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Chibi Maruko-chan Creator to Launch Chibi Shikaku-chan Parody Manga Series

This year's 21st issue of Shueisha's Grand Jump magazine is announcing on Wednesday that Chibi Maruko-chan creator Momoko Sakura will launch a Chibi Shikaku-chan manga series in the magazine's next issue on October 19. The "drama of tears and laughter" follows Shikako, a square-headed parody version of Sakura's iconic manga girl Chibi Maruko-chan. ("Shikaku" and "Shikako" are wordplays on the Japanese word for "square," while the "maru" in "Maruko" sounds similar to the Japanese word for "round.")

Sakura had previously published a Chibi Shikaku-chan short (seen above) as the first installment of her open-themed anthology Manga Club in Grand Jump last fall. However, the new Chibi Shikaku-chan manga will be a "full-fledged series" on its own.

Sakura serialized the Chibi Maruko-chan manga in Shueisha's Ribon magazine from 1986 to 1996. The manga has approximately 32 million copies in print. She launched a four-panel version in a Japanese newspaper in 2007, and she ended that version in 2011. Sakura launched the Chibi Maruko-chan Kimi wo Wasurenai yo manga as a tie in to the Eiga Chibi Maruko-chan: Italia kara Kita Shōnen anime film in September 2015, and ended it in December of that year.

The original manga inspired the Chibi Maruko-chan television anime that is consistently the #2 rated anime series after Sazae-san. The first anime series ran from 1990 to 1992, and the ongoing second series premiered in 1995. The 1,000th television anime episode aired in 2012, and the show now has more than 1,100 episodes. The series celebrated its 25th anniversary last year.

The manga has also inspired several live-action specials and television series.