At
Sakura Con, this site heard from Yamakawa Yoshinobu, the artist who revised
the Di Gi Charat character designs when the Gamers mascots were turned into
anime characters. Yoshinobu spoke about another anime series on which he
had worked, Nanaka 6/17, the tale of a high school girl who acts like an
elementary school student after she hits her head. Hiroaki Sakurai, the Di
Gi Charat director, also directed Nanaka 6/17, and spoke about that series
at Animazement. That series, adapted from a manga story, has an odd premise
that took some careful writing to make it work, he said.
"We
have to deal with the multiple personality issue and that was a serious issue
to the story," Sakurai said about Nanaka. The story follows Nanaka, but it's
also the story of her friends, how they deal with Nanaka's split personality,
and what they do to make her normal again. So this is a story of friendship
as much as the tale of a girl that acts like a six year old in a teenager's
body, Sakurai said. Another difficulty was the 13-episode length of the series,
which Sakurai said was not enough to develop all of the plot points he wanted
to explore. "If i can't mention it in those episodes I'll let the audience
figure that out," he said. "In this show there's a conclusion but it's not
a complete conclusion. You can view it as a show to be continued or as a
story that has concluded. Life is a long process and it doesn't end that
easily."
To
emphasize Nanaka's regression, she's made to be a fan of a fictional magical
girl anime called Magical Domiko, which had to be created to look like the
many similar series on the air but be different from the main show. "In the
show we used a lot more of the magical girl show than they did in the manga,"
Sakurai said. "In the actual show of Nanaka 6/17 there is one episode where
more than half the show is about Magical Domiko." Sakurai went to far as
to make a opening and closing for the show within a show, and those bits
of animation will be included in the Nanaka 6/17 box set when it's released
in Japan in June. Might there be a Magical Domiko spinoff series one day?
Probably not, Sakurai said.
At
Sakura Con, this site heard from Yamakawa Yoshinobu, the artist who revised
the Di Gi Charat character designs when the Gamers mascots were turned into
anime characters. Yoshinobu spoke about another anime series on which he
had worked, Nanaka 6/17, the tale of a high school girl who acts like an
elementary school student after she hits her head. Hiroaki Sakurai, the Di
Gi Charat director, also directed Nanaka 6/17, and spoke about that series
at Animazement. That series, adapted from a manga story, has an odd premise
that took some careful writing to make it work, he said.
"We
have to deal with the multiple personality issue and that was a serious issue
to the story," Sakurai said about Nanaka. The story follows Nanaka, but it's
also the story of her friends, how they deal with Nanaka's split personality,
and what they do to make her normal again. So this is a story of friendship
as much as the tale of a girl that acts like a six year old in a teenager's
body, Sakurai said. Another difficulty was the 13-episode length of the series,
which Sakurai said was not enough to develop all of the plot points he wanted
to explore. "If i can't mention it in those episodes I'll let the audience
figure that out," he said. "In this show there's a conclusion but it's not
a complete conclusion. You can view it as a show to be continued or as a
story that has concluded. Life is a long process and it doesn't end that
easily."
To
emphasize Nanaka's regression, she's made to be a fan of a fictional magical
girl anime called Magical Domiko, which had to be created to look like the
many similar series on the air but be different from the main show. "In the
show we used a lot more of the magical girl show than they did in the manga,"
Sakurai said. "In the actual show of Nanaka 6/17 there is one episode where
more than half the show is about Magical Domiko." Sakurai went to far as
to make a opening and closing for the show within a show, and those bits
of animation will be included in the Nanaka 6/17 box set when it's released
in Japan in June. Might there be a Magical Domiko spinoff series one day?
Probably not, Sakurai said.
