''Crossdressing Pandemic'', known in Japan as , is a Japanese

manga Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is u ...

series by Mikuzu Shinagawa. Kill Time Communication serialized it in their web magazine ''

Comic Valkyrie is a Japanese science fiction and fantasy ''seinen'' manga magazine published by Kill Time Communication. Its target readership is males between their teens and thirties. The first volume was released on July 25, 2006, and ran in bimonthly volum ...

'' from August 13, 2019, to July 12, 2021, and collected it across two ''

tankōbon is the Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or cultur ...

'' volumes in 2020–2021. It follows Nanaki Koga, a young man who wakes up from a two-year coma to learn that

cross-dressing Cross-dressing is the act of wearing clothes usually worn by a different gender. From as early as pre-modern history, cross-dressing has been practiced in order to disguise, comfort, entertain, and self-express oneself. Cross-dressing has play ...

has become very popular among men while he was unconscious, and that the students and teachers in his all-male school now dress like women. Shinagawa wrote the series with a focus on what he considered the major points of appeal in cross-dressing stories, including Nanaki's motivation for starting to wear women's clothes, how it turns habitual, and his behavior while dressed up. The series was among the most popular in the magazine during its serialization and sold well digitally, and was well received for its characters.

Synopsis

''Crossdressing Pandemic'' follows Nanaki Koga, who falls into a coma following an accident and remains unconscious for two years. After waking up, he learns that

has become highly popular among men worldwide in the past two years, to the point where the vast majority of students and teachers at his all-male school wear women's clothes, as do an estimated 90% of young men in general. Because of this environment of feminine fashion, Nanaki learns to present himself like a woman to fit in, and is helped by his experienced friend Hikaru.

Characters

* is a young man who is puzzled by the popularity of cross-dressing but ends up wearing women's clothes with Hikaru's help. * is a childhood friend of Nanaki's, who already is used to cross-dressing and helps Nanaki with it. * is one of Nanaki's classmates, who Nanaki finds beautiful.

Production and release

''Crossdressing Pandemic'' was written and illustrated by Mikuzu Shinagawa, and was serialized by Kill Time Communication in Japanese in their digital magazine ''

'' from August 13, 2019 to July 12, 2021. Kill Time Communication also collects the chapters in ''

'' print volumes, which they publish under their Valkyrie Comics imprint, starting with the first volume on July 31, 2020; certain retailers included a number of art prints with the first volume, featuring characters from the series. In October 2020, versions of the opening chapters with added voice acting were released in the form of videos, in a collaboration with the

VTuber A , or , is an online entertainer who uses a virtual avatar generated using computer graphics. Real-time motion capture software or technology are often—but not always—used to capture movement. The digital trend originated in Japan in the mid- ...

agency Nijisanji: Nanaki was played by Yuki Chihiro, Ryou by Rindou Mikoto, Hikaru by Suzuki Masaru, and another cross-dressing character by Yuka Hiyamizu. Shinagawa, who also has created other manga about male-to-female cross-dressing, described his writing process for ''Crossdressing Pandemic'' as involving a focus on what the reasons are behind why the male main character ends up dressing up like a woman for the first time; on the process of how the cross-dressing ends up becoming a habit for him; and on the way he behaves while wearing women's clothes. Shinagawa thought that these aspects, and the ways in which they can vary between characters, were the main points of appeal of stories about cross-dressing, and described them as what he personally enjoyed reading about in cross-dressing stories. He described the premise of ''Crossdressing Pandemic'' as cute, albeit not particularly deep. Funbo, another creator of cross-dressing manga, contributed a guest page for the second volume.

Volumes

Reception

''Crossdressing Pandemic'' was by July 2020 among the most popular manga serialized in ''Comic Valkyrie'', and topped the weekly comics rankings on DLsite, one of the largest digital distributors in Japan, in August the same year; conversely, neither of the physical print volumes debuted on the weekly

Oricon , established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan and Western music. It started as, which was founded by Sōkō Koike in Nov ...

charts for the top 30 highest selling Japanese comic book sales. ''Excite News'' liked the series' cast and recommended it to readers who like stories about cross-dressing male characters. Utako Suzuka of Nijisanji recommended the series for its characters and its combination of a pop art style and erotic elements, and said that it made her want to visit the manga's setting.

References

External links

* {{in lang, ja 2019 webcomic debuts 2021 webcomic endings Cross-dressing in anime and manga Japanese webcomics LGBT-related anime and manga Seinen manga Webcomics in print