Viz Media, a leading manga and anime platform, is launching One-Shots, a collection of bite-sized Japanese comic (manga) series that flow from the pens of new creators.
Leading the program is former Weekly Shonen Jump editor-in-chief Sasaki Hisashi, who oversaw Japan’s prestigious Weekly Shonen Jump magazine at a time when some of the most iconic and highest-grossing creators of all were being serialized.
The first four One-Shots series are: action, sci-fi series “Cinematic Certitude” by Naf; fantasy, action series “Ancient Melody,” by Jonathan Lareva; action adventure “Skin & Bone,” written by Josh Tierney and designed by Valentin Serber; and action, sci-fi “The Stranger,” by Liam Naughton. Others new series will be added each month.
The program allows creators to work with Sasaki in the U.S., rather than having to travel to Tokyo to do so.
Although it competes with Korean-style webtoons, Viz claims that the Japanese one-shot model for serialization has the most influential and successful track record on the planet for launching debut manga creators. “It is a model in which a one-shot (a complete story running between 20-50 pages) is published for an already built-in audience,” the company said. As with webtoons, consumption on mobile devices is optimized.
“Successful one-shots can access a wealth of opportunities at Viz Media, including the licensing and establishing of an IP as an ongoing series for digital and print formats, producing their story into an anime, and the production of consumer products,” the company said in a statement.
On the scene for some 30 years, Viz Media says it has pivoted from being a company focused on localization of Japanese content for U.S. audiences into a leading pop culture publisher and producer.
Its activities these days span: a 10,000-chapter manga library and a business model where new chapters are published free-of-charge and simultaneously with those in Japan; and VIZ Originals, manga-inspired graphic novels and manga adaptations of existing pop-culture success stories from books, TV, and film. Since launching in 2020, VIZ Originals have expanded to 14 languages and range in genre from slice-of-life, seinen, shonen, shojo, and BL.
Source Agencies
