Kumeta interview, S, spring 2007
Today I bring yet another Kumeta interview. This one is from early 2007, and Kumeta is as depressed as always. The magazine it's from is a bit of an artsy magazine, so there is a bit of a focus on drawing and stuff, as in why does SZS look the way it looks, character/clothes design and so on. For people interested in SZS, there also are some bits and pieces of info, like where Abiru's tail fetish came from. I've also attached scans from some very early character sketches and ideas, and an early draft (SUPER INTERESTING!!!(?)). I think we all can be grateful that some of those ideas fell through. And yes, it's all very very funny.
Quarterly S, 2007-04-01
- First, please tell us what made you start drawing "Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei".
K: There's nothing to do for me but to do manga, so I just had to draw something, and that was that... In the beginning I was thinking of doing a story manga, but Magazine told me that it should be "12 pages only", so I had to do the most catchy manga possible within that limit. If it had to be anything, it would be a character manga. I thought of making a whole class of strange people from the beginning, and the teacher was also a strange minor character. But since the page number had decreased from my previous work, I thought it would be hard if I didn't make one character stand out. So what made me draw it was just elimination. "Can't do this, can't do this, can't do this either!". It wasn't a very positive way of starting it. I created lots of characters in the beginning, but I have also used characters from that time when I still hadn't decided anything. I didn't plan much...
- This turned negative all of a sudden... Zetsubou-sensei and his kimonos are very fascinating. Did you like kimonos and the mood of old Japan from the beginning?
K: I think that I started getting into old Japanese-style things a lot since the latter half of "Katte ni Kaizou". I don't know how I will feel about it later, though. I was thinking of making the teacher a more negative and miserable "Botchan" type character, so that's why I used the style.
- Do you wear kimonos yourself? You seem to take great joy in kimono design.
K: No... that would just turn into cosplay. I don't have any good memories of Japanese clothes either. Long ago, people made fun of me because my obi was too high up, and ever since then I'm not wearing kimonos. But kimono patterns are pretty much fixed already, and that's about what you can do design-wise for them. It goes for western clothes too, I guess it would be better if I actually designed them before drawing them. This is sort of embarrassing...
- I see, you have even experienced a kimono trauma... But I actually thought that you spent a lot of time designing your western clothes.
K: Then it's more of an un-designed design, or something. So that it absolutely won't be offensive to anyone, so that no one will say anything... If I would do my very best with the design, people would just complain. "I am not doing anything, so please be kind and do not pay any attention to me." That's about how big my effort in design is.
- The clothes you draw are so cute though... But I'll do my best to not pay any attention to them at all. (laugh) The chapter opening pages you do for the tankobon are also fantastic, with their retro, shadowy karuta-style. You always hide an emperor penguin in them, and looking for it is also fun.
K: Tentatively, I'll be doing the whole manga in this Japanese retro style. But, there is a negative reason for me to have added those opening pages in the first place. The chapters are starting on a left page every time, so usually, when you continue with the next chapter, it will share a spread together with the previous chapter. So I insert an extra page in the middle. A blank page would really be a bit inexcusable, so I'm adding an opening page, with some small jokes.
- So you had a negative reason for that, too. (laugh) The penguin first appeared as a "unstability" joke, and it was also used as an "unreadable punch-line" in an incredibly fantastic move. Why a penguin? (Comment: This is SZS, chapter 20.)
K: Actually, I was in a hurry and it just happened... I hadn't decided on that as a punch line at all. At that time, we were talking about "now what did that penguin look like?", and so I drew it, and it was like "well, I guess we'll go with this". So, I am very sorry about that... But I had to finish my manuscript...
- But it has appeared many times since then. Is it because you came to like it?
K: It's not that I've come to like it, but maybe you'll be popular if you draw animals... that's a bit greedy of me. (laugh) But I like to hide things that appeared in previous manga chapters on the pages. My stories are shallow and I'm sorry about that, I have to do something it, and so I apologise by hiding things, kind of.
- So you're driven by fan service.
K: No, the problem is what happens before the service! How am I going to endure the manga being printed in a magazine...?
- It's okay, I really enjoy all of it. (laugh) How about some service shots of Zetsubou-sensei? I think you're aware of "moe"-like manga targeted towards female readers...
K: I'm not. ....Or rather, I don't know. People knowledgable about that stuff would tell me "something's different about this". It's more that drawing a character and going "this character is good-looking, right!?" is impossible. If I do, they'll just all laugh at me...
- But girls who like manga are into Japanese clothes and the retro world view and stuff, and I thought you were aware of that and sort of aimed for it.
K: Nooo, I wanted to draw something miserable...
- But I think that this misery just barely stops at the line where you can forgive it as "cute".
K: I see... You have a fantastic imagination.
- When Zetsubou-sensei is going away to the birthday party for people who never were invited to one, he brings a gift and says "I was invited~!" I thought that was very cute.
K: Uh...that was informative.
- No, I was giving you a compliment... So, are you consciously drawing the girl characters in an attractive way, then, if we have to say something?
K: I'm not really doing that either. If I would try to, I'd hit this unpassable wall and I wouldn't be able to do any drawing. Like "I suck, after all." "I can't draw good-looking people! I can't draw cute people!" So, I've already given up...
- It's okay! I think the girls are very cute, with their thin but sensual bodies coupled with their hair that gives balance to their looks.
K: Hmm, what should I say. It's likely that I find "glossiness" embarrassing. When I'm adding gloss to the characters' hair, it feels like the characters are saying "look at me, I'm so good-looking!"... You can only draw "I'm sooo good-looking!"-like while you're young, I think. That's why I'm jealous of the people over at Jump.
- No, your characters are fantastic, really. (laugh) I'm enjoying your stories too, everytime they're filled with a never-ending chain of jokes on diverse subjects. You are really good at coming up with all that different stuff.
K: Sometimes, I use stuff that I've seen or heard directly, but mostly I'm not working from any earlier draft at all. At first, I just decide on a theme, and then, before I'm going to draw, I write some small memo notes, and as I'm drawing I'm progressing like "what should I do here, what should I do here"...
- So when you work freely, without a draft, it's not really in a "think things through"-way, but more of a general "feeling" or "hunch"?
K: Yes. If I do make a draft, it's like it's already finished. And so when I'm drawing the same thing a second time, I just get bored. On the other hand, when you're not making drafts, it's hard when you have to make everything come together at the end. "There aren't enough pages," and stuff.
- But your finished stories feel both vibrant and alive. The story tempo is good, there is a good sense of language, and it feels good how the phrases people say are a bit like slogans.
K: That is because the panels are packed. So rather than saying that the story tempo is good, there is just no room for anything else. I actually want to make room for other stories too, but then I'll run out of pages. That my phrases feel a bit like slogans is also because of this; I can't make big speech bubbles, so there is no space to write long sentences. So I choose my words, and think about how I'll make the sentence as a whole easy to understand. If I have a big panel, and can make a big speech bubble, I think, "so now I'll have to think up a long sentence," though.
- I see. Among the stories, there are those that break down the framework of the manga itself, where you just play around. For example the one with the sealed pages, I thought it was very funny.
K: Looking at the manga, it doesn't really become awkward if it goes off track, and I think it's a manga where it's okay to do anything, comparatively speaking, so I want to try to do different things with it. Some directions are a bit wrong, and there have been times when I've went "I have to come up with something neat!", adding to my everyday worries... It was really good that they actually let me have a sealed page for the sealed page story, though. I thought they would say "we're not gonna pay anything for you!", which didn't actually happen, so I just wished "hope they'll go with the flow" instead...
- Oh, you didn't use any force... But it's a lot of fun when you have that kind of extra stuff.
K: It's good that you think it's fun, but I'm thinking, don't you feel that it's annoying too, at the same time...?
- No, and I also look forward to whatever fun thing you are going to do next.
K: Whenever people say things like that to me, it becomes yet another everyday worry...
- But that worry can become motivation for making interesting stories!
K: Positive things like that are absolutely nonexistent!
- Nonexistent? (laugh) You draw a lot of stories that goes with the seasons, like for instance Valentine's Day. Do you just pick something that relates to it randomly, or do you make a point of choosing?
K: I don't think I choose. It's more like, there's nothing else do but this... And because I've been doing season stories ever since I debuted, I'm not doing them in earnest anymore either. There's just no room to choose anymore. On the big whole, when I'm drawing a Valentine's Day story, I'm doing it several weeks before. So I'm always before or after the actual day, and when I'm trying my best to come up with a story, I'm really late. The next Valentine's Day will be next year. But, whether I should wait until the next year comes or not is a bit questionable... It's good to write memos and stuff, but I lose them. That time I forgot my note book at a family restaurant, I was thinking "now what I am gonna do?" Yeah, that note book was totally nuts. It was filled with lots of meaningless things that were impossible to understand...
- ... Did you find the note book again?
K: I didn't. It feels as if the person who picked it up, picked up something as dangerous as the Death Note.
- That person could absolutely become the god of a new world (?). To go back to the interview, when you use daily life as the resource for your manga, it feels like you always get a good multi-faceted view on things. Were you like that from the beginning?
K: You mean, did I look at things diagonally? In the past, I wasn't a person who thought of things like that at all. When I was watching TV, I was like "Oooh, I see, what a terrible incident!"; a person obediently taking in things. It feels my profession is twisting my personality gradually. In my twenties, I could see things in a bit more accepting light... I still had hope... Now, it's like I can't help feeling that there is something hidden behind everything in society... My scepticism has hardened. I can't believe anything.
- I see... Take it easy!
K: I'm in despair over still being alive...
- Please find some hope, for your readers' sake! (laugh)
K: There are people reading...?
- There are lots! But you're right, it's hard to be a mangaka. If there are no jokes coming by, you always have to search for them...
K: No, instead of jokes coming by, don't unpleasant things keep happening to as you are living your life? Usually, I'm just writing about those things, so they're not really jokes or anything. My every-day life is full of unpleasant things. And I'm like, I'll turn them into jokes and forget about them. Yeah, there are lots of unpleasant things in life. Really, there are always different unpleasant things happening, and I'm finding it painful to keep living...
- Umm... You're certainly right that everyone experiences lots of different stuff in life, but you have the ability to transform that into your manga stories, and I think that is wonderful ability to have.
K: You know... Every time I'm interviewed, it always becomes like counseling. "It's gonna be okay," and stuff. Is this really an interview...? Aren't you a counselor, employed by Kodansha..!?
- Uh, please calm down. Don't you have any hobbies that you can enjoy genuinely, without having to think negatively about everything?
K: ...Hobbies, you say. I don't really have any. Maybe I should have one. I guess it would be better if I started doing something... Is there anything? Like, a nice, good hobby... Maybe you could make friends, too.
- Maybe something where you get to move your body a bit would lighten you up a little. (laugh)
K: Moving would be a bit too hard, though. Like playing futsal or something...
- That sounds like something where you could get friends, too... But if your literary style would change because of that, you'd be in trouble, though.
K: Yes, if I could have changed it, I would have wanted to... Even if I go to Shibuya, it doesn't change. Although I'm thinking, "maybe I'll become a bit hip-hop now..." (laugh)
- You'd go from Showa style to night club style... By the way, I've really been thinking about Abiru's tail fetish. How was that idea born?
K: I happened to see a cat with a broken tail around my house. For some reason, that tail got stuck in my mind, and so the tail fetish came to be. In the beginning, I had only thought of the domestic violence, and I hadn't thought of tails or anything. But if there really had been domestic violence, it would have been problematic. You can't laugh about that, so when I was thinking "now what should I do," I decided that she was hurt by animals. And why did she like animals then? "Oh yeah, I saw that cat with the strange tail."
- So she's a character where you had a loaded theme, added something, and ended up somewhere where it wasn't exactly loaded anymore. Do you have any more characters like that?
K: But on the whole, they're all like that. If you don't make it mild, it will become a bit rough. If someone hangs himself and actually dies, it's a bit too much. Like, you have to hold back on your most extreme expressions. I'm a coward, and I don't want to provoke any quarrels and become reprimanded. So I'm pressing my brake pedal. But sometimes, with the young editors, I lose my footing on the brake pedal. Like, "what is that joke, how could you let that pass!?" And I get in trouble, and get reprimanded. "Could you at least blank some of it out...?"
- (laugh) And for our last question, is there anything you would like to try to do in the future?
K: Right now there isn't any. I want to be disliked as little as possible, though... When I'm asked about what will happen from now on, or in the future, or tomorrow, it feels soooo painful. Well, if people talk to me about the past, it feels painful too, though. And talking about the present is the most painful.
- Doesn't that mean everything is bad!? (laugh)
K: What should I do, really?
- But people get over things, and there is nothing to do but go forward...
K: Are you counseling me again!? ...Well, I'll go forward in a way that will make my heart break as little as possible. Sitting here and giving an interview is extremely positive in itself...
- I see. (laugh) Thank you so much for our talk today. I'm looking forward to next time!
- Please tell us about your work flow during one week.
K: It's not really decided, but I take care to try to not work until the very last second. I would like to say "it takes this many days to do the finished pencil sketches" though. But sometimes I can't even draw one page in a day.
- (laugh) Don't you do the pencil sketches as you do the rough sketches?
K: If I'm drawing a page (on computer), it happens that I do the pencil sketches immediately, but if I'm on a roll and have been doing three pages of rough sketches, I'll wait until I'm done with all of them. Basically, it depends on how I'm feeling at the moment.
- But it feels like the balance of the pages are really well planned.
K: No, they're not. I can't waste any pages, so there's no room for thinking about the composition. What comes first is how to squueze in all the panels... When you work on computer, you are free to move the panels around as you want.
- The panels are spotless and often filled with many characters. Do you like drawing the characters?
K: This is also related to the number of the pages. If I would make one big panel and only draw one character in it, then I would use up a page. So when I want many characters in a panel, the only thing I can do is to use that style, or something.
- But you have to plan stuff and think it over as you are progressing!
K: No, I'm not thinking it over. I don't think about anything! Just about how to squeeze in all the panels...
- I see. (laugh) When do you find work the most fun?
K: There is no time that is fun... I guess it's fun when I'm looking at kimono cloth as reference when I'm doing color pages, but since it's for work it's just painful. Really, I just can't enjoy drawing... Basically, everything is... pretty much so painful that it makes me want to die...
Thanks to sommeille.
Quarterly S, 2007-04-01
- First, please tell us what made you start drawing "Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei".
K: There's nothing to do for me but to do manga, so I just had to draw something, and that was that... In the beginning I was thinking of doing a story manga, but Magazine told me that it should be "12 pages only", so I had to do the most catchy manga possible within that limit. If it had to be anything, it would be a character manga. I thought of making a whole class of strange people from the beginning, and the teacher was also a strange minor character. But since the page number had decreased from my previous work, I thought it would be hard if I didn't make one character stand out. So what made me draw it was just elimination. "Can't do this, can't do this, can't do this either!". It wasn't a very positive way of starting it. I created lots of characters in the beginning, but I have also used characters from that time when I still hadn't decided anything. I didn't plan much...
- This turned negative all of a sudden... Zetsubou-sensei and his kimonos are very fascinating. Did you like kimonos and the mood of old Japan from the beginning?
K: I think that I started getting into old Japanese-style things a lot since the latter half of "Katte ni Kaizou". I don't know how I will feel about it later, though. I was thinking of making the teacher a more negative and miserable "Botchan" type character, so that's why I used the style.
- Do you wear kimonos yourself? You seem to take great joy in kimono design.
K: No... that would just turn into cosplay. I don't have any good memories of Japanese clothes either. Long ago, people made fun of me because my obi was too high up, and ever since then I'm not wearing kimonos. But kimono patterns are pretty much fixed already, and that's about what you can do design-wise for them. It goes for western clothes too, I guess it would be better if I actually designed them before drawing them. This is sort of embarrassing...
- I see, you have even experienced a kimono trauma... But I actually thought that you spent a lot of time designing your western clothes.
K: Then it's more of an un-designed design, or something. So that it absolutely won't be offensive to anyone, so that no one will say anything... If I would do my very best with the design, people would just complain. "I am not doing anything, so please be kind and do not pay any attention to me." That's about how big my effort in design is.
- The clothes you draw are so cute though... But I'll do my best to not pay any attention to them at all. (laugh) The chapter opening pages you do for the tankobon are also fantastic, with their retro, shadowy karuta-style. You always hide an emperor penguin in them, and looking for it is also fun.
K: Tentatively, I'll be doing the whole manga in this Japanese retro style. But, there is a negative reason for me to have added those opening pages in the first place. The chapters are starting on a left page every time, so usually, when you continue with the next chapter, it will share a spread together with the previous chapter. So I insert an extra page in the middle. A blank page would really be a bit inexcusable, so I'm adding an opening page, with some small jokes.
- So you had a negative reason for that, too. (laugh) The penguin first appeared as a "unstability" joke, and it was also used as an "unreadable punch-line" in an incredibly fantastic move. Why a penguin? (Comment: This is SZS, chapter 20.)
K: Actually, I was in a hurry and it just happened... I hadn't decided on that as a punch line at all. At that time, we were talking about "now what did that penguin look like?", and so I drew it, and it was like "well, I guess we'll go with this". So, I am very sorry about that... But I had to finish my manuscript...
- But it has appeared many times since then. Is it because you came to like it?
K: It's not that I've come to like it, but maybe you'll be popular if you draw animals... that's a bit greedy of me. (laugh) But I like to hide things that appeared in previous manga chapters on the pages. My stories are shallow and I'm sorry about that, I have to do something it, and so I apologise by hiding things, kind of.
- So you're driven by fan service.
K: No, the problem is what happens before the service! How am I going to endure the manga being printed in a magazine...?
- It's okay, I really enjoy all of it. (laugh) How about some service shots of Zetsubou-sensei? I think you're aware of "moe"-like manga targeted towards female readers...
K: I'm not. ....Or rather, I don't know. People knowledgable about that stuff would tell me "something's different about this". It's more that drawing a character and going "this character is good-looking, right!?" is impossible. If I do, they'll just all laugh at me...
- But girls who like manga are into Japanese clothes and the retro world view and stuff, and I thought you were aware of that and sort of aimed for it.
K: Nooo, I wanted to draw something miserable...
- But I think that this misery just barely stops at the line where you can forgive it as "cute".
K: I see... You have a fantastic imagination.
- When Zetsubou-sensei is going away to the birthday party for people who never were invited to one, he brings a gift and says "I was invited~!" I thought that was very cute.
K: Uh...that was informative.
- No, I was giving you a compliment... So, are you consciously drawing the girl characters in an attractive way, then, if we have to say something?
K: I'm not really doing that either. If I would try to, I'd hit this unpassable wall and I wouldn't be able to do any drawing. Like "I suck, after all." "I can't draw good-looking people! I can't draw cute people!" So, I've already given up...
- It's okay! I think the girls are very cute, with their thin but sensual bodies coupled with their hair that gives balance to their looks.
K: Hmm, what should I say. It's likely that I find "glossiness" embarrassing. When I'm adding gloss to the characters' hair, it feels like the characters are saying "look at me, I'm so good-looking!"... You can only draw "I'm sooo good-looking!"-like while you're young, I think. That's why I'm jealous of the people over at Jump.
- No, your characters are fantastic, really. (laugh) I'm enjoying your stories too, everytime they're filled with a never-ending chain of jokes on diverse subjects. You are really good at coming up with all that different stuff.
K: Sometimes, I use stuff that I've seen or heard directly, but mostly I'm not working from any earlier draft at all. At first, I just decide on a theme, and then, before I'm going to draw, I write some small memo notes, and as I'm drawing I'm progressing like "what should I do here, what should I do here"...
- So when you work freely, without a draft, it's not really in a "think things through"-way, but more of a general "feeling" or "hunch"?
K: Yes. If I do make a draft, it's like it's already finished. And so when I'm drawing the same thing a second time, I just get bored. On the other hand, when you're not making drafts, it's hard when you have to make everything come together at the end. "There aren't enough pages," and stuff.
- But your finished stories feel both vibrant and alive. The story tempo is good, there is a good sense of language, and it feels good how the phrases people say are a bit like slogans.
K: That is because the panels are packed. So rather than saying that the story tempo is good, there is just no room for anything else. I actually want to make room for other stories too, but then I'll run out of pages. That my phrases feel a bit like slogans is also because of this; I can't make big speech bubbles, so there is no space to write long sentences. So I choose my words, and think about how I'll make the sentence as a whole easy to understand. If I have a big panel, and can make a big speech bubble, I think, "so now I'll have to think up a long sentence," though.
- I see. Among the stories, there are those that break down the framework of the manga itself, where you just play around. For example the one with the sealed pages, I thought it was very funny.
K: Looking at the manga, it doesn't really become awkward if it goes off track, and I think it's a manga where it's okay to do anything, comparatively speaking, so I want to try to do different things with it. Some directions are a bit wrong, and there have been times when I've went "I have to come up with something neat!", adding to my everyday worries... It was really good that they actually let me have a sealed page for the sealed page story, though. I thought they would say "we're not gonna pay anything for you!", which didn't actually happen, so I just wished "hope they'll go with the flow" instead...
- Oh, you didn't use any force... But it's a lot of fun when you have that kind of extra stuff.
K: It's good that you think it's fun, but I'm thinking, don't you feel that it's annoying too, at the same time...?
- No, and I also look forward to whatever fun thing you are going to do next.
K: Whenever people say things like that to me, it becomes yet another everyday worry...
- But that worry can become motivation for making interesting stories!
K: Positive things like that are absolutely nonexistent!
- Nonexistent? (laugh) You draw a lot of stories that goes with the seasons, like for instance Valentine's Day. Do you just pick something that relates to it randomly, or do you make a point of choosing?
K: I don't think I choose. It's more like, there's nothing else do but this... And because I've been doing season stories ever since I debuted, I'm not doing them in earnest anymore either. There's just no room to choose anymore. On the big whole, when I'm drawing a Valentine's Day story, I'm doing it several weeks before. So I'm always before or after the actual day, and when I'm trying my best to come up with a story, I'm really late. The next Valentine's Day will be next year. But, whether I should wait until the next year comes or not is a bit questionable... It's good to write memos and stuff, but I lose them. That time I forgot my note book at a family restaurant, I was thinking "now what I am gonna do?" Yeah, that note book was totally nuts. It was filled with lots of meaningless things that were impossible to understand...
- ... Did you find the note book again?
K: I didn't. It feels as if the person who picked it up, picked up something as dangerous as the Death Note.
- That person could absolutely become the god of a new world (?). To go back to the interview, when you use daily life as the resource for your manga, it feels like you always get a good multi-faceted view on things. Were you like that from the beginning?
K: You mean, did I look at things diagonally? In the past, I wasn't a person who thought of things like that at all. When I was watching TV, I was like "Oooh, I see, what a terrible incident!"; a person obediently taking in things. It feels my profession is twisting my personality gradually. In my twenties, I could see things in a bit more accepting light... I still had hope... Now, it's like I can't help feeling that there is something hidden behind everything in society... My scepticism has hardened. I can't believe anything.
- I see... Take it easy!
K: I'm in despair over still being alive...
- Please find some hope, for your readers' sake! (laugh)
K: There are people reading...?
- There are lots! But you're right, it's hard to be a mangaka. If there are no jokes coming by, you always have to search for them...
K: No, instead of jokes coming by, don't unpleasant things keep happening to as you are living your life? Usually, I'm just writing about those things, so they're not really jokes or anything. My every-day life is full of unpleasant things. And I'm like, I'll turn them into jokes and forget about them. Yeah, there are lots of unpleasant things in life. Really, there are always different unpleasant things happening, and I'm finding it painful to keep living...
- Umm... You're certainly right that everyone experiences lots of different stuff in life, but you have the ability to transform that into your manga stories, and I think that is wonderful ability to have.
K: You know... Every time I'm interviewed, it always becomes like counseling. "It's gonna be okay," and stuff. Is this really an interview...? Aren't you a counselor, employed by Kodansha..!?
- Uh, please calm down. Don't you have any hobbies that you can enjoy genuinely, without having to think negatively about everything?
K: ...Hobbies, you say. I don't really have any. Maybe I should have one. I guess it would be better if I started doing something... Is there anything? Like, a nice, good hobby... Maybe you could make friends, too.
- Maybe something where you get to move your body a bit would lighten you up a little. (laugh)
K: Moving would be a bit too hard, though. Like playing futsal or something...
- That sounds like something where you could get friends, too... But if your literary style would change because of that, you'd be in trouble, though.
K: Yes, if I could have changed it, I would have wanted to... Even if I go to Shibuya, it doesn't change. Although I'm thinking, "maybe I'll become a bit hip-hop now..." (laugh)
- You'd go from Showa style to night club style... By the way, I've really been thinking about Abiru's tail fetish. How was that idea born?
K: I happened to see a cat with a broken tail around my house. For some reason, that tail got stuck in my mind, and so the tail fetish came to be. In the beginning, I had only thought of the domestic violence, and I hadn't thought of tails or anything. But if there really had been domestic violence, it would have been problematic. You can't laugh about that, so when I was thinking "now what should I do," I decided that she was hurt by animals. And why did she like animals then? "Oh yeah, I saw that cat with the strange tail."
- So she's a character where you had a loaded theme, added something, and ended up somewhere where it wasn't exactly loaded anymore. Do you have any more characters like that?
K: But on the whole, they're all like that. If you don't make it mild, it will become a bit rough. If someone hangs himself and actually dies, it's a bit too much. Like, you have to hold back on your most extreme expressions. I'm a coward, and I don't want to provoke any quarrels and become reprimanded. So I'm pressing my brake pedal. But sometimes, with the young editors, I lose my footing on the brake pedal. Like, "what is that joke, how could you let that pass!?" And I get in trouble, and get reprimanded. "Could you at least blank some of it out...?"
- (laugh) And for our last question, is there anything you would like to try to do in the future?
K: Right now there isn't any. I want to be disliked as little as possible, though... When I'm asked about what will happen from now on, or in the future, or tomorrow, it feels soooo painful. Well, if people talk to me about the past, it feels painful too, though. And talking about the present is the most painful.
- Doesn't that mean everything is bad!? (laugh)
K: What should I do, really?
- But people get over things, and there is nothing to do but go forward...
K: Are you counseling me again!? ...Well, I'll go forward in a way that will make my heart break as little as possible. Sitting here and giving an interview is extremely positive in itself...
- I see. (laugh) Thank you so much for our talk today. I'm looking forward to next time!
- Please tell us about your work flow during one week.
K: It's not really decided, but I take care to try to not work until the very last second. I would like to say "it takes this many days to do the finished pencil sketches" though. But sometimes I can't even draw one page in a day.
- (laugh) Don't you do the pencil sketches as you do the rough sketches?
K: If I'm drawing a page (on computer), it happens that I do the pencil sketches immediately, but if I'm on a roll and have been doing three pages of rough sketches, I'll wait until I'm done with all of them. Basically, it depends on how I'm feeling at the moment.
- But it feels like the balance of the pages are really well planned.
K: No, they're not. I can't waste any pages, so there's no room for thinking about the composition. What comes first is how to squueze in all the panels... When you work on computer, you are free to move the panels around as you want.
- The panels are spotless and often filled with many characters. Do you like drawing the characters?
K: This is also related to the number of the pages. If I would make one big panel and only draw one character in it, then I would use up a page. So when I want many characters in a panel, the only thing I can do is to use that style, or something.
- But you have to plan stuff and think it over as you are progressing!
K: No, I'm not thinking it over. I don't think about anything! Just about how to squeeze in all the panels...
- I see. (laugh) When do you find work the most fun?
K: There is no time that is fun... I guess it's fun when I'm looking at kimono cloth as reference when I'm doing color pages, but since it's for work it's just painful. Really, I just can't enjoy drawing... Basically, everything is... pretty much so painful that it makes me want to die...
Thanks to sommeille.