Person: Kurumada Masami 2oy5x

Kurumada Masami was born December 6, 1953 in Chuo, Tokyo, Japan. He is a manga artist and writer, known for specialising in fighting manga featuring bishounen. He is famous as the creator/author of popular manga, such as Ring ni Kakero, Fuuma no Kojirou, Saint Seiya and B't X. His male protagonists are a reflection of the classical and modern society's archetype of the true men. The male characters in his works often display very masculine qualities and traits, and pursue to achieve courage and manhood perfection through sacrifice, selflessness and true heroism. He has won the best success award with Saint Seiya and the best inspiration award with Ring ni Kakero.

Kurumada's first work was Otoko Raku, which earned him an award in a manga contest for aspiring mangaka, and became assistant to professional manga artists. Some time later, he debuted as a professional mangaka in 1974 with his manga Sukeban Arashi, and achieved his first hit 3 years later when he started writing and drawing Ring ni Kakero, which brought him recognition as a popular manga author, and lasted 5 years, and he considers it his favorite creation. A practicer of the martial arts in his younger days, the influence this has exerted on his various works is worthy of mention.

Also, in the same manner as many manga artist today, Kurumada employs the revered Osamu Tezuka's Star System manga technique, which is essentially resorting to the use of a stable cast of characters in his various works. Because of this, the main characters of his works most of the time bear a resemblance to Takane Ryuuji, the protagonist of Ring ni Kakero.

It is also known that anime adaptations aren't much to his liking, he prefers manga. Though he agreed that his works Fuuma no Kojirou, Saint Seiya, Ring ni Kakero and B't X were adapted to anime, to follow the long-time tradition of popular manga having an animated adaptation.

His drawing style is very classic, reminiscent from the manga/anime aesthetics more predominant in the '60s and '70s, albeit a constant flaw in his art is an inconsistent trace and proportion unbalance. He often draws his characters as if seen from a low perspective. His drawings can sometimes seem rough, but the improvement in his artistic technique is evident when comparing older works to more recent ones. The detail in his drawings is painstakingly executed, and his designs for his characters' attire in some of his works, is elaborate, rich and elegant. His stories are moving and inspiring, though they tend to suffer from plenty of plotholes and understimation of details, which lead to loss of plot coherence and discontinuity tends to creep into his storylines.

Certain graphics elements characteristic of his style can be found all over his works, mostly found during fight sequences, having become widely known. Fans have created to refer to them such as Kurumada-ochi (車田落ち, "Kurumada Fall") which designates the typical head-first falling characters, and Kurumada-futtobi (車田吹っ飛び, "Kurumada Launch") which refers to characters that are projected high into the air by opponents, to name a few.

A recurrent theme in his works is friendship, courage and sacrifice. Masculine virtue and qualities, honesty and honor are also traits often found in his characters. Female characters in his works mostly play a much lesser role, but several ones with key roles can also be found, such as Kojinyama Rei (Sukeban Arashi), Takane Kiku (Ring ni Kakero) and Kido Saori (Saint Seiya).

Kurumada has stated in interviews that he obtains some creative influence from yesterday's authors considered masters of the manga medium today, such as Hiroshi Motomiya, Sanpei Shirato and Mitsuteru Yokoyama. He specially considers that Motomiya's works had a very strong impact and influence on him.

Kurumada also draws inspiration from universal knowledge and folklore, such as Greek mythology, Japanese and Chinese mythology, Buddhist and Hinduist doctrine, Trascendental philosophies, and classic works of literature, such as Dante's The Divine Comedy.

In 2004, Kurumada celebrated 30 years as a professional mangaka and that same year two of his
older and best known works experiences a resurfacing. The original Ring ni Kakero was adapted to anime, 27 years after its manga debut and the Saint Seiya anime adaptation was resumed in 2003 with the release of the Saint Seiya TenKai-Hen Josou Overture film in 2004. Which was planned to continue the story with the subsequent release of OVAs but due to discrepancies between Kurumada and Toei Animation was abandoned.

Kurumada's works have had influence on many contemporary manga authors and related media. Clamp was heavily influenced by Kurumada's work and they began their career as manga authors creating doujinshi based on Kurumada's characters.

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