A brand new anime adaptation of "Cat's Eye," a manga by Hojo Tsukasa that gained popularity mainly in the 1980s, has been available exclusively on Disney+ since September 26th. The series was the serialized debut of Hojo, who is also known for "City Hunter," and was also adapted into a TV anime series from 1983 to 1985. This marks the first time the series has been adapted into an anime series in about 40 years. We asked Hojo, the original author, to look back on the time when the series was serialized.
◇Born from silly conversations with friends
"Cat's Eye" is a popular manga that was serialized in "Weekly Shonen Jump" (Shueisha) from 1981 to 1984. The story follows the three beautiful sisters Hitomi, Rui, and Ai, who run the Cat's Eye cafe, coolly running through the night as phantom thieves, causing a stir in society. The story is filled with brilliant action and a thrilling romance with a detective.
When asked how this masterpiece came about, he revealed, "It came from a silly conversation with my friends."
"It started as a silly story that came up when we all gathered at an apartment after finishing our graduation projects and decided to go for drinks. It was about a married couple, with the wife a thief and the husband a detective. She extracts information from the husband during a secret nighttime affair. It was a vulgar story like that. From there, I thought it could be made into a manga, so I made them lovers instead of a married couple, and gradually developed the idea into three sisters. However, I didn't hesitate to make it three. "Three" was the best balance. Even if they were to form a team, if it was two against two they would end up fighting and breaking up, and five was just too many."
The leotard worn by the Phantom Thief Cat's Eye also made a big impact. Even now, the leotard is still strongly associated with "Cat's Eye," and it has become the subject of many parodies.
"I never said a word about leotards. I was simply drawing it with the image of a fitted suit, but the editorial department called it a leotard. Ai's costume has a collar, doesn't it? Leotards don't have collars. Everyone kept saying it, so it ended up looking like a leotard."
At the time of serialization, "I hadn't decided on the ending point."
"Even if you decide on a conclusion, there's a chance that you might be told, 'The series will end in 10 more issues.' So I didn't include endings like getting married or the end of the world in the setting. I simply made it so that it wouldn't be strange if the current situation continued forever. I never thought about it too deeply, but it seems that readers found the relationship between Toshio and Hitomi interesting, so there was no need to exaggerate the events themselves. My editor told me, 'This is a boys' magazine, so come up with an exciting setting,' so I thought about what hot meant and forced myself to come up with something like getting my father's drawing back."
◇I was always pressed for time
In the 1980s, "Weekly Shonen Jump" serialized many popular works, including "Kinnikuman," "Dr. Slump," "Captain Tsubasa," "Wing-Man," "Fist of the North Star," and "DRAGON BALL." As these were weekly serializations, he recalls, "it was tough."
"Everyone says it's the ideas and the story, but the hardest part was my health. Staying up all night was the norm, and if I caught a cold, it was all over, and they wouldn't even let me off the hook. I was in poor health the whole time. If I compare my health in my twenties to now, I'm a lot healthier. I was just spacing out the whole time. It was physical labor. I wasn't using my brain that much. I didn't have time to say I couldn't think of anything, so I forced myself to draw. Whether I was satisfied with it or not, I just had to do what came to mind. I never got that sense of accomplishment when I thought I'd managed to draw something, and I've never drawn something and thought it was a success. I was always wondering if this was really good enough, and I was pressed for time."
Hojo became a popular manga artist with the success of "Cat's Eye." After the series ended, he started "City Hunter" in 1985.
"I thought that 'Cat's Eye' would end up being just a one-off, so the fact that it was going to be serialized came as a complete surprise. It was a work that completely changed my life. Until then, I had no idea that I wanted to become a manga artist, and I thought that if I could steadily publish short stories in Fukuoka, it would be enough. But then I was suddenly dragged to Tokyo, and I was rushed to meet deadlines every week, and before I knew it, my life had changed. That continued until ' City Hunter'."
"It's surprising," he said of the series being made into an anime again after about 40 years.
"It's been 40 years. It's almost half a century, so I'm surprised it's being made into an anime again, but I'm also a little worried about whether it will be accepted by today's society, and I think the staff's courage is amazing. Because it's 40 years old, I feel a bit embarrassed, like looking at my own photo album from long ago. I suggested making it more modern, but they wanted to keep the same atmosphere. So it's even more embarrassing. There are a lot of changes to the setting, like the introduction of cell phones, but the overall atmosphere and flow of the story are the same, so I still feel embarrassed. I think it's a bit immature. I mean, it would be embarrassing to look at photos from 40 years ago, right? It would be embarrassing to remember what you did at school, the things you did and said."
The opening theme "MAGIC" will be sung by singer Ado, and the ending theme will be a cover of Anri's song "CAT'S EYE," which has also been much talked about. Mikako Komatsu will play Hitomi Kisugi, the second of the three beautiful sisters, Ami Koshimizu will play Rei Kisugi, the eldest, and Yumiri Hanamori will play Ai Kisugi, the third.
"The music is different, so the atmosphere is different, but I felt it was definitely a 'Cat's Eye' anime! I think Ado's talent for the theme song is incredible. The artwork is great, and it's an exciting opening. But once the main story starts, I feel embarrassed."
"Cat's Eye," which has been revived in the Reiwa era, seems to have become a new anime while retaining the atmosphere of the time.
