Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan (TV Drama)

"Bizarre things take place in the world... Especially around Rohan Kishibe."

- Kyoka Izumi

Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan (岸辺露伴は動かない) is a live-action mini-series based on the manga series of the same name by Hirohiko Araki. It was produced by and aired on Japan's national broadcaster from December 2020 to December 2022.

Rohan Kishibe is a famous, arrogant, and eccentric manga artist whose main series "Pink Dark Boy" is enjoying a great success. Unbeknownst to all, Rohan possesses a gift he names "Heaven's Door", which allows him to turn people into books and read into their lives. At the beginning of the series, Rohan meets his new editor, a perky but strong-headed woman named Kyoka Izumi. Together, and to acquire material for Rohan's work, they seek and stumble upon some of the secrets of this world, from yokai to miracles to more esoteric phenomenon.

On April 11, 2022, the distribution company Digital Media Rights announced it will stream the first three episodes of the series with English subtitles on its streaming service RetroCrush.

Summary
Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan consists of eight episodes, each of them being loose adaptations of one of the Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan short stories. Episodes 1 and 3 are based on stories originally featured in the manga, Millionaire Village and D.N.A.. Episode 2 is based on the short story Kushagara written by novelist Ballad Kitaguni for the Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan: Short Story Collection series.

Actor Issey Takahashi stars in the series as the titular character Rohan Kishibe, an eccentric manga artist originally featured in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 4: Diamond is Unbreakable. He plays alongside Marie Iitoyo, who plays the character of Rohan's editor Kyoka Izumi from Millionaire Village. Unlike the original one-shots, Kyoka is now a recurring character and reappears in all of the episodes. also plays the original character Taro Hirai, Kyoka's boyfriend.

On August 14, 2021, NHK announced that a second season was in production and would be broadcast in December of the same year. The second season consists of three episodes, adapting The Run, the "" story arc from Diamond is Unbreakable, and Mutsu-kabe Hill. Issey Takahashi and Marie Iitoyo reprise their roles as Rohan Kishibe and Kyoka Izumi. Three additional actors make special appearances in each of the three new episodes: Show Kasamatsu as Yoma Hashimoto in Episode 4, Ennosuke Ichikawa as Masazo Kinoto in Episode 5, and Rio Uchida as Naoko Osato in Episode 6.

On August 19, 2022, NHK announced that a third season was in production and would be broadcast in December of the same year. The third season consists of two episodes, adapting Hot Summer Martha and the "" story arc from Diamond is Unbreakable. Alongside Issey Takahashi and Marie Iitoyo, two additional actors make special appearances in the two episodes: Kotone Furukawa as Eve in Episode 7 and Hinata Hiiragi as Ken Oyanagi in Episode 8.

On January 4, 2023, announced that a film adaptation of Rohan au Louvre will premiere in Japanese theaters on May 26, 2023. The film conceptually functions as the ninth episode of the drama series. Fumino Kimura and Kento Nagao make special appearances as Nanase and a younger version of Rohan respectively.

Production
The Kachi Villa in the town of, was used as Rohan Kishibe's house. The drafts of the fictitious Pink Dark Boy manga that appear in the drama were drawn by Masahiko Aoki.

The cafe where Kyoka Izumi and Taro Hirai drink is the real-life cafe Enokitei Honten, situated in. Scenes of Rohan Kishibe and Kyoka Izumi trekking in the forest were shot in the forest of in. The cascade where Kyoka rests was identified as the Tateshina Otaki. The luxurious mansion of the Millionaire Village is in reality a house named the Omori-Musasino (大森武蔵野苑). It is a historical site situated in Koganei, Japan. The tea cups used in the luxurious mansion are made of in an Adelaide shape with a phoenix motif, dating from approximately 1830. Rohan's own tea cup shown at the end of the first episode is a Saint-Médard silver plated metal tea cup. Manners consultant worked on the episode to guide the production team about the proper manners to adopt.

In Kushagara, the red book that Jugo Shishi grabs in his office is a volume from the Soseki Collection (漱石全集), a collection of Japanese novelist 's works, published by. The cafe where Rohan meets Jugo Shishi is the real-life cafe Yamata Jubankan situated in. The sloped path in which Rohan tells Kyoka about "kushagara" is situated in a road in Yamanouchi. The place where Kyoka meets Taro is the Harbor View Park Observatory in. The bookstore in which Rohan meets Jugo Shishi again is the real-life Tenpodokaribe Book Store in Yokohama. The isolated alley in which Rohan confronts Jugo about his obsession is situated in a path in Tama Ward, Kawasaki, in the Kanagawa Prefecture. Jugo Shishi's office was filmed in a building in Kawasaki. The "university building" used in the introduction of the episode is in reality an annex of the Yamanashi Prefectural Office, in. The shots of the Kushagara creatures in Jugo Shishi's throat were filmed using an upscaled model of Mirai Moriyama's throat with the creatures being manipulated like puppets by several production members.

In DNA, the park used as the production set for the episode is the Sagamihara Park. Mai and Mao Katahira's house is the Megurohonchou studio. The sloped path in which Rohan meets Mai and Mao Katahira is the Motomachi Park's Hitaizaka, in. The hospital in which Taro is brought is actually the NHK's broadcasting center in Shibuya, Tokyo.

In The Run, scenes of Yoma running were shot in Shibaura Island, Tokyo. The gym is the gym of the NAS Wellness & Spa CLUB. The scene where Yoma kicks a bicycle is situated near the following address: 1-4-29 Miyamaedaira, Miyamae-ku, Kawasaki, Kanagawa prefecture. The tunnel Yoma runs through is a tunnel is the second Kakinokidai tunnel situated in Ichihara, Chiba prefecture. For the production of the episode, Show Kasamatsu, Yoma Hashimoto's actor, had to follow a strict diet followed by a personal trainer. Kasamatsu also never practiced bouldering and thus his trainer took him on a two-hour practice session before the shooting. Afterwards, Kasamatsu was able to boulder inside of the apartment for the shooting. Kasamatsu reports that he almost cried when the director Watanabe thanked him afterwards.

The alley serving as a boundary to the other world in From Behind is actually an alley adjacent to the Chiyoda Kajicho Post Office in Tokyo.

The village in Mutsu-kabe Hill is the Japanese village of Akasawa, with part of the episode being filmed near Akasawa's Osakaya inn. Kyoka Izumi's cakes are cakes from the Nicolas & Herbs brand. The Osato House is the Kiunkaku, a historical hot spring hotel situated in Atami, Shizuoka. To recreate the effect of a corpse shriveling up, the production team created a fake model of the head of Kiriko Osato's actress Tamaki Shiratori which can shrivel up with the push of a button.

In Hot Summer Martha, the scenes of the shrine were filmed at the Gorei shrine, Zushi. Scenes of the great tree hollow were filmed near the Namiki Hotel in Nikko, Toshigi prefecture. In the Rock-Paper-Scissor Kid episode, the scene where Ken Oyanagi calls Kyoka was filmed at the entrance of the Daiichi Shimokawa building in Ota ward, Tokyo.

Original Content
There are several nods to the main JoJo's Bizarre Adventure series:
 * If closed-caption is turned on, its text is formatted similarly to the original manga as well as JoJo's Bizarre Adventure in general. For instance, Rohan and Kyoka often end their sentences with lowercase katakana.

Modifications

 * Heaven's Door's Stand form is never directly seen, akin to its appearance in the Let's Go to the Manga Artist's House story arc of Diamond Is Unbreakable.
 * When Rohan turns someone into books, the type of pages differ depending on the victim. Kyoka's pages looks like a fashion magazine, while Ikkyu's pages look like refined book pages, Jugo Shishi's pages are a notebook full of scribbles.
 * The word "Stand" is never uttered, and is replaced with the more generic term "gift".
 * Kyoka takes more importance in the drama and becomes a recurring character, appearing in stories in which she was originally absent.
 * The publisher of Pink Dark Boy is formatted as "Shumeisha" (集明社), rather than matching the real-life Shueisha (集英社).

Season 1
Season 1's promotion was rather modest, mainly consisting of a trailer and an interview with Issey Takahashi in Ultra Jump about the TV Drama, as well as several online interviews.

Season 2
Season's 2 promotion was more ambitious, with not only several teaser trailers, but also unique events and interviews.

One of the promotional events for Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan was “My Rohan Kishibe Talk” (私の岸辺露伴語り), a talk show which aired on December 18, 2021 at 11:10 – 11:39 PM JST and was rebroadcasted on December 27, 2021 at 12:53 AM JST. In this program, Issey Takahashi, Rio Uchida, Yasuko Kobayashi (the screenwriter for both the TV Drama and the anime), and culture critic Sayawaka talk about the unique worldview and appeal of the original work, the anime, and the drama while analyzing the secret of its popularity.

To promote the Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan series, the four OVA adaptation episodes also aired on TV.

The NHK TV Channel also promoted the series via its "Tensai TV kun hello" special program, in which TV "warrior" Chan Kawai (of the "W ENGINE" comedy duo) and guest presenter "Kazuhiro Ozawa" (of the "Speed Wagon" comedy duo) talked about JoJo's Bizarre Adventure and Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan's themes of "celebrating humanity" and "philosophy of life". The program also featured cameos of Issey Takahashi and Marie Iitoyo.

Finally, a special exhibition about the TV Drama was held in Sendai from December 14, 2021 to January 10, 2022 at Sendai's NHK Sendai Broadcasting Station. The exhibition displayed the costumes of the series' characters as well as original design drawings by Isao Tsugo, the face books that form when Heaven's Door is activated, and various props and accessories used in the series.

Reception
Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan won the monthly for the TV show category in January 2021. It was chosen because the drama beautifully recreated the bizarre world of the original work, and was steeped with a unique aesthetic sense with meticulous art and direction. Yasuko Kobayashi's script accurately depicted the essence of the original work and the actors all played their parts well. In particular, Mirai Moriyama made the most of his physical abilities and excellently portrayed a sense of discomfort with his character, Jugo Shishi.

Trivia

 * According to the director, Kazutaka Watanabe, the visuals, artistic scenery, and costume designs of the TV drama were heavily inspired by the film .