THE ULTIMATE INCOMPLETE GUIDE TO SNEAKERS IN MANGAS PART 1
Manga and anime did come a long way - While in its early days in the late 80s and 90s, the western “scene” felt like a secretive underground cult.
Every new release at your local comic shop and every midnight tv airing of an OVA felt like a revolution. Fast forward to today and our favourite pieces of Japanese media have become an integral part of online culture, music [rap in particular] and of course fashion. We saw collabs by everyone from Supreme, to Adidas, Puma, Acronym, Uniqlo, Bape, FPAR, Kappa, Xlarge, Sketchers -- you name it and the list could go on forever. Even high fashion had its fair share of crossovers like the insane Gucci JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure manga and the One Piece editorial. In hindsight the merging of the two was bound to happen. Not only because clothes are just another canvas for pop-cultural expression but because manga and shonen characters are freaking stylish. They have to be. It’s their whole point to immediately grab the reader's attention and to pull them into their narrative, which just adds further to their fashion appeal.
So if manga has always been fashion, the question should really be: How does it work the other way round? How did streetwear shape and influence different mangas?
For this purpose, there is no better indicator than the most iconic and most sought after fashion item that reshaped a whole industry and is crucial for making-or-breaking any outfit. The sneaker. And yes, WE ARE GOING TO TALK ABOUT SLAM DUNK! -- but not in this part, because this will be an ongoing limited series. So don't worry, we're going to get there, promise! Let's take a deep dive into sneakers in mangas.
To be clear, there are countless throwaway illustrations and panels which depict barely recognizable Chuck Taylors or just any nondescript shoe with something barely resembling three white stripes or a swoosh just to get the job done and “clothe” the character. But we want to focus on real existing shoes. This isn’t always as simple as it sounds because most mangaka choose to include made-up designs, either to avoid legal issues or because their own designs are just a better fit for their world building in general. But some manga which are set in a fictional setting use the chapter or cover illustrations to show the characters in out-of-context situations, wearing untypical clothes never seen in the mainline story. A good example is the Japanese cover of Dragon Balltankōbon #37 featuring Trunks, Son Goten, Kaioshin and a cartoonish version of an Air Jordan 5.
Stories that do include real brands are often set in a more or less realistic scenery. By referencing real life items the manga feels more grounded and connected to reality. The comedic love series Hare-Kon for example sporadically features some sneakers, like the Vans Sk8 Hi and the Nike SF Air Force Premium.
But besides making the character look cool, not all sneaker appearances have a story-relevant meaning. There are of course rare exceptions:
Yu-Gi-Oh!
One of these unexpected rare cases is the Air Max 95 in Yu-Gi-Oh!, which Joey Wheeler, also known as Katsuya Jonouchi, is wearing. In-universe it's called the Air Muscle though. The best part is, there is even an origin story about how he acquired them. If you're wondering when a pair of Air Max became a relevant plot device, you’ve probably only followed the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime and trading card games. Unknown to a lot of people the anime skipped most of the original earlier content of the manga and was heavily abridged. It’s important to note that when mangaka Kazuki Takahashi created the series, he didn’t have any clear direction for the plot in mind. The whole duel monsters theme was just one of many little story arcs before gaining an insane following. So almost all of the early chapters introduced a new shadow game, which Yu-Gi and his friends had to engage in. These ranged from tabletop RPGs or Monster Chess to dice gambling games, but always with a dark twist. Kind of like the monster-of-the-week trope used in Tokusatsu serials.
Inspired by real life crime sprees, the manga exclusive chapter #8 deals with the downside of the sneaker craze in mid 90s Japan. Shortly after buying a highly sought-after pair of the Air Max 95-like shoe from a shady back alley vendor, Yu-Gi’s companion Joey/Katsuya gets mugged by a group of goons called the “Muscle Hunters”. Each of them is wearing either the Air Max 95 or 96 version respectively. As it turns out, this is a continuing scheme by the store clerk, who hired the gang to pray on unsuspecting customers, in order to resell the same kicks again and again.
When Yu-Gi confronts the ”Venomous Man” to get the pair back, they both play a shadow game of “coin in sneaker”. The rules are simple: The players take turns grabbing coins from inside a shoe, while trying not to get stung by a Scorpion which is hiding in there as well. Whoever gets the most coins wins. Needless to say, Yu-Gi wins back the shoes and Joey/Katsuya subsequently wears them for the duration of the series including the anime. The chapter is definitely worth a quick read, not only for the accurate drawings, but also because it's a self-contained episode and doesn’t require huge knowledge of the Yu-Gi lore.
In addition, there are multiple other very subtle inclusions of real sneakers throughout the series, which have gone largely unnoticed. Ryo Bakura is wearing a New Balance 1500 and Mokuba Kaiba, little brother of Yu-Gi’s archrival Seto Kaiba, is wearing the Air Max 96, too. And finally Yu-Gi himself wears a pair of the Nike Air Zoom Flight 96 in some of the very first chapters and in the anime.
You can easily recognize them by the distinctive wave line pattern towards the heel and the oval sole design. Since there are only very few panels in which the shoes appear they are very easy to miss and unlike the Air Max they have absolutely no relevance to the story whatsoever.
GTO
Regarding the huge cultural impact the Air Max 95 had in Japan, it should come as no surprise that the sneaker appears in other manga as well. Another infamous example is Tōru Fujisawa’s GTO - Great Teacher Onizuka. The sequel to Shonan Junai Gumi and Bad Company focuses again on the ex-bōsōzoku member Eikichi Onizuka. The series became highly successful, spawning an anime and several live action TV dramas plus a movie in the 90s and 00s. In the very first chapter the completely broke Eikichi forces a random rich kid to trade his old pair of Air Max 95s for a brand new BMW, so he can impress a school girl on their first date.
After they both end up in a love hotel Eikichi is finally about to lose his virginity. To Onizuka’s dismay everything goes awry when her current “boyfriend”, her teacher shows up and begs her to come back to him. Despite being a short, bald headed and overall unattractive middle-aged man his influence over her is so strong that she leaps from a second-story window directly into his arms. Inspired by this display of power over his student, the former delinquent Onizuka decides to become the greatest teacher Japan has ever seen. Oh -- and of course he hopes he can score with some of the attractive mothers of his protégés. The great appeal of this drama /comedy comes without a doubt from Onizuka’s highly questionable motives and teaching methods. These are always escalating into hilarious over-the-top gags before ultimately resulting in heartwarming moments.
Thanks to Fujisawa’s realistic art style he is able to incorporate countless existing brands and products into his stories. Throughout the series and its two sequels GTO: 14 days in Shonan and GTO: Lost Paradise he’s referencing apparel staples from Stüssy, Thrasher, the Casio G-Shock Frogman, a Rolex Yacht Master, Tenga Sex Toys, several cars by Mercedes and Suzuki motorbikes, just to name a few. Also a ton of video games and anime franchises are being mentioned as well, for instance PaRappa the Rapper, Boundary Gate, Final Fantasy, Initial D, Doraemon, Cutie Honey and Devilman.
Unfortunately this attention to detail doesn’t extend all too much to other sneaker models anymore. You might be able to occasionally find some barely recognizable New Balance, Nikes (a halfway decent pair of Air Max 96 in chapter 23) or Adidas silhouettes if you squint really hard. But the only other nice close-ups we get are of the Air Max Triax 96 near the end of the first manga and the Onitsuka Tiger Mexico 66 on Onizuka's face as a meta joke in GTO: Lost Paradise.
While Eikichi Onizuka is the main protagonist of Fujisawa’s most popular works, he created several other lesser-known mangas with limited sneaker appearance, too. Kamen Teacher is a shorter story which takes place in the same universe as GTO. This becomes apparent in a brief crossover in a spinoff called Ino-Head Gargoyle. Towards the end of the solo story an overly aggressive P.E. teacher named Ohtakagi Jodan is introduced. He wears Nike Dunks Low and the Air Jordan 12s during basketball related scenes.
For a moment the shoe appears again in his more violence and action oriented series Rose Hip Zero in addition to a short glimpse at the Air Jordan 8. The sequel Rose Hip Rose depicts an unnamed goon with Nike Dunks in combination with the Supreme x RUN DMC collab hoodie. For fans of the “brand with the three stripes”, Fujisawa included the Adidas Forum and Superstar in the action-horror manga Tokko.
My Hero Academia
Moving on to a current release, let's take a look at the peculiar, yet interesting relationship My Hero Academia and its author Kōhei Horikoshi have with sneakers. First of all there seems to be a widespread misconception that the main character and aspiring superhero Izuku Midoriya a.k.a. Deku is wearing a crimson red pair of Nike Air Force 1 High - which is just flat out wrong. There are slight overlapping visual trades like the perforated toe box, but the overall bulky shape, the ultra chunky sole, the different paneling and most importantly the total absence of the velcro strap and swoosh logo indicate that it’s a completely made-up design.
Despite all this, it is now somehow ingrained in the collective consciousness as Deku’s shoe. To be fair, the AF1 can be a great alternative for cosplayers and fans in comparison to the faithful replicas. In fact there are reports suggesting that sales for this particular colorway have spiked as part of Nike’s ID customization feature in Japan as a direct result of MHA popularity. Even American publisher VIZ supposedly presented a custom pair of AF1s to Horikoshi at San Diego Comic Con in 2018 as a gift.
The similarities are no coincidence though, because as it turns out mangaka Horikoshi is a genuine sneaker enthusiast. Nearly every other fictitious shoe he creates is based on well-established design elements of existing models as well. Just take a quick look at some of MHA’s pages and you’ll be able to find a lot of familiar sneaker design language -- in particular from Nike. As interesting as they may seem, there are no real models in the manga with some minor exceptions. These can be found on two title illustrations, including several Asics and Mizuno shoes (chapter 69) and the Air Jordan 6 (chapter 212). An interesting customized version of the Nike Uptempo can be seen in an introduction illustration of tankōbon 16. The wording “AIR” has been notably replaced with Ochaco Uraraka’s initials “CHA”. The last reference is the Reebok Pump Fury in a character scribble of the minor supporting character Nagamasa Mora in street clothes at the end of chapter 109.
It seems like a missed opportunity that Horikoshi relies on made-up designs in his manga instead of actual ones, because he clearly enjoys drawing his characters in real shoes. Case in point: His amazing twitter account 堀越耕平 (@horikoshiko) which is a goldmine for drawn sneakers. Here he regularly tweets pictures of the quirky MHA cast wearing beloved icons like the Air Force 1 High, Air Huarache, Air Max 90 High Top and again the Air Jordan 6.
There is one specific post that gained widespread praise from manga and NBA fans alike. After the tragic and untimely passing of Kobe Briant in late January of 2020 Horikoshi posted another sketch of Deku. As a tribute to the late basketball legend he switched his signature AF1-inspired boots with a pair of Nike Zoom Kobe 1s. As of now the series is far from being finished, so it is yet to be seen if Horikoshi is changing his stance on including more real models or if he relies on his own designs.
BAKUMAN
If you want to see a main character in real Air Force 1s you have to read Bakuman instead. This very meta story revolves around the creative team of author Akito Takagi and artist Moritaka Mashiro. Moritaka is wearing the shoe throughout all 20 tankōbons, so we get some nice views from multiple angles across the series, especially the detailed sole.
The blend of fiction with real real-life business practices is a compelling behind-the-scenes look at the Japanese comic industry, showing the intricate process of creating a manga from its inception to its serialization in the notorious Weekly Shonen Jump magazine. If the art style seems familiar to you, you might have recognized it from Death Note, which was the previous project of the prolific duo Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.
One Punch Man
As we were speaking of superheros -- Yusuke Murata’s redrawn version of the online comic One Punch Man also takes cues from established brands. A-class hero Lightning Max is wearing the Nike Dunk Low with an integrated jet propulsion system to increase his roundhouse kicking abilities. If you want to get technical the shoes get introduced in chapter 24, but we do not get a very good look at them until much later. It takes some time for Murata before he starts to show this and other models more prominently and in greater detail. Most notably in chapter 73 towards the end of the tournament arc -- which is basically mandatory for every good shonen story. As a side note, a stylized lightning symbol was added to the heel and the sole, which makes it almost look like Hiroshi Fujiwara’s Fragment Design logo.
From then on more and more shoes find their way into the panels of One Punch Man eventually, a pair of nondescript New Balance are worn by wannabe hero King and the B-class ranked hero Glasses has the Adidas Superstars. Murata seemed to like the Dunks so much that he decided to redraw them later on in chapter 85 again.
This time fan favourite cyborg Genos gets the shoes as part of a complete cybernetic overhaul after he was almost destroyed in a previous fight. Sadly the Dunks disintegrate almost immediately in a powerful kicking-attack in his very next fight and don’t make a comeback in his next outfit.
GOLDEN BOY
The next entry became an instant anime cult classic in the late 90s and early 00s, thanks to its unique fusion of comedy and erotica -- Golden Boy. The series focuses on the exploits of Kintaro Oe, a free-spirited Tokyo University drop-out law student. He’s roaming Japan on his trusty bicycle jumping from job to job taking in the lessons of the school-of-life, observing and studying the people and events around him. During his adventures Kintaro meets outstanding women whose lives he changes, despite very poor first impressions. Creator Tatsuya Egawa seems to be a real Reebok-Guy, because he repeatedly inserts the brand into his mangas. In Golden Boy he decided to give main character Kintaro a pair of the amazing, yet completely underrated Pump SXT II from 1991.
Due to its now obscure status, fans often confuse it with the more popular Reebok Pump Omni Light, Reebok Twilight Zone or sometimes even with Air Jordans. But the SXT II is way more articulated with its perforated leather panels, detailed sole element and distinctive 90s white / teal / yellow colorway. Egawa really takes a liking to the shoe, drawing it meticulously from every view imaginable. To the confusion of many fans, the short 6-part OVA is based on a much longer manga spanning ten tankōbons. The anime only features chapters from the very first volume with an original story at the end of the series, to tie everything together to a halfway decent conclusion.
This works perfectly for the animated version because it maintains Kintaro’s innocence in his sexualy charged encounters, but the manga goes full hentai very quickly later on, utilizing extremely graphic content including but not limited to all kinds of kinks and fetishes like: crossdressing, domination, BDSM, orgies or the consumption of certain yellow bodily fluids (that's not why the manga is called Golden Boy though). Surprisingly all the ecchie stuff is contrasted with rather deep philosophical and ethical questions about love, hate, social norms, the fabrics of a modern society, humanity and ultimately the question “what is free will?”.
Other smaller brandings on various pieces of clothing can be spotted by paying close attention, covering logos from Nike, Jack Wolfskin or Champion. The 89th chapter illustration also features a Reebok Pump Fury in the background.
Masakazu Kazura
Finally, let’s focus on an absolute legend in his own right with a rich catalogue spanning over four decades -- Masakazu Kazura. He drew tons of shoes but unfortunately his efforts have gone largely unnoticed by the sneaker community. Instead he is mostly known for two other things: his obsession with Batman and drawing incredibly cute girls. In fact he is so crazy about the Dark Night, that he is in a rivalry with fellow mangaka Kia Asamiya (Silent Möbius, Steam Detectives) over who the biggest Batman otaku is. It is also safe to say that if Urushihara Satoshi (Plastic Little) is the “Master of Breasts”, Kazura is the “Master of Butts and Thigh Gaps”, because he always finds a way to portrait his female characters in poses that highlight this particular area of their bodies in great detail. Another typical element of Kazura is his highly distinctive flat art style which is a mix of neo-folklore, with a hint of Art Nouveau and futurism.
His probably most beloved heroine is Ai Amano, namesake for Video Girl AI. As the title already implies, Ai is everything but a regular girl. Instead she literally is the video made flesh -- a girl who became alive from a VHS tape in order to cheer up heartbroken young men. This romantic comedy marks one of Kazuras earliest, yet modest attempts to include sports brands. During a fight scene with another supernatural female entity, which is also heavily influenced by Batman, Ai wears a pair of Saucony trainers.
More bolder designs were implemented in his follow-up series DNA². This time travel related story is about Karin Aoi, a female agent who tries to stop human overpopulation in the future by eliminating the so-called mega playboy -- a person with perfect DNA, who, let’s just say, is so irresistible to women that he procreated way too much and is the cause of the impending crisis.
Of course in typical rom-com fashion a lot of misunderstandings, twists, romantic tensions and chaos ensues. Main protagonist Junta who is about to become the mega playboy wears the Air Jordan 6 Black Infrared across all five tankobons. In contrast, supporting character and one of Juntas' many love interests, Ami Kurimoto, wears the Air Jordan 3 White cement. Time traveler Karin also wears a futuristic design with a clear Nike branding on the heel.
In his next love story I"s, Kazura takes a down-to-earth approach and leaves out all previous fantasy and sci-fi elements. Instead I"s deals with the romantically troubled teenager Ichitaka Seto and his supporting cast of friends in a realistic slice-of-life setting: Ichitaka is in love with his classmate Iori Yoshizuki, but too shy to tell her.
Things get more complicated as more and more other attractive girls enter the scene. While the plot is straightforward and simple it's the delivery and humor that made the series so successful while featuring a lot of Nike models. Ichitaka wears the original Air Max Plus and other characters' wardrobe rotations include the Air Max 97, Dunk High and Air Jordan 11.
If you are unfamiliar with the titles above you still might have heard of Kazuras latest project Zetman, which breaks with a lot of his established traditions. Instead of the mostly innocent heart throbbing teenage love quarrels you get a manga that is extremely dark. Zetman is hyper violent, nihilistic and includes very disturbing sexually graphic content. The sneaker references seem to have disappeared as well, but luckily for us we got to see his talents put to good use in other ways, because Kazura is one of the rare cases where sneakers and manga crossed over into other projects.
Someone at Onitsuka Tiger must’ve been a great fan of his work, because in 2019 Kazura was hired to create an illustration for the promotional campaign of the Street Fighter Chun Li Collab (other artists contributed as well but Kazura did the key artwork). By purchasing this version of the Mexico 66 SD buyers could also unlock a virtual pair for Chun Li in the Street Fighter V game.
To better understand why Kazura was probably chosen for this task we have to take a look outside of the realm of manga and focus on his character designs for the anime Tiger & Bunny. Believe it or not, but this series from 2011 is so immensely beloved in Japan, that it even beat classics like Doraemon, Gundam, One Piece, Naruto and Dragon Ball in NHK’s publicly voted “Most Popular Anime of All Time'' list. The main series of this humorous balls-to-the-wall take on the superhero genre claimed the number one spot on this list from 2017, while two other T&B installments made it into the top 10 as well. The ingenious concept that turns established tropes on its head: all the futuristic superheroes take part in a reality TV show and are sponsored by real life brands like Pepsi, Bandai, Amazon.com.jp, Domino's Pizza, Soft Bank and many more.
The civilian outfit of the cutely designed character Pao-Lin Huang a.k.a. Dragon Kit is a clear homage to Bruce Lee’s iconic yellow costume from Game of Death, including the Mexico 66s. Although Onitsuka Tiger is not an official sponsor in the anime, they still managed to get free advertisement thanks to Kazura’s design choice. In addition another character, the quiet-talker professor Saito, is wearing Nike Blazers Low with a slightly distorted swoosh. Coincidentally this iteration isn’t so far away from Nike’s current playfully motivated usage of its brand identity. To close things off and for the sake of completion it is also worth mentioning that Kazura created the original character designs for the multimedia franchise The Girl in the Twilight [Akane Sasu Shoujo] in which protagonist Asuka is wearing a pair of shoes which are evidently meant to be a pair of Reebok Pump Furys / Insta Pump Furys. There are some slight differences, but the similarities make the inspiration abundantly clear through to the sleek shape, the pump button on top and the small gap in the sole.
Stick around for part two, in which we’ll delve further into different genres and mangas!
About the author:
Julian Meinert is a hyperactive introvert who hates design by day but
works for your favorite brands at night. On his time off he either screams into microphones with his weird band, or is scheming awesome projects with the local Crunch Corp. crew.
Fun Fact: Wears Gore Tex all the time, although he knows it won't keep him dry from tears.
