is a Japanese
manga series written and illustrated by
Naoki Yamamoto. It is a romantic comedy which details the life of Suekichi Terayama, a student who will inherit a fortune when he graduates from college and gets married with unexpected complications from a mysterious girl, Aya Hibino.
The manga was originally serialized in
Shogakukan
is a Japanese publisher of dictionaries, literature, comics ( manga), non-fiction, DVDs, and other media in Japan.
Shogakukan founded Shueisha, which also founded Hakusensha. These are three separate companies, but are together called the H ...
's ''
Big Comic Spirits
is a weekly Japanese ''seinen'' manga magazine published by Shogakukan. The first issue was published on October 14, 1980. Food, sports, romance and business are recurring themes in the magazine, and the stories often question conventional va ...
'' magazine from 1989 to 1990. The first five volumes were published in the now-defunct adult manga magazine ''
Pulp
Pulp may refer to:
* Pulp (fruit), the inner flesh of fruit
Engineering
* Dissolving pulp, highly purified cellulose used in fibre and film manufacture
* Pulp (paper), the fibrous material used to make paper
* Molded pulp, a packaging material
...
'', and the rest were released afterward under Viz's Editor's Choice line. It has also been adapted into two live action films, and in a two-episode
original video animation (OVA).
Characters
Main
;Suekichi Terayama
:A student who takes part in an acting troupe, Bondage Horse. Originally from a small island, his parents are lighthouse keepers. His life is changed dramatically when he finds out he has been left a secret inheritance from his great-grandfather: a stamp collection worth millions of yen. However, he can only claim the inheritance on condition that he graduates from college, marries and establishes a career.
;Aya Hibino
:A kindergarten teacher lacking modesty and propriety who left her husband. She accidentally stumbles in Suekichi's life at his grandfather's funeral and learns of his secret inheritance, and quickly begins a sexual relationship with him.
;Miyuki Fukagawa
:Originally hired by Suekichi's lawyer to break up Aya and Suekichi. Miyuki needed money to prevent her family home from being repossessed. She orchestrates an "accidental" meeting with Suekichi and joins his acting troupe, eventually starting a sexual relationship with her, and convincing him that she is pregnant. Although Suekichi learns that Miyuki was hired by his lawyer, he still professes his love for her and agrees to marry her. Before the wedding Miyuki realizes that this was a sham and cancels the wedding. She finally takes on a job as Tachima's personal assistant.
Other
;Naruhito Munakata
:Aya's husband, who works for the National Mint. Aya leaves him a few months after their wedding, and he is determined to get back together with her. Later in the series, he wins an award for the diaries he kept concerning his feelings towards Aya, which were edited and published by Suekichi's nosy cousin Sue.
;Ikezu
:The lead actor of the drama troupe. A slacker-type who works at a convenience store, he is often involved in affairs with various women.
;Masami Shimomura
:She is the leader of the drama troupe, and Suekichi has a crush on her in the beginning of the series. She has been friends with Ikezu for a long time, and according to him, she is a twenty-seven-year-old virgin.
;Mr. Tachimi
:Suekichi's lawyer and the manager of his trust fund. He is always looking out for Suekichi's best interests, and is convinced that Aya is after him only for the inheritance. He looks upon marriage as a form of prostitution.
;Freddy
:A Southeast Asian man who Aya brings home one day to live with Suekichi. For most of the series he knows very little Japanese, and is often used as a comic-relief character. At the end of the series, after learning proper Japanese and establishing a career as a gameshow host, he goes back to his home country and returns ten years later at Genichiro's funeral. He is known for shouting the word "pussy" as a greeting, since when he arrived in Japan Aya told him that that was the way to greet people in Japanese.
;The Reasonable Yakuza
:A gangster whose office is located above the Bondage Horse theater troupe. He becomes a regular patron of the troupe after they sell him tickets half-price to their show to make up for the noise they made while practicing. Later on, he asks Suekichi to hold on to a handgun that the police are looking for. He even hides out at Suekichi's apartment, and Aya paints his skin so that he resembles Freddy. During this time, he works for Bondage Horse for a brief period of time, using scare tactics to sell tickets for their show.
;Daikichi Terayama
:Suekichi's deceased great-grandfather, who left him the inheritance. But even in death he does not rest: He has too much fun haunting Suekichi at the most inopportune moments and peeping on or possessing people.
;Genichiro
:A wealthy old man that Aya meets while working at a nightclub. She ends up marrying him so that she can live off of his money. Though he considers himself a sickly old man about to die, his death does not occur until 10 years later.
Production
''Dance till Tomorrow'' was described as "boy-meets-girl-story" by Yamamoto, who created it just following a trend among young-adult comic magazines. He declared, "I must have unconsciously put myself inside some boundary, thinking I had to do some thing like that." Nevertheless, he tried to have an alternative to the common place "mediocre happy ending" and the "tearjerker separation" on its conclusion. After ending it, "
efelt like
ed done enough in a commercial genre".
The character of Aya Hibino was not based on any real person, although her thick eyebrowns were inspired by
idol
Idol or Idols may refer to:
Religion and philosophy
* Cult image, a neutral term for a man-made object that is worshipped or venerated for the deity, spirit or demon that it embodies or represents
* Murti, a point of focus for devotion or medit ...
s' style in the 1980s. Yamamoto said she was meant to be a
femme fatale and "probably somehow represents
isown deep-seated feelings of not being able to understand women".
Media
Manga
''Dance till Tomorrow'' was originally serialized in
Shogakukan
is a Japanese publisher of dictionaries, literature, comics ( manga), non-fiction, DVDs, and other media in Japan.
Shogakukan founded Shueisha, which also founded Hakusensha. These are three separate companies, but are together called the H ...
's ''
Big Comic Spirits
is a weekly Japanese ''seinen'' manga magazine published by Shogakukan. The first issue was published on October 14, 1980. Food, sports, romance and business are recurring themes in the magazine, and the stories often question conventional va ...
'' magazine between 1989 and 1990.
[ Shogakukan later compiled its individual chapters into seven '']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 ...
'' published between September 1989 and February 1991.[ It was re-released twice; Yudachi-sha published seven volumes from March to September 1994, while Ohzora Publishing released it into four volumes between November 25, 1998, and February 17, 1999. It was licensed to North America by ]Viz Media
VIZ Media LLC is an American manga publisher, anime distributor and entertainment company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1986 as VIZ LLC. In 2005, VIZ LLC and ShoPro Entertainment merged to form the current VIZ M ...
and serialized in its adult oriented magazine ''Pulp'' from the first issue in December 1997 to the last issue in August 2002. After having already released five volumes through ''Pulp'', the last two volumes were published in straight-to-graphic-novel format in Editor's Choice line.[
]
Adaptations
It was adapted into a two-episode original video animation (OVA) by Knack Productions
, formerly known as or simply until August 2008, is a Japanese anime and film production company.
History
Knack Productions was founded on September 25, 1967, by a group of former employees of Toei Animation and Osamu Tezuka's Mushi Production ...
that was directed by Teruo Kogure and Masamune Ochiai. The first part, produced in 1990, was released on VHS on July 25, 1991 while the second video was released at an unknown month in 1991.
In 1991, studio Daiei Film
Daiei Film Co. Ltd. ( Kyūjitai: Shinjitai: ''Daiei Eiga Kabushiki Kaisha'') was a Japanese film studio. Founded in 1942 as Dai Nippon Film Co., Ltd., it was one of the major studios during the postwar Golden Age of Japanese cinema, producing ...
adapted it into a live-action film directed by Itsumichi Isomura
is a Japanese film director. He won the award for Best Director at the 20th Yokohama Film Festival for ''Ganbatte Ikimasshoi''.
Filmography
* ''Ganbatte Ikimasshoi
{{Nihongo, ''Ganbatte Ikimasshoi'', がんばっていきまっしょい, " ...
, starring Tomoko Nakajima and Tamotsu Ishibashi and released on June 22. It was released on VHS by Daiei on November 25, 1991, and then re-released on January 14, 1994.[ This production was elected the third best film of the year at the 1st Japan Film Professional Awards.
In November 2005, a live-action film directed by Ryūichi Honda, based on the series and starring Hiroaki Matsuda and Ai Kurosawa, was announced. A trailer was released on its official site on December 5 to promote the film, which debuted on December 10. Divided into four segments it was released as a DVD box set on March 23, 2006, as well as four individual DVDs on April 26, 2006. This adaptation was released in North America under the title ''Naughty Gold Diggers'' by Asian Media Rights on November 27, 2012.
]
Reception
Adam Arnold, writing for ''Animefringe'' magazine, described it as "a sex comedy that puts anything on TV to shame." Jason Thompson, author of book '' Manga: The Complete Guide'', wrote "Yamamoto's art has a gangly, hand-drawn look, and the whimsical, self-referential story provides opportunities for surreal, artsy humor." Thompson concluded calling it "loosely plotted but enjoyable and unpredictable." Author Shaenon K. Garrity
Shaenon K. Garrity is a webcomic creator and science-fiction author best known for her webcomics ''Narbonic'' and '' Skin Horse''. She collaborated with various artists to write webcomics for the Modern Tales-family of webcomic subscription serv ...
declared it is "almost too smart to be a manga: it's cheerfully cynical, it's self-aware, there's real sex… and the characters feel real and unforced." Garrity praised the first two volumes as "especially amazing, a comedy balancing act of money, sex, and power" and how Yamamoto developed and its characters. Inside Pulse's Jimmy Lin praised its characterization, as Yamamoto created "wackos, weirdos, and other kooks", and said it "hits an emotional key… when it takes on its soap-opera notes." Lin commented that "even at his most cogent, Yamamoto draws you in and keeps you in with his strong sense of character and weird sense of humor and story."
References
External links
*
*
*
{{Pulp Manga
1989 manga
Romantic comedy anime and manga
Seinen manga
Sex comedy anime and manga
Shogakukan manga
Viz Media manga
Japanese romantic comedy films
Japanese sex comedy films