{"id":55227,"date":"2025-12-22T20:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=55227"},"modified":"2025-12-22T17:38:00","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T08:38:00","slug":"author-of-popular-himouto-umaru-chan-reveals-tragic-circumstances-behind-the-manga-warns-that-knowing-about-it-could-change-the-story-for-readers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/author-of-popular-himouto-umaru-chan-reveals-tragic-circumstances-behind-the-manga-warns-that-knowing-about-it-could-change-the-story-for-readers\/","title":{"rendered":"Author\u00a0of popular\u00a0Himouto!\u00a0Umaru-chan\u00a0reveals tragic circumstances behind the manga, warns that knowing about it could\u00a0change\u00a0the story for readers\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Sankakuhead,&nbsp;creator&nbsp;of the popular comedy manga and anime&nbsp;<strong>Himouto! Umaru-chan<\/strong>, recently uploaded&nbsp;a&nbsp;YouTube&nbsp;video detailing events from his personal life that took place during the manga\u2019s publication (between 2013 and 2017).&nbsp;The video comes with several \u201cviewer discretion advised\u201d notices and a warning that says, \u201cWatching this video may completely change your perception of Umaru-chan, so please watch at your own risk.\u201d&nbsp;The following&nbsp;paragraphs&nbsp;will cover the contents of the video,&nbsp;so please keep in mind the author\u2019s warning&nbsp;before reading on.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"\u3010\u95b2\u89a7\u6ce8\u610f\u3011\u4eca\u307e\u3067\u4e00\u5ea6\u3082\u8a71\u3057\u305f\u4e8b\u306e\u7121\u3044\u3046\u307e\u308b\u3061\u3083\u3093\u306e\u9023\u8f09\u4e2d\u306b\u8d77\u304d\u305f\u60b2\u3057\u3044\u8a71\u3010\u59b9\u306e\u8a71\u3011\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/XaHCwyLNQ-Y?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Sankakuhead&nbsp;explains that he originally&nbsp;modelled Umaru-chan&nbsp;after his younger sister&nbsp;\u2013&nbsp;aiming to capture the&nbsp;comical duality&nbsp;of a&nbsp;girl&nbsp;who\u2019s&nbsp;elegant on the outside but turns into a&nbsp;lazy couch potato&nbsp;at home. He describes having a good relationship with his sister, with the two of them&nbsp;often&nbsp;drawing manga together&nbsp;while growing up. When&nbsp;Himouto! Umaru-chan&nbsp;was approved for serialization by&nbsp;Sankakuhead\u2019s&nbsp;publisher,&nbsp;his sister was happy to have served as the inspiration. However, around the time the comic\u2019s 6-7th volume came out, she was diagnosed with a&nbsp;serious&nbsp;disease and hospitalized long-term. By the time the manga was at its 10th&nbsp;volume, the disease had progressed, and&nbsp;Sankakuhead\u2019s&nbsp;sister&nbsp;passed away.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cRather than feeling sad, I just remember thinking&nbsp;\u2018What\u2019s going on?\u2019&nbsp;I&nbsp;couldn\u2019t&nbsp;understand what was happening. Rationally, I knew every person had to die at some point, but I&nbsp;couldn\u2019t&nbsp;help but wonder why it had to be my sister,\u201d&nbsp;he commented.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1594\" height=\"895\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1594px) 100vw, 1594px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/20251222-55227-header-1.jpg\" alt=\"Himouto! Umaru-chan \" class=\"wp-image-55232\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/20251222-55227-header-1.jpg 1594w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/20251222-55227-header-1-380x213.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/20251222-55227-header-1-768x431.jpg 768w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/20251222-55227-header-1-1536x862.jpg 1536w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Since&nbsp;Himouto! Umaru-chan&#8217;s&nbsp;protagonist was modelled after his sister,&nbsp;Sankakuhead&nbsp;became unable to draw the manga for a while. He took breaks to recover&nbsp;emotionally, but&nbsp;felt conflicted about doing so as the timing coincided with the anime adaptation\u2019s first season beginning to air.&nbsp;Ever since her death, the author has been hesitant to talk about it publicly or via his afterwords because he&nbsp;was&nbsp;worried readers&nbsp;wouldn\u2019t&nbsp;be able to enjoy the manga in the same way \u2013 as a&nbsp;light-hearted&nbsp;comedy. However,&nbsp;now that&nbsp;he\u2019s&nbsp;started his personal YouTube channel,&nbsp;he\u2019s&nbsp;decided to be open about everything. Additionally, he wishes that the memory of his&nbsp;sister&nbsp;will&nbsp;live on&nbsp;among&nbsp;his&nbsp;readers through Umaru-chan.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Himouto! Umaru-chan author Sankakuhead talks about the manga&#8217;s sad background story, something he&#8217;s always been conflicted about going public with.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":55231,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[73,17],"class_list":["post-55227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-anime","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Author\u00a0of popular\u00a0Himouto!\u00a0Umaru-chan\u00a0reveals tragic circumstances behind the manga, warns that knowing about it could\u00a0change\u00a0the story for readers\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Himouto! 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Umaru-chan author Sankakuhead talks about the manga's sad background story, something he's always been conflicted about going public with.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/author-of-popular-himouto-umaru-chan-reveals-tragic-circumstances-behind-the-manga-warns-that-knowing-about-it-could-change-the-story-for-readers\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Author\u00a0of popular\u00a0Himouto!\u00a0Umaru-chan\u00a0reveals tragic circumstances behind the manga, warns that knowing about it could\u00a0change\u00a0the story for readers\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST","og_description":"Himouto! 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Currently devoted to growing Automaton West to the size of its Japanese sister-site, while making sure to keep news concise and developer stories deep and stimulating.","url":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/author\/amber-vjestica\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55227"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55233,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55227\/revisions\/55233"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}