Kagerou Project
The Kagerou Project, also known as "Kagerou Daze" or "Kagerou Days", is a Japanese mixed-media project. It started as a Vocaloid song series created by Jin. The story revolves around the Mekakushi Dan, a group of young people with unusual eye-related powers.
The series became infamous on the video sharing website Niconico after the release of the music video and song for "Kagerou Daze", which primarily featured character Hibiya Amamiya, also gave the series its name. The song has amassed over 10 million views and is the most popular song of the project. Eight light novels have been released, written by Jin and illustrated by Sidu. A manga adaptation with illustrations by Mahiro Satou, began serialization in Monthly Comic Gene on June 15, 2012, also written by Jin. A 12-episode anime adaptation titled Mekakucity Actors—"Mekakucity" being a portmanteau of "mekakushi" and "city"—aired between April 12 and June 28, 2014. The series was directed by Akiyuki Shinbo and Yūki Yase, and animated at Shaft, with the script also written by Jin.
Plot
Shintarō Kisaragi of "Kashiwa City", Japan is an 18-year-old hiki-NEET who has not left his room in two years, engrossing himself with his computer and the internet. However, on August 14, due to the messing about of the cyber girl Ene, who lives inside his computer, Shintarō spills soda on his computer keyboard and is forced to go outside to buy a new one, due to the fact that during the Obon festival none of the stores will deliver until August 17. Shintarō goes to the department store, where a group of criminals break in and hold the people inside hostage for ransom. Here he comes in contact with a group of people calling themselves the "Mekakushi Dan", who stop the robbery with their mysterious eye powers and "force" Shintarō to join into their group.Before this occurs, Shintarō's younger sister, Momo Kisaragi, is a popular idol and first-year high school student who has the ability to attract people's attention. This is due to the "Drawing Eyes" ability, which she cannot control and causes people to look at her wherever she goes. One day, while fleeing from a horde of fans, she meets the Mekakushi Dan leader, Tsubomi Kido, who invites Momo to join, which she does.
While meeting the first four members of the Mekakushi Dan, Marry trips and gets Momo's phone wet, and the Mekakushi Dan all go to the department store to buy a new phone for Momo. Kido uses her ability to keep people from staring at Momo, but while in the store, they find out Shintarō is there at the same time. The terrorists break in and take all the shoppers hostage, but with Kido's eye power, she, Momo, Marry, Seto, and Kano are invisible and thus do not get caught. They work together to stop the heist, though Shintarō passes out, and they bring him to their hideout and introduce him and Ene as members once the former awakens. Afterwards, they all go to the amusement park to have fun. However, further events begin to unfold.
The prologue for the novels' storyline is told in the second novel, -a headphone actor-. Takane Enomoto and Haruka Kokonose, students of Kenjirō Tateyama, plan a class booth for their school's cultural festival. Haruka gets an idea to host a shooting booth; however, this idea could not be fulfilled due to Kenjirō spending all their booth funds on a rare specimen. Takane, being a highly-skilled gamer, decides that instead of a shooting booth with a large amount of equipment, they should make a video game of a first-person shooter. Kenjirō would be in charge of programming, Haruka was in charge of illustration and Takane was responsible for playing as the opponent. Their plan captured a great amount of attention, good and bad.
The series contains alternative storylines, endings depending on the format of the media, called "routes".
- Music Route, occurring between the years 2011-2013 initially and otherwise beyond, is the original first "route". It comes first in the official "timelines" order. It contains all of the official music videos for the "Kagerou Project" songs, with music by Jin, and animations by Wannyanpū and Sidu. Many notable songs, however, are left out of the initial, chronological "music route" described, though they are stated to still be included in the overall route. "Lost Time Memory" in Music Route splits into "Route XX", "Route 1", and "Route 2", with "XX" being a "bad ending", "1" leading to the main storyline, and "2" implied a "good ending".
- Manga Route, published between the years 2012 and currently, comes second in the official "timelines" order. Though it debuted in June 2012, Jin confirmed he was working on the manga earlier on, writing the story for it as of "Konoha's World Situation"'s music video release in May 2012. The manga would later split into two alternate timelines, the second following drastically different events from the first.
- Novels Route, published between the years 2012 through 2017, comes after Manga Route and seemingly before the Mekakucity Actors anime in the official "timelines" order.
- Mekakucity Actors Route, the initially airing anime which aired beginning of April 2014 through June 2014, was not included in the official timelines of the "Kagerou Project Perfect Guide" ; however, the anime itself signifies more initially conclusive events. The lack of inclusion in the official timelines, despite its existence at the time, seems to indicate it comes after them as well.
- Kagerou Daze -in a day's- is an MX4D produced an animated short movie in which the Mekakushi Dan join together to once again stop an incident occurring at the mall. This Mekakushi Dan consists of Dan members 1-7 initially, and also containing Ene, Hibiya Amamiya, Konoha, and Hiyori Asahina. This is despite many notable events of the previous "routes". Certain other members related to the Dan do not appear in this "route", while instead "new" characters do; however, the "new" characters' identities were kept somewhat secret, including their names. An initial promotion for the film described it as a "Route-2", though the events contained seem wholly different to the "Route-2" that occurs in "Lost Time Memory"'s music video. The "new" characters were created specifically for this film.
Characters
Mekakushi Dan
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Other characters
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Media
CD / DVDs
The series began as a series of albums that were released alongside the novels. The soundtracks were produced by Jin and released by IA Project. The first album is titled Mekakucity Days and was released on May 30, 2012. It was followed by a single, "Children Record", on August 15, 2012. A second album titled Mekakucity Records was released on May 29, 2013. A third album titled Mekakucity Reload was announced on August 15, 2017 and was released November 7, 2018.Songs
Light novels
The Kagerou Daze light novels are written by Jin with illustrations from Kagerou Project music video maker Sidu. The first volume was released on May 30, 2012 by Enterbrain on their KCG Bunko imprint, and will conclude in the eighth volume on December 29, 2017. Yen Press has been releasing the novels in English in North America since May 26, 2015.There is an anthology series called Mekakushi Dan: Watchers that is made up of short stories from a Pixiv contest.
There is a novel anthology series named Kagerou Daze Novel Anthology made from other Pixiv competitions.
Manga
The Kagerou Daze manga is illustrated by Mahiro Satou. It began serialization in Media Factory's Monthly Comic Gene on June 15, 2012. The first tankōbon volume was released on November 27, 2012; thirteen volumes have been released as of March 27, 2019. Yen Press will release the manga in English in North America, with the first volume released on April 21, 2015.There is also an ongoing anthology series called Kagerou Daze Official Anthology Comic and each volume goes with a certain theme. It is written and illustrated by various people including Kagerou Daze light novel artist and music video creator Sidu, the Kagerou Daze manga artist Mahiro Satou, and Kagerou Project music video creator Wannyanpu.
Anime
A Kagerou Project anime titled Mekakucity Actors, directed by Akiyuki Shinbo and produced by Shaft, began airing on April 12, 2014. The anime adaptation starring Kana Asumi as Ene, Kana Hanazawa as Mary, and Mamoru Miyano as Konoha. This is the first voice-acting of Asumi since its marriage on January 14, 2014. The teaser website of the anime series was launched on January 17, 2014. The anime has been licensed for streaming by Aniplex of America. The opening theme is "Daze" sung by Maria from Garnidelia and the ending theme is "Days" by Lia. For episode six, the opening theme is "Headphone Actor" and the ending theme is "Yūkei Yesterday"; both songs are sung by LiSA. For episode eight, the ending theme is "Lost Time Memory" sung by Kōta Matsuyama from Byee the Round. For episode nine, the opening theme is "Ayano no Kōfuku Riron" sung by Aki Okui. All songs are composed by Jin.A Kagerou Project short anime film titled Kagerou Daze -in a day's- was directed by Sidu and produced by Studio Jumonji. It was produced with MX4D presentation in mind and premiered on November 4, 2016. The opening theme is "Red" by Gouache, a band Jin is a part of.
A Kagerou Project anime titled Mekakucity Reload was announced at the Seek at Mekakucity event on August 15, 2016.