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Nokemono to Hanayome Manga by Utena's Ikuhara Gets 'New Chapter'

The official website of anime director Kunihiko Ikuhara (Revolutionary Girl Utena, Penguindrum) revealed on September 3 that Ikuhara and manga creator Asumiko Nakamura launched a "new chapter" of their Nokemono to Hanayome (The Nokemono & The Bride) manga titled Nokemono to Hanayome+ (pronounced "cross") on Gentosha's Densha Birz manga website.

The "lolita hardboiled" manga centers on the "cruel and dangerous" love between the girl Hitsuji Sera and the boy Itaru Hagumazuka, who wears a bear costume.

Ikuhara serialized the original novel in Index Communications' Kera magazine from 2006 and 2007. Ikuhara and Nakamura launched the manga 2007, and it continues on from the novel's story. The manga's first part concluded last year, and Gentosha published the manga's seventh volume on April 26.

Ikuhara is perhaps best known as the director of the Revolutionary Girl Utena anime, a 1997 series he co-created with the Be-PaPas creative group, which consisted of him, writer Yoji Enokido, animator and character designer Hasegawa Shinya, manga creator Chiho Saitō, and producer Yūichirō Oguro. Before Revolutionary Girl Utena, he worked at Toei Animation, where he directed Sailor Moon R, S, and SuperS. After Revolutionary Girl Utena, he did not direct another anime series until Mawaru Penguindrum in 2011. Until now, his most recent directorial work is Yuri Kuma Arashi in 2015. He will direct a new television anime titled Sarazanmai at MAPPA in 2019.

Nakamura's Dōkyūsei manga inspired the Doukyusei -Classmates- anime film, which opened in Japan in February 2016. Aniplex of America opened the film in theaters in the United States in May 2016, and released the film on home video in September of that same year. Nakamura's Double Mints manga inspired a live-action film adaptation that opened in Japan in June 2017. Vertical Comics released Nakamura's Utsubora manga in North America in 2013.

Sources: Kunihiko Ikuhara's official website, Denshi Birz