The new 103rd volume of the popular long-running gag manga "Asari-chan," "Asari-chan in Paris" (Shogakukan), was released on December 26th. This year's new volume follows the much-talked-about new volume "Asari-chan Revenge," released in May 2023, which was the first in about seven years.
The new volume includes many completely new works, such as "All Character Manga," which features familiar classmates who did not appear in the previous volume, "Asari-chan Revenge," and the popular series "High School Asari-chan." The customary "Author's Page" is the largest volume ever, including a special edition, and contains information on the latest developments of the authors, sisters Mayumi Muroyama and Mariko Muroyama.
"Asari-chan" was first serialized in the August 1978 issue of "Shogaku Ni-nensei" (published by the same publisher) by sisters Mayumi Muroyama and Mariko Muroyama under the name "Muroyama Mayumi". It depicts the slapstick comedy of Hamano Asari, a fourth-grader who hates studying but is good at sports, and her older sister Hamano Tatami, the most intelligent in the school. It was also published in "Monthly CoroCoro Comic", "Pyonpyon", "Ciao", "Shogaku Ichinensei", "Shogaku San-nensei", "Shogaku Yonensei", "Shogaku Go-nensei" and "Shogaku Rokunensei".
It was adapted into a TV anime in 1982, and won the 31st Shogakukan Manga Award in 1985. It came to an end in 2014 after 36 years of serialization. In the same year, the 100th volume of the comic was released, and it was recognized by the Guinness World Records as the "Most Volumes Published in a Single Comic Series by a Duo (Female Authors)". In 2016, the release of "Asari-chan 5th Year Class 2," a comic about Asari who has advanced to the 5th grade of elementary school, also attracted attention.
