Danica Davidson
August 7, 2024 
Unico: The Awakening by Samuel Sattin and artist team Gurihiru hits comic shops today! The title is a continuation of Osamu Tezuka’s Unico manga, and Gurihiru spoke to Otaku USA about how Tezuka influenced them, their creative process, and what they like best about the little unicorn.
Were you a fan of Osamu Tezuka’s works before this? Do you have any favorite titles?
Sasaki, the penciler of Gurihiru, met Tezuka manga for the first time when she was in grade school. It was Vampires that her friend had and that was the Tezuka manga she read for the first time. She loved drawing already but she fell in love with how Tezuka drew animals (especially wolves), and it gave her a great impact on how cool his drawing was and made her a huge fan of Tezuka. She copied his art style and it gave her so much influence.
For Kawano, the colorist of Gurihiru, the first manga she bought with her own money was The Three Eyed One. She loved mystery novels such as Sherlock Holmes, so she was always excited to read the stories where they solve difficult cases.
After The Three Eyed One, she kept on buying other Tezuka manga and for a long time the only manga she had on her bookshelf was Tezuka manga.
What’s it like working on something originally created by Tezuka?
There was great pressure to work on a Tezuka character for us. And because of that, we actually turned down the offer once. But we thought Unico had affinity to our art style and we now think it was a good decision to work on Unico. Also, we have permission from Tezuka Productions to use other Tezuka characters from the star system, so it is a great challenge for us to think about how we will have the other charming Tezuka characters appear in the future stories.
What is your process like working as a creative team for Unico: The Awakening?
After receiving the script from Sam, our writer, we have a discussion with Sam such as the questions we had about the script and what we can do to make it better. After the script is approved, Sasaki will work on new character designs, and then onto layouts, inks. And then Kawano will color the inked pages. In each step, we both check each other’s work and give comments while we work on a book. We both can see the other’s work objectively and we think that is the strong part about working together.
What do you like best about Unico?
“You were kind to me, that is why I can use my power.”
This Unico dialogue is about the “the power of kindness” that any generation should not forget about, and it is also a line that moves our hearts every time we read it. And this is our favorite theme from Unico as well. It is not just a cute character, and we hope to draw in that important thing in our Unico.
What else would you like your Western fans to know about you?
That is a very difficult question. There is not much we want our fans to know about us to be honest, but we have been working as a comic book artist that is published in the U.S. for a long time. Our biggest wish is that the people will enjoy our work from past to present to the future.
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Danica Davidson is the author of the bestselling Manga Art for Beginners with artist Melanie Westin, plus its sequel, Manga Art for Everyone, and the first-of-its-kind manga chalk book Chalk Art Manga, both illustrated by professional Japanese mangaka Rena Saiya. Check out her other comics and books at www.danicadavidson.com.
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