April 2024 - Cine21 Wayama Yama Interview
Translation by nag2n on Twitter. Original translation post can be found here. Translated from this article.
[INTERVIEW] AUTHOR WAYAMA YAMA VISITS KOREA TO COMMEMORATE THE PUBLICATION OF LET'S GO TO THE FAMILY RESTAURANT. VOLUME 1, "I LIKE CHARACTERS WHO WEAR GLASSES"
"Let's go to karaoke!" The first encounter between Kyouji and Satomi began with this one sentence. The yakuza Kyouji nonchalantly hands over his business card and asks Satomi, head of the Morioka Middle School choir, to teach him how to sing. If judged the worst singer at the gang's karaoke competition, the loser is forced to get a tattoo personally done by none other than the boss—Kyouji wants to avoid this at all costs. The middle schooler Satomi, though afraid of Kyouji, eventually starts accompanying him to karaoke and gives him singing lessons. Though he doesn't completely lower his guard, little by little he begins to open his heart up to Kyouji. Author Wayama Yama's Let's Go Karaoke! has been very popular since its publication in Japan, even being adapted into a live-action movie by the same name. In her new work Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. Volume 1 (referred to hereafter by just its title), the setting transitions from the karaoke bar to a family restaurant. The daily lives of the patrons who come to dine or get work done and the employees who interact with them are illustrated in detail. Satomi, who has since become a college student, works there part-time. When he's just about forgotten their last encounter, he contacts Kyouji to grab a meal and check in on how he's doing; though he's still as blunt as ever, Satomi's definitely softened up around the edges. Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. was published in Korea on April 1st, ranking 1st on Kyobo's bestselling comics list for the first two weeks and 2nd on their overall bestseller list for the first week of April.
Wayama Yama, author of Let's Go Karaoke! and Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., enrolled in her university's manga program and went on to debut in 2019 with her short story anthology Captivated, by You. Since winning the 23rd Japan Media Arts Festival New Face Award in the manga category and the 24th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize in the short story category with said work, this artist has continued to attract attention. On top of Let's Go Karaoke! and Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., which focuses on the relationship between Satomi and Kyouji, Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, which illustrates the highs and lows experienced by the students and teachers of an all-girls high school, has a strong Korean fan base as well. On April 6th, author Wayama Yama visited Korea to attend a meet and greet commemorating the publication of Let's Go to the Family Restaurant.. The following is a conversation with author Wayama Yama about Let's Go Karaoke!, Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., and Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, who expressed her anticipation with the words, "It's my first time visiting Korea for work."
Q: The works you've published in Korea are fairly popular. Were you aware of this?
A: Even talking about just the official X (formerly Twitter) account run by my manager, I've heard that Korean fans are quick to leave replies as soon as a post goes up, so I did know that my work was pretty popular even in Korea. I was looking forward to this trip because I wanted to hear firsthand what the Korean readers felt about my work.
Q: How did Let's Go Karaoke! come to be?
A: First was the character known as Kyouji. The details were originally pretty different from the Let's Go Karaoke! of today. The story was about an elementary school teacher who actually turned out to be ex-yakuza. It wasn't planned out very well though, so I didn't end up using it. That said, I wanted to draw Kyouji some how some way no matter what, so by adding in some elements like karaoke and middle schoolers, Let's Go Karaoke! was eventually born.
Q: Is there any chance that your original draft might be reworked into an actual story?
A: The story I mentioned earlier was actually something I came up with for a different magazine I was indebted to. I storyboarded some ideas and showed it to the person in charge at the time, but the response was pretty lackluster, so I thought that a story like that wouldn't cut it. In the end, the elementary school teacher idea was tweaked and adapted into the setting of Hoshi of the Girls' Garden instead. Kyouji shows up in Let's Go Karaoke!, while the teacher setup is used Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, respectively.
Q: Did you have the sequel Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. in mind when you first started drawing Let's Go Karaoke!?
A: At the time, not at all. I'd planned to put everything into one volume of Let's Go Karaoke! and leave it at that. After publishing Let's Go Karaoke! though, I received a proposal to try serializing an unrelated story. To be honest, since I tend to frequent family restaurants to get work done, I thought it'd be nice to draw a story featuring several characters set against a family restaurant background.
Q: If the relationship between Kyouji and Satomi is considered the focus of Let's Go Karaoke!, in Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., like you mentioned, a lot more emphasis is placed on the people around Satomi and Kyouji, like Morita and Houjou Reiko. Could you elaborate on why you decided on this approach?
A: The premise was to try drawing a work unrelated to Let's Go Karaoke!. Though Satomi's also the main character here, while portraying him as just one of many characters, I wanted to show him growing up little by little. I thought if I could do that, the readers of Let's Go Karaoke! would be able to enjoy it too. With that, if possible, I wanted to portray the people periphery to Satomi and Kyouji through their intertwined lives.
Q: Between planning the story out in great detail from the get-go and coming up with it as you go, which do you prefer?
A: Though I decide the start and end early on, I'm the type to come up with everything else that happens in between as I draw. Even with things related to the characters themselves, thinking things like "On the contrary, couldn't they also act like this?", I find myself changing their behavior patterns as I draw.
Q: The instances where characters make their appearance are memorable. For example, there are quite a few characters like Junko, who at first appear as brief extras, but become more important as they become increasingly intertwined with the main characters as the story progresses. Are you coming up with when these characters show up on the fly as well?
A: While the characters' interiorities are developed as the story progresses, things like the relationships between them and what kind of the impact certain characters will have are clearly determined before I start a work.
Translation by nag2n, typeset by me.
Q: I've seen Korean fans speculate about the meaning behind the names Kyouji and Satomi. Did you actually name them with any particular intention?
A: I didn't think about it at all (laughs). The name Kyouji was taken from an old Japanese actor, Kyouji Sugi. Satomi's original name wasn't Satomi. I wanted to use a gender-neutral name, so I going to use the name Masami initially. Before starting to work on Let's Go Karaoke! though, I'd actually hung out with a friend of mine named Masami. After that, while trying to draw Let's Go Karaoke!, I thought that if I used the name Masami as it were, my friend might misunderstand and think "She just went ahead and used my name however she wanted" if they saw the work later. So I ended up using Satomi, a similarly gender-neutral name to Masami.
Q: What kind of changes did you want to make to Satomi and Kyouji's relationship in Let's Go to the Family Restaurant.?
A: Let's Go Karaoke! hinted at a happy ending, the relationship between the two being implied to continue even after Satomi becomes a college student. Before serializing Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., I seriously considered Satomi's future. Even though it's fiction, I wondered if it was realistically okay to continue intermingling with criminals belonging to an organization like that. I worried about whether to have Satomi continue his relationship with Kyouji like in Let's Go Karaoke! unchanged, or have him break off the relationship for the sake of Satomi's future. Even now, I'm still drawing while centering and taking Satomi's heart into consideration.
Q: It's my understanding that you consider looks first when designing characters. What parts did you focus on when drawing Satomi and Kyouji's appearances? In Satomi's case, while I definitely felt that he'd grown up in Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., was there anything in particular you kept in mind when incorporating those changes?
A: While I was focused on Satomi's expressions in Let's Go Karaoke!, I intentionally wanted it so that he rarely smiled. Specifically, though he doesn't smile at all in front of Kyouji, it's really because he's wary of others. Just like that, I drew middle school Satomi while keeping in mind his totally-not-cute-in-the-slightest vibes. In Let's Go to the Family Restaurant., because Satomi's grown up and entered adulthood, I tried giving him a more mellowed out demeanor compared to before. Since I modeled Kyouji's appearance after an actor I had in mind, though I did try to make him look similar in a sense, I didn't draw him while paying special attention to any one thing in particular.
Q: I expected that Kyouji would've been drawn with an emphasis on his dark circles.
A: It is something I kept in mind, you're right. It is the case that a lot of my characters have dark circles. I think it's because I have this impression that people with dark circles under their eyes are sexy. It's because of this that even among the female teachers, there's a character who shows up who has dark circles as well. Also, since I thought there'd be a lot of night owls among the yakuza, I drew Kyouji's dark circles even darker.
Q: I found even the most minor of scenes depicted between Satomi and Kyouji to be interesting. Do you find drawing the characters' everyday lives fun?
A: Yes, I really like drawing stories that have more or less nothing to do with the main narrative. Since I look at Satomi with the eyes of a parent, I enjoyed the process of drawing Satomi's ordinary college life and his time at his part-time job. I also thought that the readers would also want to see Satomi's daily life like that.
Q: I felt that Let's Go Karaoke!'s Satomi and Hoshi of the Girls' Garden's Hoshi-sensei had similar features. Do you have a type of character that you fancy?
A: I think it's easy to guess for those who have read my works, but I like characters who wear glasses. So yes, it's even clear to me that I draw a lot of characters with similar features. That said, like with Morita, I'm trying to broaden my horizons even within the 'characters who wear glasses' category.
Official English translation.
Q: I also had some questions regarding Hoshi of the Girls' Garden. How do you come up with setups for the students and the scenarios that happen at the school? Did you do any separate research for them by any chance?
A: No research, I basically draw while reminiscing about my school days. Of course, as the times change, the trends — like the kinds of songs that are popular — may cycle, but I don't think that the mindset or manner of living among students has changed at all. Given that, I mostly draw while reminiscing over memories from 10 years ago.
Q: A lot of the female students are pretty distinct, so I was curious if they were modeled after any real people, as well as if there were any students in you enjoyed drawing in particular.
A: They weren't based on anyone, they were all pulled from my imagination. The character I had the most fun drawing was the student named Torii. She's my favorite character.
Q: The titles of Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, Let's Go Karaoke!, and Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. are all concise yet eye-catching. What are some of the criteria you keep in mind when coming up with titles?
A: I'm actually not very good at coming up with titles for my works. In the case of Let's Go Karaoke!, it was the title of a doujinshi I'd personally released and had named at the time without much thought. That said, since it's gone on to be adapted into a movie, I find myself thinking that I should've come up a cooler title in hindsight. I consider it a silly title (laughs). In the case of Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, I wanted to include a character's name in the title. At first, I had only come up with "Girls' Garden", but since there was already an old movie by same name, I stuck on the kanji "hoshi" (meaning "star" in Japanese) to the title and ended up naming it Hoshi of the Girls' Garden.
Q: The relationships of your protagonists are unusual because of their respective backgrounds and professions. For example, when deciding on a male teacher, you chose him to be the main character at an all-girls high school; in the case of a yakuza and middle schooler, it's not so simple as their paths just overlapping. Do you consider planning these aspects out in the early stages of a work to be important to you?
A: I don't think things like "If these two people were to meet, they'd have this kind of chemistry" when I begin my process. Hoshi of the Girls' Garden was also a work that was conceived because I'd already come up with Hoshi-sensei and wanted to draw him. An editor who was in charge of my work once told me that she had attended an all-girls high school and while listening to her story, I started to think, "What would happen if Hoshi-sensei were the only man at an all-girls high school?" I couldn't have expected that things would end up turning out the way they did; changes crop up all the time as I continue to mull over my thoughts.
Q: You're the type who tends to come up with your stories by starting with the characters.
A: Hoshi-sensei also started out as a stern and coolheaded character at first. He works at an all-girls high school and is surrounded by a lot of female students though, so his personality's grown a gentler and meeker side. Since the story isn't something I've set in stone, even I was surprised to find that my character had this side to him. I could see the direction of the story being influenced by changes in the characters' personalities.
Q: Let's Go Karaoke! and Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. are sometimes seen as BL by the readers. In Korea, both works are classified as dramas. Is there a reason why you gravitate towards drawing dramas over more conventional shoujo or BL (Boy's Love)?
A: Hoshi of the Girls' Garden is much the same, I've never been particularly conscious of things like genre while drawing. I also tend to draw without clearly deciding on things like the plot progression or the characters' personalities. I often feel that the impressions people have of a work will differ depending on the reader as well. Like you mentioned, readers of my work will frequently debate amongst themselves whether or not my work is BL. I consider my works to be ones where the characters come first, and as they develop, the story changes accordingly.
Q: The continuation of what's currently published in Let's Go the the Family Restaurant. is being serialized in Japan. Are there any key points you could possibly disclose to keep our eyes peeled for in the second half of the story?
A: I feel like anything I say could be a spoiler (laughs). I'd like for you to pay more attention to Satomi's change of heart rather than how the story might unfold in the future.
THE SCENES THAT WERE THE MOST FUN TO DRAW
Translation by nag2n, typeset by me.
Let's Go to the Family Restaurant. is a story that quietly unfolds. In the midst of all this, there are moments where Satomi's emotions explode; those were the scenes I really enjoyed drawing. Like the scene where he boils the watch Kyouji let him borrow, or the scene at the end where Satomi hugs Kyouji. These are scenes where he expresses his anger, joy, and loneliness through his actions instead of his words. In Hoshi of the Girls' Garden, as opposed to any one particular scene, it was the female students themselves that I had fun drawing. I always thought I had an easier time drawing women than men, so I have fun drawing scenes where a lot of the female students show up.
— Wayama Yama