? That doesn't sound right. Honestly, I also don't understand what that initial だからこそ refers to.

Answer 1

• This そこ refers to the old anime and its voice actors.
• The meaning of this 触る ("touch") is a bit obscure, but judging from the original interview, I think it can be understood along the lines of "to approach" or "to bring up (again)".
• だからこそ modifies さわれない, so the basic structure of the sentence is "This is why I cannot touch".

だからこそ、連載していた頃にテレビアニメがあり、声優さんたちがいらっしゃったけど、自分としてはそこにはさわれないというか
This _{(=the fact that I wanted to make the new movie with a new policy)} is why, even though there was an anime and its voice actors in the days when I was working on the manga series, I couldn't touch/approach them _{(=the old anime and voice actors)}, you know.

So, Inoue, as the director, wanted to make the new movie with a different policy than the old anime. He understands that the previous staff and voice actors did a great job according to the policy of the previous anime, but this time he wanted voice actors to perform differently. That was why he decided not to use the same voice actors.