Hana Kappa-kun Kids' Newspaper Manga Gets TV Anime

posted on 2010-01-21 04:53 EST

Story of mystical Japanese river creature with flower growing out of his head

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Hana Kappa, a television anime adaptation of Tadashi Akiyama's children's manga Hana Kappa-kun, will begin airing on the NHK-Educational public television channel on March 29. The manga follows Hana Kappa, a kappa (mystical Japanese river creature) who happens to have a flower (hana) growing out of his head. Hana Kappa-kun lives with his father, mother, grandfather, and grandmother in a verdant village known as Yamabiko.

Akiyama serializes the manga in Mainichi Shōgakusei Shimbun, a daily newspaper for elementary school children from The Mainichi Newspapers company. An anime episode will premiere every weekday on 7:15 a.m., and then repeat at 5:30 p.m. Hana Kappa is also the main lead of two picture books. Another picture book series of Akiyama's, Mameushi-kun, was previously animated into a television series in 2007.

Source: Mainichi Shimbun's Mantan Web