is a Japanese

science fantasy file:Warhammer40kcosplay.jpg, Cosplay of a character from the ''Warhammer 40,000'' tabletop game; one critic has characterized the game's setting as "action-oriented science-fantasy." Science fantasy is a hybrid genre within speculative fiction ...

manga are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long history in earlier Japanese art. The term is used in Japan to refer to both comics ...

series written and illustrated by

Masakazu Katsura is a Japanese manga artist, known for several works of manga, including '' Wing-Man'', '' Shadow Lady'', '' DNA²'', '' Video Girl Ai'', '' I"s'', and '' Zetman''. He has also worked as character designer for '' Iria: Zeiram the Animation'', '' ...

. It was serialized in ''

Weekly Shōnen Jump is a weekly Shōnen manga, ''shōnen'' manga anthology published in Japan by Shueisha under the ''Jump (magazine line), Jump'' line of magazines. The manga series within the magazine consist of many Action (fiction), action scenes and a fair ...

'' from 1983 to 1985, with the chapters collected into 13 ''

tankōbon A is a standard publishing format for books in Japan, alongside other formats such as ''shinsho'' (17x11 cm paperback books) and ''bunkobon''. Used as a loanword in English, the term specifically refers to a printed collection of a manga that w ...

'' volumes by

Shueisha is a Japanese publishing company headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. Shueisha is the largest publishing company in Japan. It was established in 1925 as the entertainment-related publishing division of Japanese publisher Shogakukan. The ...

Synopsis

''Wing-Man'' is the story of Kenta Hirono, a fan of superheroes and

sentai In Japanese language, Japanese, is a military unit and may be literally translated as "wikt:squadron, squadron", "task force", "Division (naval), division (of ships)", "group (air force unit), group" or "wing (air force unit), wing". The ter ...

television shows to the point where he dreams of becoming such a hero himself. To that end, he creates a superhero of his own called "Wingman", and, much to the chagrin of his teachers, acts out his fantasies of being Wingman at school. When Kenta meets Aoi Yume, the beautiful blue-haired princess of an alternate universe called Podreams, he gets his chance to make his fantasy come true, as Aoi carries a book called a Dream Note which can make any dream come true, and Kenta draws a picture of Wingman in the book, allowing him to become Wingman for real. Kenta, Aoi and Kenta's classmate and love interest, Miku Ogawa, team up to save Podreams from the evil dictator Rimel, who wants to use the Dream Note to take over Podreams, while Kenta deals with his conflicting feelings for both of his female compatriots.

Characters

; : :Played by: Maito Fujioka ; : :Played by: Konatsu Kato ; : :Played by: Hina Kikuchi ; : :Played by: Amane Uehara ; : :Played by: Hiyori Katada ; : ; : ;Kenta's Father : :Played by:

Koji Matoba is a Japanese actor and ''tarento Television personalities in Japan, known as in Japanese, are celebrities who regularly appear in mass media in Japan, especially as panelists on variety shows. During the Golden Age of Hollywood, bankabl ...

;Kenta's Mother : :Played by: Shinobu Nakayama ; : ; : ;Principal : ;Vice Principal : ; : ; : (Anime),

Tomokazu Seki is a Japanese voice actor and singer. He has previously worked with Haikyō. He is honorary president of and affiliated with Atomic Monkey and the chairman of theater company HeroHero Q. He is a special lecturer at Japan Newart College. Caree ...

(Drama) ; : (Anime),

Akio Otsuka is a Japanese actor, voice actor, and narrator from the Tokyo Metropolitan area. He is attached to Mausu Promotion. The astringent and calm quality of his deep voice has landed him many roles in films, dubbing, animation, and video games. He i ...

(Drama) ; : ; : ; : (

Kōzō Shioya is a Japanese actor, voice actor and narrator from Kagoshima Prefecture. He is represented by Aoni Production. His younger brother Yoku Shioya is also an actor and voice actor. Biography Filmography Television animation ;1980s *''Mobile Suit ...

in episode 7) ; : ; : (Anime),

Haruka Tomatsu is a Japanese actress and singer, employed by Music Ray'n. She received the Rookie of the Year award at the 3rd Seiyu Awards and the Synergy Award at the 9th Seiyu Awards. Tomatsu is known for voicing main heroines as Asuna Yuuki in ''Sword A ...

(Drama) ; : ; :

Production

Kazuhiko Torishima is a Japanese publishing executive and former manga magazine editor, who is currently serving as an outside director at Bushiroad. He formerly worked at Shueisha, where he began as an editor in 1976, before becoming a senior managing director ( ...

, the editor who discovered

, said he was disappointed when the artist told him he wanted to draw a transforming superhero manga. He explained that science fiction works in television with its

special effect Special effects (often abbreviated as F/X or simply FX) are illusions or visual tricks used in the theatre, film, television, video game, amusement park and simulator industries to simulate the fictional events in a story or virtual world. ...

s, but it does not come across visually in manga. So Torishima proposed making it a school story involving girls and asked him to make the main character more realistic and familiar to readers.

Media

Anime

The manga was adapted into an

anime is a Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, , in Japan and in Ja ...

television series titled , produced by

Toei Animation is a Japanese animation studio primarily controlled by its namesake Toei Company. It has produced numerous series, including '' Sally the Witch'', '' GeGeGe no Kitarō'', '' Mazinger Z'', '' Galaxy Express 999'', '' Cutie Honey'', '' Dr. Slu ...

and aired from 1984 to 1985. The anime had a total of 47 episodes. Featuring character designs by Yoshinori Kanemori and intended by

to be a strong shōnen title following the female-targeted '' Ai Shite Knight'', ''Wing-Man'' marked the first anime adaptation of one of Katsura's works and the debut role of

Ryo Horikawa Ryo may refer to: * Ryō, a gold currency unit in pre-Meiji Japan Shakkanhō system * Ryō (actress) (born 1973), Japanese model, actress, and singer * Ryō (given name), a unisex Japanese given name * Ryo, Georgia, an unincorporated community ...

as Kenta. (Katsura himself would later appear as Wing-Man in a live-action adaptation of ''

Video Girl Ai ''Video Girl Ai'', known in Japan as simply , is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Masakazu Katsura. It was serialized in Shueisha's ''shōnen'' manga magazine ''Weekly Shōnen Jump'' from December 1989 to April 1992. ...

''.) The anime's ending differs from that of the manga, but the manga's ending was dramatized with the anime's voice actors on a drama LP.

Video games

The manga was adapted into a 1984

visual novel A visual novel (VN) is a form of digital interactive fiction. Visual novels are often associated with the medium of video games, but are not always labeled as such themselves. They combine a textual narrative with static or animated illustratio ...

adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story, driven by exploration and/or puzzle-solving. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based m ...

also titled ''Dream Soldier Wing-Man''. It was developed by TamTam and published by

Enix was a Japanese multimedia publisher who handled and oversaw video games, manga, guidebooks, and merchandise. It was founded in 1975 by Yasuhiro Fukushima as Eidansha Boshu Service Center, initially as a tabloid publisher and later attempting t ...

for the

NEC PC-8801 The , commonly shortened to PC-88, are a brand of Zilog Z80-based 8-bit home computers released by Nippon Electric Company (NEC) in 1981 and primarily sold in Japan. The PC-8800 series sold extremely well and became one of the four major Japane ...

and other

personal computer A personal computer, commonly referred to as PC or computer, is a computer designed for individual use. It is typically used for tasks such as Word processor, word processing, web browser, internet browsing, email, multimedia playback, and PC ...

s. It featured a

point-and-click Point and click are one of the actions of a computer user moving a pointer to a certain location on a screen (''pointing'') and then pressing a button on a mouse or other pointing device (''click''). An example of point and click is in hypermedi ...

interface, where a cursor is used to interact with on-screen objects,
Translation
similar to '' Planet Mephius'' (1983) and the

Famicom The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...

version of ''

The Portopia Serial Murder Case is a 1983 adventure game designed by Yuji Horii and published by Enix. It was first released on the NEC PC-6001 and has since been ported to other personal computers, the Family Computer (Famicom), mobile phone services and most recently, Win ...

'' (1985).
Translation

Live-action

On September 2, 2024, a live-action television adaptation of ''Wing-Man'' was announced. Co-produced by

TV Tokyo JOTX-DTV (channel 7), branded as is a Japanese television station that serves as the flagship of the TX Network.Toei Video , simply known as Toei Company or Toei, is a Japanese entertainment company. Headquartered in Ginza, Chūō, Tokyo, it is involved in film and television production, distribution, video game development, publishing, and ownership of 34 movie ...

, and DMM TV, it began airing on TV Tokyo and its affiliates on October 22, 2024 and was available on the DMM TV streaming service starting October 16. Maito Fujioka and Konatsu Kato will star as Kenta Hirono and Aoi Yume respectively with ''

Ultraman The , also known as ''Ultraman'', is a Japanese science fiction media franchise owned and produced by Tsuburaya Productions, which began with the television series '' Ultra Q'' in 1966. The franchise has expanded into many television shows, fi ...

'', ''

Kamen Rider The , also known as ''Masked Rider Series'' (until ''Kamen Rider Decade, Decade'' and except Thailand), is a Japanese superhero fiction, superhero media franchise consisting of tokusatsu television programs, films, manga, and anime, created by ...

'' & ''

Super Sentai The is a Japanese superhero team media franchise consisting of television series and films produced by Toei Company and Bandai, and aired by TV Asahi. The shows are of the '' tokusatsu'' genre, featuring live action characters and colorfu ...

'' veteran

Koichi Sakamoto is a Japanese film and television director, stunt performer and coordinator, fight choreographer and producer. He is best known for his work in the tokusatsu genre, particularly for the ''Power Rangers'', ''Super Sentai'' and ''Kamen Rider'' f ...

as the director, "Chang by Blue Encount will be the show's opening theme song. The series ended in December 25, 2024. To promote the series, Konatsu Kato was featured in a pictorial in her Aoi Yume costume for the release of the 46th issue of Weekly Young Jump, which was released on October 17, 2024.

References

External links

Wing-Man at Toei Animation
* {{Tomoharu Katsumata 1983 manga 1984 anime television series debuts Masakazu Katsura Science fiction anime and manga Shōnen manga Shueisha franchises Shueisha manga Superheroes in anime and manga Toei Animation television Transforming heroes TV Asahi original programming Toei tokusatsu