Draw This, Then Die! (これ描いて死ね)

Building bookshelves is a real pain in the butt.

Keep at it.

Wh-What manga do the two of you like?

I love hot-blooded manga.

Fujita Kazuhiro for life!

I'll read anything.

But I like Teshima-sensei's manga best.

Who do you like?

I-I don't really read that much manga...

but Morohoshi Daijiro-sensei.

Eek

Eek!

That's a deep cut!

That's a deep cut!

His stuff is great

His stuff is great.

Episode 4 Utopia Making Manga's Better with Others

There.

We did it!

Good job.

Some chilled taiyaki from Voneten to celebrate.

Bless you.

It's looking a lot tidier in here.

Oh, Teshima-sensei.

If you're going to draw manga here, it'd help to have chairs and a table.

Next time, I'll bring what I have from home.

That'd be great.

So tiny. Boy, it's cramped in here.

Sorry about that.

Nana-chan. You're not part of the club, so get out.

Boo.

Will you be going digital or analog for the art?

Hup.

A digital setup will run you 100,000 yen. Analog, about 1,000—

Analog, please!

I don't mind lending you equipment from my house.

But what about you?

I'm not going to draw again—

Analog it is!

We can go digital once we've saved up for it.

As I mentioned the other day, on purely a hobbyist level,

I'd like to hear what all of your goals are.

Drawing interesting manga that I'm satisfied with, I guess?

I'm happy as long as I can draw Yasumi-san's manga.

Renovated Closet: Akafuku's Nest

Hogging all the Fujita Kazuhiro manga

Freezer-safe water bottle from home

A/C switch within arm's reach

Cushion made from a trash bag packed with scrap paper

Handmade mini-desk

Loafing around in here and reading tons of manga.

Hey, Akafuku!

Sounds fine to me if that's your hobby goals.

Yay!

She's fine with it?

Creativity cannot come from being told what to make.

Let your artistic freedom shine when you draw.

Goodbye.

What?

D-Don't you have any advice for us?

Yasumi-san, the manga you showed me lacked cohesion.

Practice writing proper conclusions by limiting yourself to four to eight pages.

Makes sense.

Akafuku-san, please read all of her manga and share your thoughts on them.

Yo-kai Gotcha!

I'll check in on you daily. I'll answer your questions then.

Please do your best in a hobbyist capacity.

Goodbye.

I feel a manga training montage coming on.

Now I'm getting excited!

Let's work hard!

Sure!

Demolish Sou-Bou-Tei is so good!

That also means you, Akafuku.

I drew a short manga starring Nyanta, but it didn't come together very well.

No, it's wonderful. Let me try drawing it.

Oh, you finished it?

Fujimon's drawings are good, but it just cuts off all of a sudden.

Did you forget the ending?

Compared to Fujimon's drawings...

It's about what I'd expect from newcomers.

Fujimori-san, your art is fantastic.

Try drawing on this manuscript paper going forward.

What kind of pen are you using?

You can achieve even cleaner lines with a mapping nib...

It's hard to wrap up ambitious stories, so I tried scaling things down.

This one's just about Nyanta enjoying a meal.

It's cute! Let me try drawing it.

Fujimon, your penwork is great.

Where's the plot, though? It's just him eating.

Try using a fineliner pen for panel borders.

Make the horizontal gutters thicker than the vertical ones.

Say something about the writing.

Oh, what lovely cross-hatching.

I'll wow 'em this time. Something simple with impact and an interesting twist.

This art by Fujimori-san is great.

Compared to Fujimon's drawings...

The writing...

Yasumi-san, your stories...

Y-Yes?

They often fall into formulaic patterns, so spend more time plotting things out.

Next time, I'd like to take a look before Fujimori-san redraws it.

Yasumi-san.

You climb the hill to school every day, don't you?

Would you mind if I joined you tomorrow?

Maybe some other time.

What's wrong? Throwing in the towel?

What makes a manga interesting?

Your voice is a mess.

Pokota, isn't it your job to cheer me up?

That's asking a lot, considering I'm all in your head.

When you're down in the dumps, I feel just as listless.

But I can tell what it is you want deep down.

Ask for help.

Ask who?

Your friend. Didn't you find yourself a partner?

I came to life because you didn't have any friends,

but I may not be long for this world.

Pokota!

Not that I'd disappear so suddenly.

Be honest with yourself.

Yasumi-san.

Wanna climb the hill together?

C-Could you slow down a little?

M-My bad!

I'm sorry, Fujimori-san.

I know you've put in more work than me to earn everyone's compliments.

I'm sorry I let it get to me.

P-P-Please don't apologize.

I'm...

I'm your biggest fan.

Fujimori-san!

To learn more about short-form manga,

I've been reading a lot of manga posted on social media.

While I was busy moping, Fujimori-san's been...

That's what sets us apart.

Find anything good?

Stone Dragon-san's work is my favorite.

"Stone Dragon"? Why's that name sound so familiar?

Are you stupid?

I met her at Comitia.

Oh, wow. She's really popular right now on social media.

She has over 50,000 followers.

Her manga always ends with a splash page, which I think is neat.

So precious.

I tried imitating her by drawing a splash page in the style of your manga.

Ooh, let me see!

S-Something like this.

Wonderful!

It'd be so hype if I could end my manga on a drawing like this.

I always run out of pages for the back half.

Oh! I've got it!

I finished drawing it.

It's well put-together.

How's this, Akafuku?

Cohesive to the point of being boring.

Why, you little...

How's this?

Predictable.

How's this?

Can't stand all these twists.

How's this?

I think it's well-structured.

Yippee!

How did you come up with this narrative?

Well, first, Fujimori-san came up with an eye-catching drawing,

and I worked backwards to come up with a plot that'd lead to her wonderful panel.

Then, Akafuku nitpicked it, so I rewrote it to fix all the problems.

But Akafuku had more nitpicks, so we kept going back and forth...

m 0 0 l 100 0 100 100 0 100

Deductive Method

What should happen after this?

Your stories lacked cohesion

because you had no ending and made up stuff on the fly.

In Tezuka Osamu-sensei's book on how to draw manga,

he refers to this way of writing as the "deductive" method.

Inductive Method

What needs to come before this conclusion?

The End

The method you all stumbled on is the opposite: the "inductive" method.

That's where you come up with an ending and work backwards.

Doing this results in a cohesive narrative.

Good job figuring it out.

Makes sense. You should've told us about that from the start.

Learning the theory without practice won't do you any good.

We should now be good to go with this.

We figured out the secret to drawing manga!

Awesome!

You really think it's that easy?

Take manga more seriously!

I can't say that to them. They're doing this as a hobby.

It's a step forward. Keep up the good work.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay! I'll keep putting your manga on blast.

You're so mean, Akafuku.

G-Go easy on us.

You got it.

No, Akafuku-san's fine the way she is.

Readers are arrogant creatures.

Yasumi-san's unfettered imagination.