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Satoshi Kon's Short Manga Stories to be Published (Updated)

The official website of the late director Satoshi Kon (Perfect Blue, Millennium Actress, Paprika) announced on Monday that Kodansha will publish Kon's first manga series and a complete collection of his short manga stories next year. The publisher will first reprint Kon's Kaikisen series (pictured at right) on January 21, 2011. As Kon's first manga series, Kaikisen ran for 11 installments in Kodansha's Weekly Young Magazine from March to June of 1990. Kodansha had previously published the series in one compiled book volume in 1990 and again in a new edition in 1999.

Kodansha will then publish Yume no Kaseki - Kon Satoshi Zen-Tanpen (Fossils of Dreams: Satoshi Kon's Complete Short Story Collection) on February 17. The 400-page book will contain the first collection of all 15 short manga stories that Kon created. The collection begins with "Toriko," Kon's 1984 manga debut that won the Tetsuya Chiba Award for new artists, but never ran in a magazine. (Kon's story has no relation to the later manga by Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro.) The last story in the upcoming book is "Bashō-Ō no Bōken" ("The Adventures of the Venerable Bashō," 1988). 11 of the stories have never been compiled in book form before, and one of the stories, "Picnic," will be reproduced entirely in color as it was first published.

Tokuma Shoten's Animage magazine reprinted part of Kon and Mamoru Oshii's Seraphim: 2-Oku 6661-Man 3336 no Tsubasa (Seraphim: 266,613,336 Wings) manga series earlier this year. Kodansha then reprinted the entire Seraphim series on December 4, as well as Kon's OPUS manga on December 13. Madhouse announced last month that it resumed production on Yume-Miru Kikai, Kon's unfinished last feature film.

Thanks to Daniel Zelter for the news tip.

Update: While Seraphim originally ran in Animage, the reprint ran in Monthly Comic Ryū. Thanks, Brian Ruh.