Toward the 100th anniversary of Shigeru Mizuki's birth: ...... Toei Animation's producer secretly reveals the secret of "Gegege no Kitaro" [Anime Industry Watching No.76].

Shigeru Mizuki, the late author of "Gegege no Kitaro," celebrated the 99th anniversary of his birth on March 8 this year. To celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth next year in 2022, Toei Animation has announced four projects. There will be exhibitions, campaigns, and other events, but what is of interest are two new animations. One of them is "Akuma-kun," which will be the first animated feature since 1989. The other is a theatrical animation titled "The Birth of Kitaro: The Mystery of GeGeGeGe.
As for "Kitaro" in particular, it is a film adaptation of the sixth TV anime season that was broadcast from 2018-20, but what is it about?　We spoke with Mr. Daichi Nagatomi, Chief Producer of the IP Strategy Office, Planning Department, Toei Animation Co.

The new "Kitaro" movie will be scary for adults!

─ ─ "Akuma-kun" and the new "Gegege no Kitaro" movie, are these two animated films produced by Mr. Nagatomi?

Nagatomi Yes, I am. We will announce the details of the new "Akuma-kun" and the new "Kitaro" movie at the "Gegege-no-Moment 2021" to be held in Chofu City this November, so please wait until then. The movie of "Kitaro" is titled "Kitaro no Shussho Gegege no Mystery" (Birth of Kitaro: The Mystery of Gegege). It will have the same worldview as the 2018 version of "Gegege no Kitaro" that I produced, with Kitaro played by Sawashiro Miyuki and Kitaro's father by Nozawa Masako. Many "Kitaro" movies for children have been produced in the past at Toei Manga Festival and Toei Anime Fair, but "The Birth of Kitaro: The Mystery of Gegege" will be a scary movie for adults that is different from them.


─ ─ "The Birth of Kitaro" is a movie about how Kitaro was born, isn't it?

Nagatomi Yes. Considering the significance of the film as a commemorative film for the 100th anniversary of Mr. Shigeru Mizuki's birth, we are going to depict head-on the mystery of Kitaro's birth, which you are vaguely aware of but do not know in detail. Do you know what Kitaro's father looked like before he became the father with the eyeballs? In the original manga, he was a mummy man with bandages wrapped around his head. The story begins when a man named Mizuki moves in next door to Kitaro's parents' house and asks them, "We are going to have a baby soon. His parents die, but a baby is born from the grave. Only the eyeballs fell out of the body of the father who died, leaving behind his love for his own child, and that is how it is depicted in the comic ...... and how it is depicted in the comic.

─ ─ I think the birth of Kitaro is also depicted in the anime "Graveyard Kitaro" (2008), isn't it?

Nagatomi It is true that it is depicted as an event, but "Graveyard Kitaro" has a different title and is treated as an extra chapter. In the original manga, the story moves too quickly, so it is not exactly depicted why Kitaro's parents died and how the baby became Kitaro. In this movie, I would like to depict the birth of Kitaro as an authentic history while utilizing the original story with the participation of Mizuki's daughter, Ms. Naoko Haraguchi (Mizuki Production).

─ ─ Is this a prequel to the 6th TV series that aired in 2018?

Nagatomi Yes, in fact, Kitaro's father appeared in the 6th season as a dream scene, before he became the father of the eyeballs. As you can see by doing an image search for "Kitaro's father is handsome," we portrayed him as a very cool father, which got a lot of attention on SNS. We received many offers from various companies to commercialize the product. However, we decided not to go on a spree just because the movie was temporarily popular, but to discuss with Mizuki Productions that we would depict Kitaro's father in the movie as a single episode. Whether he will appear in the movie as that cool father figure or not remains to be seen. We are still adjusting whether the character design for the movie will be the same as the sixth season. Anyway, as a fan of Kitaro, I am very happy to have Masako Nozawa, who first played Kitaro in the first and second seasons of the TV series, play his father.


──When developing the TV series for the sixth season, you and Mizuki Productions had a lot of discussions about it, didn't you?

Nagatomi That's right. When I went to Mizuki Productions to show them the new design of Neko-musume for the 6th season, I was indeed very nervous. As a result, they called me "Neko-sama" and accepted me favorably, but there was half a chance that they would criticize me harshly. But I didn't make Neko-musume bigger for the sake of mischievous and short-sighted popularity. We had decided to introduce a human girl named Inuyama Mana, who shares the same line of sight as Kitaro, so we couldn't have a Neko Musume with the same height and the same personality as Mana. We decided on the design of Neko-musume based on the necessity of the story. When Mizuki Production saw the new Nekomusume design, he said, "I was indeed surprised, but there was no way Toei Animation would do anything strange to "Kitaro. It was thanks to the strong relationship of trust we had built over the past 50 years.