When Beastars by Paru Itagaki originally launched in 2016, it very quickly gained notoriety for its expressive art style, as well as its incredibly unique world – in place of human protagonists, Beastars is a story told through the lens of anthropomorphic animals living in a modernized society in place of humans. The manga excelled in telling a compelling coming-of-age story that challenged many common struggles that young people face as they enter adulthood by reimagining many of those struggles as a conflict between being born as a carnivore, or an herbivore.
Beastars was incredibly successful, having over 7.5 million copies in circulation by the time the series ended, and received a gorgeous anime adaption courtesy of Orange. Paru Itagaki has experimented with other types of stories, encapsulating everything from an autobiographical essay manga to an action-packed Santa Claus-themed shonen series. Her latest upcoming series, Ushimitsu Gao, which is slated to begin serializing in Champion Cross, might take the cake as her most unhinged work yet.
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Ushimitsu Gao Explores a Peculiar Love Triangle
Paru Itagaki’s latest work follows a married thirty-two-year-old woman named Megumi Sano with a strong sense for the supernatural trying to have a baby with her husband. One night, she notices what appears to be a ghost watching them from a corner in their home, and instead of being frightened, is overwhelmed with a feeling of shame. From that point forward, the ghost visits her every night and begins to put her into a state of sleep paralysis, which, interestingly, reminds her of bondage – and not in a negative way. The series is categorized as a horror romance, but with no official English translation as of writing, details regarding the story are still relatively sparse. The manga is currently available on Champion Cross, and began serializing on October 16, 2024.
This, of course, isn’t Itagaki’s first time writing an offbeat love story. One of her more popular mini-series, Drip Drip, followed a similarly macabre, raunchy premise, which follows a young woman who gets a nosebleed any time she encounters something that she perceives as dirty, which makes her intimate love life extremely difficult. Her most popular work, Beastars, explores plenty of complicated romantic relationships as well, with many of the series’ core couples struggling with their identities as predator and prey. While Ushimitsu Gao may sound like her most unhinged serialized work so far, if anyone can pull off a quirky adult drama this intense, it’s Paru Itagaki.
