Tracing
drawings and passing them off as yours is basically a death sentence within the
demanding Japanese publishing industry, and this case was no exception. The
editorial department of the Monthly Shonen Magazine (owned by
Kodansha) suddenly announced the cancellation and end of the serialization of
the manga Oshiawase ni Konyakusha-sama (Oshiawase ni
Konyakusha-sama. Watashi mo Watashi from Shiawase ni Narimasunode). The
reason? A series of complaints of plagiarism that ended up being one hundred
percent real.
The whole
scandal erupted when readers began to notice extremely suspicious similarities
between the vignettes of this manga and the art of other published works. When
Kodansha's editors cornered illustrator Matsurika to ask for
explanations, the artist had no choice but to confess. He openly admitted that
his "visual references" crossed the line and ended up being direct
imitations and carbon copies of other people's work.
The
guillotine fell quickly and mercilessly. The publisher ordered the immediate
suspension and total removal of the series on all of its digital distribution
platforms, including Palcy, Getsumaga Kichi, and Comic
DAYS. And as if that were not enough, the punishment extended to the
mangaka's history: a previous one-shot drawn by Matsurika himself, titled Shinitagari
no Hashi no Ue, was also wiped off the map in Comic DAYS for being under
suspicion of the same fraudulent practices.
On the
future of the franchise
It is
important to clarify that the blame for this disaster fell entirely on the
cartoonist. The original story comes from a light novel written by Gorogoro
Mikan, with the base character designs created by HIROKAZU, who
unfortunately saw how the adaptation of his work went to waste because of a
third party.
Through an
official statement on its website, the magazine deeply apologized to readers
and the original creators for the inconvenience caused. They promised that they
will tighten their review and monitoring filters to prevent plagiarized work
from slipping through again. For now, fans of the original novel will have to
cross their fingers and wait to see if, in the future, some other publisher or
magazine is encouraged to give the work a second chance with a
completely different artist.
