This interview with Masamune Shirow is from the magazine Manga Mania from publisher Dark Horse Comics. The magazine is readily available in the United Kingdom, but given its age, not necessarily this issue.
In October 1993 Toren Smith met Masamune Shirow at the Kobe Oriental Hotel, together with Harumichi Aoki, the president of Seishinsha (publishers of Appleseed and Orion), and Shirow's longtime editor and friend, Shigehiko Ogasawara. Kobe is a small, clean, port town in the southern part of Honshu, Japan's main island. Since the bulk of Japan's manga artists live within easy commuting distance of Tokyo, I began by asking why he bases himself in Kobe, almost four hours from Tokyo by Shinkansen ("Bullet Train").
It's peaceful. I tend to require isolation for my work, and I prefer a peaceful, meditative environment. Tokyo is too "high-voltage" for me. How about American comics artists? Is there somewhere they tend to live?
It used to be true that in order to be a comics artist, you pretty much had to live in New York or nearby. In the '60s, Marvel and DC ruled the roost, and if you weren't easily available for story conferences or hanging out with the editors, you had a hard time getting work. Often, the artist worked in the offices of the publisher. International couriers, fax machines and the increasing power of artists changed all that. Do you have any assistants that come in regularly?
I work alone. Practically my only visitors are Aoki and Ogasawara.
Was the decision to work without assistants an artistic one, or were you simply filling the local asylum with raving ex-assistants, whose minds have been broken from trying to work on your rather difficult pages?
[Laughs.] How did you know? Partly an artistic decision, but actually the problem was more plebeian. It was very difficult for me to find good assistants in a place like Kobe. And when I did find someone good, I really couldn't keep them busy. Since there aren't too many artists here, the poor fellow would practically starve. If my studio was more like the traditional "comics factory", I'd have no problems, but since that isn't the case...
So your situation is quite different from, say, Johji Manabe's (artist of Outlanders and Caravan Kidd) studio, where he has two full-time assistants working for him.
Yeah... but he's producing a lot more work than me.
Over 100 pages a month, last I heard. [Horrified reaction from all present.] The Dominion "side story" that you did ("Phantom of the Audience", to be published by Dark Horse Comics in the US in March 1994) has a very different look from the rest of the series, and I was wondering if that was because it was partially inked by an assistant.
Well, not exactly... it was inked by a different person, but not an assistant - it was inked by the "other Masamune Shirow".
Huh?
I was just in a peculiar mental state at the time...
Ah... I see. There was widespread speculation in manga fandom that you just pencilled it, and one of your old assistants - maybe Kotetsu Hagane - had inked it. (Kotetsu Hagane - two Japanese words meaning "steel" was a nom de plume Shirow used up until 1986, purportedly the name of his assistant, who handled the exacting and time-consuming task of laying down the zipatone effects on the original artwork.)
My evil twin. [Laughs]
It's not that it looks bad, just different. Anyway, so recently you stopped working on Appleseed 5, and started on Dominion 2 instead. However, even Dominion 2 seems to be temporarily on hold now. So what are you working on now, other than Neuro Hard?
Can you believe it? He's done over 45 full-colour paintings since the release of Intron Depot 1 (July 1993).
He said it would be ten years before Intron Depot 2!
Now we're looking at maybe 1996.
Oh, lord... I'm not ready! [Everybody laughs except Smith who, along with Alan Gleason, Dana Lewis and Frederick Schodt, handled all the translations on Intron Depot 1, while Studio Proteus undertook the English production of the book.]
Sorry about that. [Laughs.] The major part of my straightforward "story comic" work now is still Dominion 2, that's about it. Of course, I'm still doing Neuro Hard, which will be about 80 pages altogether when finished. ( Neuro Hard, currently running in Fujime Shobo's monthly comic Dragon, is a unique series. Shirow is basically "world building", and publishing eight pages per month of notes, sketches, and text describing the world and characters of Neuro Hard. When it's finished, he intends to open up his creation to other artists and writers.) Also, I'm working on conceptual designs for use in animation and computer games. If I create a regular "story comic", it can't really be adapted to animation or games without radical changes. So, rather than offering a completed story to the various companies that have expressed interest in my work, I'm just putting together "do-it-yourself" packages of various bits and pieces, such as mechanical and character designs, and basic storylines. So, from that, they can develop whatever they want, without feeling restricted by the existing work.
Similar to what Syd Mean, Ron Cobb and Moebius do for movie projects. Maybe when you're done, we can have Adam Warren do a Neuro Hard series. He's probably be up for that... to say the least!
Boy, I'd love to see that.
So the next thing fans should see from you in English is Kokaku Kidotai (Ghost in the Shell), sometime in 1994. After that should be Dominion but beyond that, what should we expect? Appleseed 5?
After I finish Dominion 2, I'm planning to do one or two more episodes of Ghost in the Shell, maybe 30 pages each.After that, I'm not certain. As for Appleseed 5... [Laughs and shrugs.]
I'm just working on the Appleseed Databook right now (to be released by Dark Horse Comics in March 1994) which came out in 1989? In that, you say that we can expect Appleseed 5 in "the near future". [Everybody laughs.] Perhaps you'd like to add a footnote to the English-language edition... maybe something like "just kidding folks!"
Hmm... That's "near future" in Kobe time. I do feel sorry for my readers, though... many apologies!
It's been very interesting working on the Databook material, and getting insights into what could be called your "fiendish master plan", such as it is, for Appleseed. It does tend to raise some questions, however...
Uh-oh... now you're going to ask the hard questions. Now I'm scared!
For example, on the timeline chart of the Databook, the "real" history of the world, as opposed to the "Appleseed history", diverges sometime in 1988. Are you basically relying totally on your "new history", or are you making any effort to bring in elements of current events?
Not a thing! As you can see, it starts by diverging pretty significantly, and heads into the stratosphere after that. I fully intend to keep it that way. Who wants to be at the mercy of current events?
Looking at the future world that you predict, there seems to be an interesting contrast between your extreme pessimism on the one hand, with the destruction of the environment, global thermonuclear war and the like, and yet, on the other, you seem to be very optimistic about foreseeable scientific developmen
antigravity; practical applications of nanotechnology; the creation of a functional utopia. What do you really think is going to happen? Do you foresee armageddon or utopia?
Of course I want it to be a utopia. The general tendency of the world seems to be for destruction, but there are isolated pockets of true progress. Still, I can't be too optimistic. Human nature seems to be depressingly self-serving.
One of the points you make in the Databook is the exhaustion of the world's resources.
I firmly believe we shoud persue natural, renewable energy sources, such as geothermal, solar and that sort of thing.
One interesting hypothesis you explore in Appleseed is the concept of a utopia that contains individual freedoms. Have you read Thomas More's Utopia? One of the conclusions that More comes to is that you cannot have a utopia that has any significant degree of peronal freedom for the inhabitants. And yet, you say one of the key aspects of Olympus is personal freedom.
My vision of "utopia" is not what you'd call a true utopia, or at least not More's utopia. I believe that there can be no utopia if we are required to change our personalities or behavior. My ultimate ideas for a perfect world are expressed in Neuro Hard, but I also feel the Appleseed world represents, well, another sort of utopia. Utopia isn't just one thing to me.
But if you don't have a consensus of opinion in society, then you're going to have conficts. And if you have conflicts, you no longer have a utopia.
I have, to a certain extent, addressed that point in Appleseed 2. The whole "Gaia incident" revolves around the idea that the only way to approach a true utopia is to replace everyone with bioroids. To me, one of the fundamental improvements over present day society would be the resolution of conflicts through negotiation, rather than violence or war. So, instead of eliminating personal differences, we could learn to coexist peacefully despite them. The Council and Gaia believe that an all-bioroid society is the only hope for utopia. I don't. My watchword would be "tolerance". If different people have enough tolerance for each other, utopia can be realized. The history of industrialised societies is rather short, as a part of mankind's history, so we need to take a long range view to establish that level of tolerance.
In any case, your utopia can't be too much like a utopia, or there'll be nothing for Deunan and Briareos to do.
Just unemployment, ... if they're lucky! [Laughs.] Anyway, utopia won't be reached in Olympus within Deunan's lifetime.
One of the key areas of inquiry for your fans in the West, and I'm sure it's the same in Japan, is concerning your artistic techniques. A lot of your fans are artists, or would like to be, and they have many questions about "how you do it."
I use a type of smooth surface Kent paper, pretty much the same sort of paper every manga artist uses. The particular type I chose is a fairly cheap paper, with a bit more tooth than is usual for Kent paper. Seishinsha has it overprinted with non-photo blue rulings. So it's pretty much custom made.
A grave disappointment for your fans.
Maybe we ought to sell packages of "genuine Shirow paper". [Everybody laughs, Aoki looks thoughtful.]
One of the problems Adam (Warren) had when adapting some of your techniques, is that Japanese screentone is made to stick to smooth paper. It doesn't stick very well to the sort of rough paper he's used to, so he needs to really burnish it down.
I usually use Maxon screentone, mostly 60 line, 10 per cent, 20 per cent, 30 per cent. A long time ago I bought several cases of my favorite types, so I'm still using that. Some may not even be available anymore.
What about pens? Do you use a marupen (roughly equivalent to a crow-quill pen)?
I almost exclusively use a kabura [turnip-shaped] pen. Unfortunately, the type I use is no longer in production. I bought a bunch when I heard that, and am currently testing potential replacements. Seems like there's no good news for my fans. Everything is unobtainable! Sorry about that. Even my pen holder is custom made. Kabura pens are rather long, so I made my own holder so that my fingers are closer to the point.
Do you have any secret techniques for your screentone work? Do you just scratch it with a regular art knife, or do you use an electric eraser?
Just a plain old X-Acto. Electric erasers produce nice effects, but they don't seem to reproduce well, so you have to be careful. Besides, my recent linework has gotten so fine, it would probably be lost under multiple layers of tone. Also, for some special effects, like clouds, I use a scalpel that's designed for dissecting insects.
[Laughs.] Where did you find that? Do you have a whole set? Is dissecting insects a sideline or something?
No, no. I just had this catalogue of weird art tools. It was in that. I'm always looking for stuff I can use.
What about your colour work? I noticed you began using colour xeroxes as elements of the art.
I use a Canon copier. It's a great toy. Sometimes I draw or paint the patterns, then manipulate them using the copier, and sometimes I copy real things, like kimono fabrics of photos I've shot.
When you're beginning work on a new story, do you write it down as a prose story, or do you work directly into thumbnails or layouts?
It depends. In the case of Neuro Hard, prose. Appleseed goes directly into layouts.
Ogasawara tells me you often produce several versions of a page before settling on the final version, sometimes even replacing panels just before publication.
When I was doing Appleseed 3 and 4, it was common for me to throw away three or four finished pages of a page. I've improved now, so I usually only throw away pencils.
You mean you were actually throwing out finished, inked pages?!
Yeah.
That's, uh, that's very unusual. I can guarantee a strong reaction from your fans.
I used some of them in the Databook. Did you know that (Hayao) Miyazaki (creator of Nausicaa) throws away painted pages?
Yes, I've seen that, when he was working on Totoro. It's enough to break your heart. Well, I suppose we'd better wrap this up as my train leaves pretty soon. Any closing comments?
I'd just like to say that I really appreciate my foreign fans, and their interest in my work. They've been very patient, and I feel sorry that they're going to have to wait so long for Appleseed 5.
I think I can speak for all of his fans if I say that they'd rather have it good, than soon.
Good and soon is the best. [Everybody laughs.]
Thanks to Harumichi Aoki and Shigehiko Ogasawara of Seishinsa for setting up the interview, and to Nozomi Omori, the Studio Proteus agent in Japan, for his assistance.
Manga Mania Volume 1 Number 8
February 1994 ISSN 096-1315
© 1993 Dark Horse International - UK
