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Shigemitsu Harada, Hachi Sendō's Hikaru to Hikaru Comedy Manga Ends
posted on by Rafael Antonio Pineda & Joanna Cayanan
Hikaru to Hikaru (Hikaru and Hikaru; with the manga's title featuring the first "Hikaru" written in blue hiragana characters and the second "Hikaru" written in pink katakana characters, the latter syllabary being usually used for foreign words) centers on Hikaru, the descendant of a long family line of ninjas. Though he has long trained in ninjutsu arts, he longs to master a technique that he has long had trouble with, the "Kunoichi no Jutsu," which allows a male ninja's body to transform into that of a female body. Without mastering this technique, Hikaru will never be acknowledged as a full-fledged ninja by his peers. In order to force him to get better, Hikaru's father orders him to enroll at a well-known all-girls school, and use what little skill he has in "Kunoichi no Jutsu" to hide his true gender and graduate from the school.
Harada and Sendō launched the manga in Dragon Age in March 2023. Kadokawa published the manga's second compiled book volume on May 9. The manga's third and final volume will ship in April 2025.
Harada wrote two different manga spinoffs for Akane Shimizu's Cells at Work! manga. The first, Cells at Work! Code Black, launched in Kodansha's Morning magazine and the Weekly D Morning digital manga magazine in June 2018, and ended in January 2021. Issei Hatsuyoshi drew the manga. Kodansha USA Publishing licensed the manga. The manga inspired a television anime that premiered in January 2021. The second, Hataraku Saibō Lady (Cells at Work! Lady), launched in Kodansha's Morning two magazine in January 2020, and ended in September 2022. Akari Otokawa drew the manga. Kodansha USA Publishing is releasing Cells at Work! Code Black in English.
Harada and Shinjirō launched the Shinyaku Kani Kōsen (The Crab Cannery Ship: New Testament) manga in Young Animal in June 2021, and ended it in November 2022. Hakusensha published the manga's fifth compiled book volume digitally in December 2022. While Hakusensha published the manga's first and second volumes both digitally and physically, it published the third through fifth volumes digitally only.
Harada's Ippatsu Kiki Musume manga previously inspired a television anime in 1999, while his Yuria Hyaku-shiki manga inspired a live-action video in 2009.
Source: Dragon Age December issue
Disclosure: Kadokawa World Entertainment (KWE), a wholly owned subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, is the majority owner of Anime News Network, LLC. One or more of the companies mentioned in this article are part of the Kadokawa Group of Companies.
