Strong Manga Originals Have Powered Anime’s Global Rise

A Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle display at a movie theater in Ikebukuro, Tokyo, in September 2025. (© AFP/Jiji)

Tezuka Osamu’s My Sun Wukong. (© Nakano Haruyuki)

Saiyūki (1960). (© Tōei)

Tezuka Osamu poses in front of Mushi Production on May 13, 1963. (© Kyōdō)

A tankōbon edition of Astro Boy. (© Nakano Haruyuki)

Children’s manga books from the 1960s and 1970s that were adapted into TV anime. (© Jiji)

A display at the Suginami Animation Museum shows how many manga works were adapted into anime in the 1960s. (© Matsumoto Sōichi)

A mural featuring Tezuka characters near Takadanobaba Station. (© Matsumoto Sōichi)