Rumiko Takahashi is famous for his Japanese manga series, Inuyasha. Inuyasha falls under the categories of adventure, romance, drama, supernatural and comedy. It was published on November 1996 by Shogakukan in the Weekly Shonen Sunday. As of June 2008, there are a total of 56 tankobon volumes with each one containing several chapters. Sunrise Studios produced the anime adaptation of the big-hit anime which was directed by Masashi Ikeda and Yasunao Aoki whilst Katsuyuki Sumisawa wrote its script. Other people who worked on the show included Rina Miura, Toshio Hasegawa, Yukie Tsuda and Yutaka Senba who were in charge of the special effects for the show. It debuted on several TV networks including NNS, ABC, Seven Network and YTV on October 2000. The anime television series ended with 167 action-packed episodes on September 2004. As of June 2008, the manga has sold more than 43 million copies in Japan alone. For several years, Inuyasha have been quite popular in Japan ranking in several lists. In 2001, the manga won the Shogakukan Manga Award for best shonen manga title of the year. In 2003, Inuyasha ranked third in the “Best Anime” category by polls done by Animage.
Set in modern day Tokyo, Japan, the story revolves around one fifteen-year old high school student who goes by the name Kagome Higurashi who just so happens to live close to the family’s Shinto shrine. Celebrating her fifteenth birthday, she goes to check on her brother who was playing around the old well of the temple grounds. His brother, Sota, was actually looking for their family cat who he feared might have fallen in the old well. Kagome ventures into the old shed to look for Buyo, the family cat to put his brother at ease. As she grew closer to the well, huge arms suddenly emerged from within the old well and dragged her down with it. As she came around, she later discovers she is transported to Feudal Japan in the Sengoku Era and is facing a huge centipede woman who keeps asking her about some kind of jewel. In an effort to escape her, Kagome grabbed one of her hands which suddenly tore off. She took the ensuing chaos as a chance to escape and found herself in the forest. Looking around, she notices a boy that was pinned down to the tree with an arrow and not soon later finds herself in a nearby village. Everyone, Kaede (Kikyo’s sister) included, was shocked at how Kagome closely resembled Kikyo, the long dead priestess of the village. It was later did she discover that she has travelled through time and that the boy he found in the forest was actually Inuyasha, a half-demon, half-human. Back in the day, Inuyasha loved Kikyo, but rumors say that Inuyasha betrayed her to get his hands on the Shikon no Jewel, a mysterious jewel said to grant immense demonic power and can make anyone’s wish come true. It wasn’t till later did they realize that Kagome is actually the reincarnation of Kikyo and that on her fifteenth birthday, the Shikon no Jewel was embodied in her tiny little body. When the centipede demon came to attack the village, Kagome was separated from the villagers who were trying to protect her. The centipede found the Jewel and swallowed it whole. In a desperate attempt to save her life, Kagome unseals Inuyasha, which he easily makes short work of. They were able to retrieve the jewel only to be stolen by an evil crow. Trying to save it, Kagome fires an arrow but instead of hitting the crow, the arrow hit the jewel causing it to shatter into dozens of small shards. Even the individual shards are said to be capable enough to grant great power which were highly sought out by humans and demons alike. And that’s where Kagome and Inuyasha’s journey to find the rest of the missing Shikon no Jewel before it falls into the wrong hands.
Due to its successful run, fans constantly asked for a sequel to the original anime series of which news of a sequel entitled “Inuyasha: The Final Act” was announced on July 2009 in the 34th issue of Shonen Sunday. The supposedly sequel is to have 26 episodes by the same crew who worked on the original TV series which debuted on October 2009 and ended shortly on March of the following year. Aside from a sequel, four films were made which featured original plots by Katsuyuki Sumisawa. An original video animation was also made entitled the “Black Tetsusaiga” which was released on October 2010. A novel by Tomoko Komparo and a live action series were also released to the public.
