VIDEO
COMIC PAGES AND SYNOPSIS
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The two sisters, Anzu and Hanako, grew up with their grandfather Hideaki, a war hero and Samurai veteran, and their uncle Eiji, a lazy good-for-nothing sake-drinking gambler. Hideaki manages to make the girls’ childhood a happy one, without any great luxury but a lot of love. Beside teaching everything a child can learn, he teaches them that there is a lot of different things out there, weird and mysterious beings, yokais like the kappa Rokuro, who – in exchange for food – supplies herbs that help the sickly Hanako, and see that she gets a decent amount of rest.
Everything takes a brutal turn when their grandfather dies. Instead of taking care of the girls, their uncle Eiji, sells everything that he had inherited from his father, including his armor and last name to a family of revolting and greedy traders, when he marries Hanako to Goro, their eldest son, a slimy and unpleasant man. Through wedlock, the traders acquire the status of a Samurai family, and take on the grandfather’s last name, Nakamura, as well as the social status and advantages that it included.
As part of the deal, Little Anzul works as a housemaid in the house. Her life becomes a living hell until she becomes desperate, and through a dramatic series of events, gets hold of her grandfather’s katana, and runs away.
The traders send people to find her – they do not want any scandal to jeopardize their reputation and make them lose their newfound social position.
She asks her only friend, Rokuro, for help, but he isn’t strong enough to defend her even though he tells her about a creature, Korokku, a different kind of oni, who isn’t like the others. Korokke is a legendary hero who will fight all who follow her.
At least that’s how it seems....because what if all the legends about his incredible achievements weren’t true? What if they were exaggerated?
CHARACTER DESIGN
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HOW KOROKKE CAME TO LIFE (by Josep Busquet)
Spaceman Project contacted us to develop a comic book together. The editor had been following Jonatan’s work for a while and wanted to publish something of his (me too, ok? This is the year we are publishing Nothin Personal! If you don’t know what it is after throwing your money away on the screen to buy Korokke, you can click and buy several copies of one of the year’s best comic books).
Now where were we? Ah yes! Jonatan and I were developing a comic book for Spaceman Project. The question was, what could we do? It’s not a secret that I enjoy customizing my writing for the author who will draw the comic. I don’t have any scripts collecting dust in boxes and I don’t recycle failed projects (maybe I should one day). I like to write something that the cartoonist will enjoy working with, something that will trigger his imagination and I like it best when he gets involved, when his ideas intervene, which will then motivate him even more to draw out the story instead of turning into a nightmare where he will have to draw what he hates most in the world.
As such, Korokke includes some of our favorite things, like Japan, for example, a place that we both love and have visited on more than one occasion. We decide to create a story in an undetermined moment in time in the past of this country, when western civilization still hadn’t arrived (or had arrived in a discreet way that wasn’t revolutionary), in a feudal period when technology was similar to that of the middle ages. A place packed with yokais.
THE YOKAI WORLD
Some of you may ask “what is a yokai?” (if you know you can already go buy a copy of Korokke in the format of your choice). Yokais are the best known types of fantastic and mythical creatures in Japan, from spirits to onis (devilish ogres known for gobbling people up). There are hundreds and hundreds of yokais…some of them are very well known in the western world, like the kappas, and others are less known, like the Umi Bozu. Some of them interact with human beings while others hide from them and others make their lives impossible.
Yokais are also the explanation of certain phenomena: Do you hear weird noises in the woods at night? That would be the work of a yokai. They are useful to get people to do things. Is your bathroom dirty? It’s possible that an Akaname finds it out and decides to lick all of the dirt. Some of them would be happy not to clean but the greatest majority will do whatever it takes to get rid of the yokai….what would the neighbors think if they find out you have an Akaname? They will think you are a pig, that’s for sure.
Korokke is a story that unites all of this with a bit of adventure, drama, humor…I’d tell you to run and buy it right now but I am not impartial. We want Korokke to become a reality and we need your help.
IMPORTANT
We know what a job well done entails and both the author and Spaceman Project are prepared. We love this medium and want to take it to another level where readers, authors, editors and booksellers are the protagonists. Therefore, we have taken small details into account and set a goal of raising an amount in keeping with what we offer.
A maximum period of 15 months (after the campaign ended) is anticipated for the development of this work.
Finally, but no less important, all the illustrations presented in this campaign are provisional and are subject to modifications once the goal is reached and the work begins to be created. This will mainly only affect cover images, never the story and format of the work and the type of reward offered. Naturally, we are presenting a live project to be developed. Creativity has no limits and we are convinced that we should not stop improving, which is why we have a commitment to quality with our readers.
