Featured Image courtesy of Crunchyroll.

Host Kwok-Wai Hanson talked with the manga creator of “Tonikawa” Kenjiro Hata and lead actress Akira Kito. 

Named after the U.S. space agency, Nasa Yukari does his best to reach the top. Though still bothered by his parents’ choice of name, he has plans to be the best in the school exams. However things take a sudden halt when he sees a beatiful girl and gets hit by a truck. She saves him and Nasa confesses to her. She agrees to be in a relationship only if they get married. He accepts her condition but doesn’t see his so-called wife until years later. While things didn’t go as Nasa expected, he and Tsukasa now have a chance to start their lives together has spouces.

Key art for main characters was revealed immediately after the trailer screening.

The first question was about Hata’s feelings when he heard about “Tonikawa” getting an adaptation. He answered that it was a big goal to reach and was happy with the news. Regarding story creation, he said he worked on “Hayate the Combat Butler” for 13 years and followed the pattern of ending with the main character getting together. He decided to begin at the final step of the relationship, marriage and hoped he could teach younger readers about it and its complications. 

When asked about how she felt getting to play Tsukasa, Kito replied that she watched “Hayate the Combat Butler” when she was young and was thrilled to work on another project of his. She said she had fun reading the manga to prepare for her performance. She enjoyed reading the cute moments but was a bit shocked that she would have to act it. Hata said he “thought that she was the only person for the job” when they held auditions.

Hanson then talked about the term “precious” and said fans regarded the relationship as so. Then asked Hata if it was difficult to keep having precious moments in the manga. He said it wasn’t but hoped readers understood the intentions. Hanson then asked if Kito knew what made her character cute in the eyes of Nasa. She answered that while she is mostly cool and classy, she is quite silly with Nasa. She then said how they cared for each other and respected each other was precious.

Attendees got a sneak peek into Episode One which Hata then said that the production staff and director Ikehata put a lot into it. Kito said she was impressed with the adaptation. When asked about what fans should take note of while watching, Hata said that “marriage is something that crosses all borders, because there are people in every country who think their wives are cute”.

Hanson then revealed more characters of Tonikawa including Kaname played by Yu Serizawa, her sister Aya played by Sumire Uesaka and Chitose who likes Tsukasa but not her marriage to Nasa played by Konomi Kohara. Hata mentioned that he didn’t see them in motion yet but looked forward to those scenes.

Kito then announced the show’s opening and ending theme songs. Yunomi produced the opener “Koi no Uta” with Kito singing as Tsukasa. She said the song was unlike those she worked on before that was a bit challenging. She said she was happy to have such a unique song. Hata said that Yunomi composer was a fan of the manga and the song matched the setting well. Hanson said that the ending was “Moon and Starry Sky” by KANOERANA. Hata elaborated on the fact that Endo who worked on both ending song and background tracks is a fan of Hata’s work and said he understood them well.

Hata in his closing message said that he gave his “total trust” to the team working on the anime. Kito said the story makes people happy and hope that the anime does the same to its viewers.

Before its October release, fans can check out our manga review of “Fly Me to the Moon” from VIZ Media. VIZ also has Hata’s other series “Hayate the Combat Butler” available in English. Crunchyroll has the anime adaptation of “Hayate” on their site. Make sure to go to Crunchyroll when “Tonikawa” is available to watch this Fall.