 Animazement
had to remove a divider and combine two meeting rooms to accomodate the
number of fans who wanted to hear from manga artist Yuu Watase about her
Fushigi Yuugi series. While the series is remarkably popular, it nearly
never happened. Watase said that, at first, the editors at her manga company
didn't like her idea of a time-traveling junior high school girl. When
she got permission to start the series, she fretted about its chances.
Now that it's a success, "It's all up to you," Watase told the appreciative
audience. |
 Fushigi Yuugi
bounces back and forth between modern-day Japan and ancient China, and
Watase had to research Chinese history to get the details right. "I started
to respond very quickly to anything Chinese," she said. "I started to collect
a lot of books. For 4-1/2 years it was a very hard road...I think what
was most lost during that time was sleep." |
 Fushigi Yuugi
fans peppered Watase for the details of her characters and their motivations.
"He was just drunk, okay?" she joked about one character. When asked why
Miaka always seems to be eating or hungry, she responded that "I don't
know if junior high school students are different in the U.S., but in Japan
they're always chowing down." |
 When everything
goes right, a story seems to write itself, Watase said. "In a lot of cases
the characters took on a life of their own and went in different directions,
and I asked `Why are you doing this?'" |
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