Naoki Urasawa

Naoki Urasawa

CountryJapan Japan
GenderMale
BirthdayJan 2, 1960
BiographyNaoki Urasawa (Japanese: 浦沢 直樹, Hepburn: Urasawa Naoki; born January 2, 1960) is a Japanese manga artist and musician. He has been drawing manga since he was four years old, and for most of his professional career has created two series simultaneously. The stories to many of these were co-written in collaboration with his former editor, Takashi Nagasaki. Urasawa has been called one of the artists that changed the history of manga and has won numerous awards, including the Shogakukan Manga Award three times, the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize twice, and the Kodansha Manga Award once. South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho called him "the greatest storyteller of our time", while Dominican-American writer Junot Díaz proclaimed Urasawa to be a national treasure in Japan. By December 2021, his various works had over 140 million copies in circulation worldwide, making him one of the best-selling authors of all time.

Urasawa's first major work was illustrating the action series Pineapple Army (1985–1988), which was written by Kazuya Kudo. The first serial that he wrote and illustrated himself, and his first major success, was the sports manga Yawara! (1986–1993). He then illustrated the adventure series Master Keaton (1988–1994), which was written by Hokusei Katsushika and Nagasaki, and created the sports manga Happy! (1993–1999). The thriller Monster (1994–2001) was his first to receive international acclaim and success, which continued with the science fiction mystery 20th Century Boys (1999–2006). Following the acclaimed Pluto (2003–2009), which is a re-imagining of Astro Boy by Osamu Tezuka, one of Urasawa's biggest influences, he and Nagasaki created the mystery series Billy Bat (2008–2016). After two short series, a sequel to Master Keaton with Nagasaki and Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams, Urasawa began his currently ongoing Asadora! in 2018.

Biography from the Wikipedia article Naoki Urasawa. Licensed under CC-BY-SA. Full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Part of Crew

Recently Updated Shows

Recently updated shows that might be of your interest.
The Rainmaker
Upcoming

The Rainmaker

Fresh out of law school, Rudy Baylor goes head-to-head with courtroom lion Leo Drummond as well as his law school girlfriend. Rudy, along with his boss and her disheveled paralegal, uncover two connected conspiracies surrounding the mysterious death of their client's son.

GenreDrama
Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Running

Percy Jackson and the Olympians

12-year-old modern demigod Percy Jackson has just come to terms with his newfound supernatural powers when the sky god Zeus accuses him of stealing his master lightning bolt. Now Percy must trek across America to find it and restore order to Olympus.

Lost Treasures of Egypt
Running

Lost Treasures of Egypt

An immersive, action-packed series follows international teams of Egyptologists as they unearth the world's richest seam of ancient archaeology — Lost Treasures of Egypt. Through excavations and unprecedented access to the teams on the front line of archaeology, we follow these modern-day explorers as they battle searing heat and inhospitable terrain to make the discoveries of a lifetime.

GenreHistory
Invasion
Running

Invasion

Earth is visited by an alien species that threatens humanity's existence. Events unfold in real time through the eyes of five ordinary people across the globe as they struggle to make sense of the chaos unraveling around them.

Skywatch
Upcoming

Skywatch

Skywatch tells the story of an outcast teen, who hacks into a ubiquitous drone delivery system to pull a prank on his school bully, he accidentally crashes a dangerous prototype – and finds himself entangled in a life-and-death conspiracy. Based on the short film by the same name.