The Four Color Media Monitor

This may be a few weeks old, but last month, CBR announced the pretentious Netflix is renewing Rurouni Kenshin despite the controversy of its mangaka Nobuhiro Watsuki, who was arrested for possession of child porn several years ago:

Netflix continues its investment in Rurouni Kenshin, despite the controversial connection the 2023 anime remake has with its original creator, Nobuhiro Watsuki. In November 2017, Watsuki's home was raided by the Tokyo Police, who found the Shonen Jump author in possession of pornographic material of girls in their early teens.

Rurouni Kenshin Season 2 will be available to stream on Netflix in multiple regions, such as the U.S., this October. Per What's on Netflix, additional regions include the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Latin America, and South Africa. Rurouni Kenshin, which is also available on Crunchyroll, has been engulfed in controversy since its Season 1 premiere in July 2023, following Watsuki's conviction of child pornography in 2017. In February 2018, Watsuki was fined 200,000 yen (about US$1,900), which many international readers viewed as a slap on the wrist for such a heinous crime. [...]

Although the 1996 Rurouni Kenshin anime was initially popular in Japan -- especially during its adaptation of the "Kyoto arc" -- its ratings severely declined during the final season, dominated by filler stories, as it waited for the manga to produce more material to adapt. The current Kenshin anime, produced by Liden Films, continues the adaptation of Watsuki's manga, similarly to other remakes like Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. However, Rurouni Kenshin's resurgence in popularity and lasting legacy were hindered by Watsuki's possession of child pornography.

Again, it sure doesn't reflect well on Netflix's MO, which is costing them subscribers as it is. As though it weren't bad enough they were employing far-left ideologues who made offensive political statements. This is another reason to avoid the shoddy streaming service.

There's at least two or three other reasons why the Kenshin manga/anime haven't aged well. For example, the design for the star character may have been ripped off from a character who appeared in Rumiko Takahashi's Urusei Yatsura back in the 80s; I remember seeing a character in the original 80s franchise with reddish hair whose design looked vaguely similar to Kenshin, and the same character also appears in the 2022 remake series. Arguably, Watsuki wasn't being very original when he thought up the design for the star of his now tarnished manga series. And then, there's how Watsuki handled creation of Misao Makimachi, and quite possibly another kunoichi who appeared in the latter half:

Her design originates from Nakoruru in Samurai Shodown (Samurai Spirits) and the author received criticism for this. Watsuki believes that she is closer to Mai Shiranui and Yuri Sakazaki from another SNK battle-game. He also added that the setup of the physical design occurred very quickly as he fussed with an Oniwabanshū ninja outfit a bit. He also stated that he intended Misao’s face and body to resemble of a young man. While Misao is 16, Watsuki wanted her to appear like a 13-year-old. He argued with his editors about the inclusion of Misao’s braid. Ultimately, it was kept since it added emphasis to Misao’s movements. “Misao’s cloak was added just for fun”, he stated. The creator of Rurouni Kenshin intended for her to have a painful encounter with Aoshi in the future, but that Misao would keep going strong.

It sounds like he was trying to come up with a cunning disguise for his repugnant viewpoints in real life. 13 years of age is around what Watsuki admitted in police records was his preferential age range, sickeningly enough. And since the subject of Mai Shiranui comes up, if memory serves, there was another kunoichi in the latter half of the 1996-98 Rurouni Kenshin series whom I think could also have supposedly drawn on SNK's famous lady fighter, since IIRC, this specific one also had bouncing breasts, but there's a very big problem: Mai's supposed to be a good girl (which gets a special emphasis in Street Fighter 6's dialogue), while the one in the Kenshin series was a crook. There's something wrong with making a woman who's a criminal look potentially sexy in a story written by a man who turned out to be a scumbag who was hoarding child porn, while Kaoru Kamiya by contrast is the more modestly dressed girl in the series. If the 2nd kunoichi who's part of a crooked clan of ninjas is supposed to be a "tribute" to Mai Shiranui, all Watsuki did was insult SNK's sex symbol by making the character in his manga/anime a criminal by contrast. It's additionally sad Watsuki was even hired to draw character designs for Samurai Shodown 5, the last game to be produced on the Neo-Geo hardware, which, interestingly enough, didn't get a good reception at the time. Such a game was not my favorite, even if it wasn't as revolting as Mortal Kombat is, but it's still regrettable they had to do business with a mangaka who turned out to be a monster. Watsuki also has art design credits on Endride, another anime-and-game project from 2016, and that's another game project that's now tainted.

To be sure, one of the biggest problems with Watsuki is that he's a big virtue-signaler, and it's since cost him big time outside Japan. He has no business working in video games either, and it's to be hoped no publishers will hire him for character designing anymore, and some probably do realize having his name attached to a project could draw very unwanted attention. For now, we can only hope Netflix's loss of subscribers will bring down the ratings for the Kenshin remake, which was a bad idea to produce anyway.

Labels: Europe and Asia, history, manga and anime, misogyny and racism, moonbat artists, technology, violence