Messages to Kentarou Miura: Takashi Hoshi (2)

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Part 1 of this translation can be found here.

I'm not specifically choosing to talk about his work. However, in those days Miura-nii, who dedicated his whole life to manga, was always searching for "something to create, something that can be a seed for his creative ideas" like animations, games, movie stories, photo collection books that he could use as reference material, things happening on the Internet, etc. All the while enjoying them.

When our discussions reached their peak in a coffee shop, he would immediately write down setups or illustrations on a paper napkin, in the end, starting to elaborate an idea for a work.

Now he’s taking a break, now he’s creating a new work… This state of things was usual.

While Miura-nii had a hunch that Berserk would be his life’s work, he always continued to elaborate new ideas and he was such a highly motivated person for publishing them in a work when he got the chance.

He lived like that day after day. Time went by, (until it was) 2006.

The illustrations currently featured are my main subject. The title of the work is "D.RI.F.T", which is a provisional title. The story is about the amazing races of dragon riders in a world that has fallen into ruins.

It was written by myself and director SATO Junichi, who is well-known for “Sailor Moon”, “Sergeant Frog”, “Kaleido Star”, “Hug! Pretty Cure”, etc.

While I had been absorbed in framing the structure of the work, (one day) I was with Miura-nii in a nomiya (1) in Shinjuku. I casually told him about it and (asked) "could you design the characters and the creatures?", (he answered) "Ohhh, Ok～ but I’m not sure I have the time". We were elated… Long before it was animated based on our proposal, and with the green light from Mr. S (2), the person in charge who was in a management position for Miura-nii at that time, he was kind enough to design the characters and the creatures for the project while it had neither a production committee nor a budget, needless to say.


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Note 01: A nomiya (飲み屋) is a type of traditional Japanese pub.

Note 02: He’s referring to SHIMADA Akira, former editor for Berserk.