Yoshihiro Togashi

• 1. Introduction

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  On the 24th of May 2022, the Japanese manga artist Yoshihiro Togashi opened a Twitter account. His publisher, Shueisha, later verified that the account was really his. Within a single day he had gained over one million followers, and within 72 hours he had two million. He is now the most-followed manga artist on the platform, with over three million. That is a remarkable audience for someone who can draw only sporadically. It exists because of two series, YuYu Hakusho and Hunter × Hunter, which rank among the best-selling manga of all time. This documentary asks how a boy from a family paper shop in Yamagata came to create them. It asks why he ended one hit series abruptly and why he now draws lying down. And it asks whom he married, and which younger artists look back to his work.

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• 2. Paper Shop Beginnings

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  Shinjō, in Yamagata, is where Togashi was born into a family that owned a paper shop. He began drawing manga casually in his first or second year of elementary school. In high school he joined the fine-arts club. He then enrolled at Yamagata University, where he studied education in the hope of becoming a teacher.

  While still in college, he submitted manga to Weekly Young Jump, a magazine published by Shueisha. In 1986, at age 20, he wrote a manga called Buttobi Straight and won the Tezuka Award, the most prestigious prize for new comic artists in Japan. In 1988, another of his manga, Jura no Mizuki, earned an honorable mention in Shueisha's first annual Hop Step Award Selection.

  He eventually gave up on becoming a teacher. During his senior year, an editor from Weekly Shōnen Jump contacted him and asked him to move to Tokyo. The Togashi Paper Store, run by his mother, is still open in Shinjō today.

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• 3. Underworld Detective

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  In 1990, a character named Yusuke Urameshi died and came back to life as an "Underworld Detective". That was the premise of YuYu Hakusho, which Togashi built from his interests in the occult and horror films. The manga ran for 175 chapters across 19 tankōbon, from 1990 to 1994. It sold over 78 million copies worldwide and earned Togashi a Shogakukan Manga Award in 1994. It also received a hit anime adaptation.

  Critic Jason Thompson saw the series as one of the obvious imitators of the Dragon Ball formula. That formula starts as a comedy and turns to fighting once readers love the cast. Togashi was 24 when it became a hit. Rather than stretch it out as long as possible to maximize his profit, he ended it abruptly.

  In 1994, Togashi also distributed a YuYu Hakusho dōjinshi called Yoshirin de Pon! at the summer Comic Market. The work itself took a toll. Togashi suffered immense stress, which left him with inconsistent sleep and chest pain.

  Kunio Ajino worked as his assistant from 1990 to 1997. In his 2017 book Sensei Hakusho, Ajino recalled that Togashi was unusually generous to his staff.

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• 4. Genre Shifts

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  "Togashi is no ordinary mangaka; he does things his own way." That is how Jason Thompson summed up the artist. Thompson noted that Togashi's first one-shots mixed school comedy with "splatter-film horror references".

  Togashi's earliest published works for Shueisha include Ōkami Nante Kowakunai!!, a collection of comedy short stories. Weekly Shōnen Jump ran some of them before the tankōbon came out in 1989. From 1989 to 1990 he wrote Ten de Shōwaru Cupid, a four-volume romance about a normal human boy and a beautiful devil girl.

  In 1995, after YuYu Hakusho, he created Level E, a science-fiction comedy. Thompson described it as "0% fighting and 100% humor" science-fiction horror. It filled three volumes in Weekly Shōnen Jump and ran until 1997. An anime television series followed in 2011.

  In 2017, Togashi returned to short work with Akuten Wars, a two-chapter manga. He wrote the story, and Hachi Mizuno illustrated it. It appeared in the September and November issues of Grand Jump Premium.

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• 5. Hunter × Hunter

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  Gon Freecss is a young boy searching for his father, who belongs to a legendary, elite group of people called Hunters. Togashi began serializing that story as Hunter × Hunter in 1998. Like YuYu Hakusho, it sold very well.

  The first 20 volumes sold nearly 55 million copies in Japan as of August 2011. By the 4th of July 2022, the series had 84 million copies in circulation.

  In 2008, the marketing research firm Oricon ran a poll of favorite manga artists. Togashi tied for fifth place with Eiichiro Oda, the author of One Piece.

  Shueisha published an Official Hunter × Hunter Guide in 2004, while the story was still unfolding. Since 2006, the series has also been marked by numerous lengthy breaks in its schedule.

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• 6. Minimalist Lines

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  Screentone, the printed shading patterns that manga artists apply to their pages, shaped Togashi's early artwork. Over time his style grew gradually more minimalist. Rika Takahashi of EX.org and Claude J. Pelletier of Protoculture Addicts both found the art in Hunter × Hunter much simpler than in YuYu Hakusho and Level E.

  Thompson observed that the artwork in the magazine run of Hunter × Hunter is often "sketchy" and missing backgrounds. Togashi goes back and fixes those pages for the collected tankōbon. Thompson also wrote that Togashi loves gore, and he noted that some Hunter × Hunter panels seem to be censored for gore, covered with screentone.

  Togashi names the visual effects designer H. R. Giger as a major influence. His own influence reaches other artists. Nobuhiro Watsuki and Pink Hanamori have both cited Togashi and YuYu Hakusho. Naruto author Masashi Kishimoto counts him among his favorite artists.

  Gege Akutami, the author of Jujutsu Kaisen, also names Togashi as an influence. Akutami was inspired by both YuYu Hakusho and Hunter × Hunter.

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• 7. Lying Down to Draw

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  Some of the hiatuses in Hunter × Hunter, which began in 2006, were due to illness and lower back pain. The reasons for others were never disclosed. In 2012, Thompson speculated that the slow output came from perfectionism. In his reading, Togashi enjoys his work and wants to do things himself, though his assistants could be called on more.

  Togashi has long suffered from chronic back issues, which have led to several hiatuses spanning multiple years. In July 2022, he revealed that back and hip problems had kept him from sitting in a chair for two years. He found a way to resume drawing by working while lying down.

  Fans now follow his progress through status updates on Twitter, which he posts on an irregular basis.

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• 8. Life Beyond Pages

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  At a party hosted by Kazushi Hagiwara in August 1997, Togashi was introduced to Naoko Takeuchi, the creator of Sailor Moon. The following year, Takeuchi briefly helped on Hunter × Hunter by adding screentone to his pages. They married on the 6th of January 1999. Fellow manga artists and voice actors from both the Sailor Moon and YuYu Hakusho anime attended the ceremony.

  The couple have two children. In 2005, Kodansha published a children's book they made together, titled Oobo, Nu, Tochiibo, Nu, . Takeuchi wrote it, and Togashi illustrated it.

  Away from the drawing desk, Togashi enjoys board-game-style video games and bowling with his family. He also likes horror movies, and his favorites are Don't Look Up and Dawn of the Dead. His younger brother, Hideaki Togashi, is also a manga artist.

  On the 29th of March 2011, Togashi and fellow manga artists posted messages on the official Shōnen Jump website. They were written in support of the victims of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.

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