The following are excerpts from a presentation written about my favorite artists and relative series.
ONE
Born October 29th, 1986, One developed his webcomic “One Punch Man” on his personal website. While not much information is known about One’s personal life, from what we do know, he is very much like his own main character “Saitama” (named after the city of Saitama, One’s hometown). According to the artists, he is “a manga artist for fun”, who transformed his hobby into his career. The art style for the original version of the webcomic is shoddy and poorly drawn. We can infer by this that the artist may be using a ‘Paint’ program or something similar to Adobe, and rather than spending many hours drawing out intricate slides, he spends a leisurely amount of time on each page. However, what made this comic interesting for most readers was not the art style, but the intricate character development, relativity to character struggles, and surreal twist on the norms of character creation in the Shonen manga industry. Achieving over 70 million visits to his website, One and Yusuke Murata would win the Best Manga Sugoi Japan Award in 2016, for promoting universality, originality, and potential growth. One would go on to serialize multiple one-shot comics, such as “Doto no Yushatachi” (Angry Warriors), “Gokiburi Buster” (Cockroaches Buster), and “Dangan Tenshi Fan Club” (Bullet Angel Fan Club). He would also develop other series like “Makai no Ossan”, “Mobu Saiko Hyaku” (Mob Psycho 100), and its predecessor “Reigen”.
Yusuke Murata
Born July 4th, 1978, Yusuke Murata knew from a very young age that he wanted to become a manga artist. Winning several awards at the age of 12 and having his own original character designs implemented into the Megaman series, Murata was destined for greatness. His first manga, a one shot titled ‘Partner’, would win him the Hop Step award, with his second piece winning the Akatsuka award only three years later. His most famous work, Eyeshield 21, reached the top ten bestselling Mangas multiple times throughout its publication. Eyeshield 21 was ranked 7th in Ameba’s “Best Shonen Jump Manga of the 21st Century” and would spark an interest in many young Japanese teenagers to play American football. Murata began work on the digital manga remake of One Punch Man, posting its first chapter on June 14th, 2012, for Japanese audiences. Viz Media, an American manga publishing company, would pick up the series and release translated volumes only 7 months later. As of 2018, 16 volumes have been released in this way, and production of the second season of One Punch Man is currently underway, with chapter 99 being released just after Halloween of this year. In congruence with the near end of the second season, it has been reported that the second season of the anime will air in April 2019.
Saitama
Despite being the strongest hero in his respective universe, Saitama suffers from depression. While he originally enjoyed fighting and becoming stronger, eventually his countless battles became one sided fights, where he’d destroy the monster or threat in a single punch. This depression develops further throughout the show, giving him a unique quality that many characters don’t have, and allowing viewers who even suffer from minor depression to relate to the character. Saitama is an unemployed squatter (until later in the comic), relying on saved money, pocket change, and every possible supermarket Saturday deal to stay housed and fed. One specifically made Saitama to define the standards of the average anime protagonist. Saitama is small and plain looking, many times being drawn blander than the characters surrounding him to show how out of place he is. A long running joke of the series revolves around the character being bald. Many notorious anime protagonists have killer hairdos, as do multiple other characters in the OPM universe, making him that plainer to look at. Saitama is very lazy, only going out on hero work when a major incident happens on the news, and quite often leaving before anyone can recognize him for what he’s done and give him the credit he deserves. Additionally, he isn’t charismatic, many times being harassed by average citizens and other heroes for his weird look and lack of social skills. Nonetheless, Saitama nearly never lifts a finger against another human, unless in self-defense, and diligently destroys calamity-like monsters on the daily.
Curatorial Statement
What makes One Punch Man such a fantastic show is not just the flashy art, or the satirical humor, but the production and artistic evolution that went into the series. Starting off small as a mere, crudely drawn webcomic, the series rose to its own standings, becoming an online sensation long before being picked up by Murata. One’s website had consistent visits from over 100,000 people daily, grossing 70 million views by 2015. When Murata began remaking the manga, many were afraid the artist wouldn’t give the series the love they felt it deserved, though those fears were quickly shattered when Yusuke released the first, jaw dropping chapter of the series on December 12th, 2012. With Yusuke’s help, the plot quite literally “thickened”, compacting choreography, positioning, scale, and depth into every chapter. What more, while most characters, including Saitama, were given much more rigid and beautiful character designs, Saitama would consistently be drawn to show One’s more relaxed style. This pushed the comedic idea of our all-powerful, lazy protagonist to new heights, and grossed an even higher fan base because of it. With stunning environments and extremely detailed monster designs, the series grew ever livelier, until it was finally picked up by Madhouse Inc., and transformed into the wonderful anime it is today. Condensed down into a 12-episode series, along with multiple OVA episodes, One Punch Man has become a staple must watch in the anime community, and with a second season underway, many have gone back to revisit the show in preparation for what’s to come.
Citations
“ONE.” OnePunch-Man Wiki, 1212, onepunchman.wikia.com/wiki/ONE.
“Yusuke Murata.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 19 Nov. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yusuke_Murata.
“Yuusuke MURATA.” Shounen Fighting Series: Why Do People like Them? - Forum - Anime News Network, 2015, www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/people.php?id=16398.
“One Punch Man.” MyAnimeList.net, 2015, myanimelist.net/anime/30276/One_Punch_Man.
“VIZ: The Official Website for One-Punch Man.” VIZ Media: The World's Most Popular Anime, Manga and More!, 2015, www.viz.com/one-punch-man.