is a comedy ninja

Ninja

A or was a covert agent or mercenary of feudal Japan specializing in unorthodox arts of war. The functions of the ninja included espionage, sabotage, infiltration, and assassination, as well as open combat in certain situations...

 manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

 series created by Sōbē Amako in 1986. The anime adaptation, Nintama Rantarō

Nintama Rantaro

is a Japanese anime series based on Sōbē Amako's manga Rakudai Ninja Rantarō. It was produced by Ajia-do Animation Works and originally broadcast on NHK. It is aimed at young children, featuring the adventures of Rantarō and his friends and teachers at Ninja school. The fact that glasses are worn...

, began broadcasting on NHK

NHK

NHK is Japan's national public broadcasting organization. NHK, which has always identified itself to its audiences by the English pronunciation of its initials, is a publicly owned corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee....

 in 1993 and a side-story anime film Eiga Nintama Rantarō premiered in 1996' several Nintama Rantarō video games were also published since 1995.

Plot

The series is set near the end of the Muromachi period

Muromachi period

The is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate, which was officially established in 1338 by the first Muromachi shogun, Ashikaga Takauji, two years after the brief Kemmu restoration of imperial...

. It is during the Sengoku period

Sengoku period

The or Warring States period in Japanese history was a time of social upheaval, political intrigue, and nearly constant military conflict that lasted roughly from the middle of the 15th century to the beginning of the 17th century. The name "Sengoku" was adopted by Japanese historians in reference...

 that the story takes place. By his father's recommendation, Rantarō enters the Ninjutsu Gakuen in order to study and become an elite ninja. However, since joining and befriending Kirimaru and Shinbee, everything for him usually results in failure.

Ninjutsu Gakuen is an educational institution established in the mountains of the Kansai region. Because it is a ninja school, the exact location is kept a secret (which is really because the author had not thought of one). Students attend in grades 1 through 6, which are divided up into three classes: I-gumi, Ro-gumi, and Ha-gumi, based on the old order of kana

Kana

Kana are the syllabic Japanese scripts, as opposed to the logographic Chinese characters known in Japan as kanji and the Roman alphabet known as rōmaji...

. Male and female students attend separate classes.

Despite its detail in historical accuracies, there are also a considerable amount of anachronism

Anachronism

An anachronism—from the Greek ανά and χρόνος — is an inconsistency in some chronological arrangement, especially a chronological misplacing of persons, events, objects, or customs in regard to each other...

s, such as speech using katakana

Katakana

is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji, and in some cases the Latin alphabet . The word katakana means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana scripts are derived from components of more complex kanji. Each kana represents one mora...

 or the appearance of a vending machine

Vending machine

A vending machine is a machine which dispenses items such as snacks, beverages, alcohol, cigarettes, lottery tickets, consumer products and even gold and gems to customers automatically, after the customer inserts currency or credit into the machine....

 or a wristwatch. There are also many instances of breaking the fourth wall

Fourth wall

The fourth wall is the imaginary "wall" at the front of the stage in a traditional three-walled box set in a proscenium theatre, through which the audience sees the action in the world of the play...

, in which a character will turn back or tear though a page to interrupt a scene or refer to specific volumes or pages, or sometimes interact with the author herself.

Characters

Many of the characters' names have been taken from names of places in the Kansai region, especially Amagasaki of the Hyogo prefecture

Amagasaki, Hyogo

is an industrial city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. The city was founded on April 1, 1916. Its population is around 460,000, below its peak of over 554,000 in 1971.-History:...

, where the author lives, as well as the names of real people.

The main characters are:

Age: 10, lives in Settsu province

Settsu Province

was a province of Japan, which today comprises the eastern part of Hyōgo Prefecture and the northern part of Osaka Prefecture. It was also referred to as or .Osaka and Osaka Castle were the main center of the province.-History:...

, Health Committee

An obedient and energetic boy with reddish hair and glasses. Despite being born into a line of poor, second-class ninjas, he is determined and constantly strives to be top of his class, though the opposite always tends to be the case. Although he has an awful astigmatism

Astigmatism

An optical system with astigmatism is one where rays that propagate in two perpendicular planes have different foci. If an optical system with astigmatism is used to form an image of a cross, the vertical and horizontal lines will be in sharp focus at two different distances...

 and must wear glasses, he is an exceptionally swift runner, having been able to run 100 meters in 10 seconds. Being a member of the health committee, he is often called "Fuun Kozou" (lit. bad luck boy) since this committee in partucular is deemed unlucky and any student in it, as a rule, is said to suffer constant mishaps.

Age 10, lives in Settsu province

Settsu Province

was a province of Japan, which today comprises the eastern part of Hyōgo Prefecture and the northern part of Osaka Prefecture. It was also referred to as or .Osaka and Osaka Castle were the main center of the province.-History:...

, Books Committee

One of Rantarou's friends. A boy obsessed with money, he will try to gain any amount, no matter how small. This often results in his amassing as many part-time jobs as he possibly can, which are sometimes more than he can handle and has to have Doi-sensei help him, with less than favorable results. He's also very thrifty because of this. Dislikes words such as "give" and "pay". One of the reasons for this is that he is an orphan, having lost his parents after his village burned down, leaving him with no other living relatives. He managed to pay his entrance fees with money earned selling bento

Bento

is a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal common in Japanese cuisine. A traditional bento consists of rice, fish or meat, and one or more pickled or cooked vegetables, usually in a box-shaped container. Containers range from disposable mass produced to hand crafted lacquerware...

 boxes. He lives with Doi-sensei during breaks.

Age 10, lives in Sakai

Sakai, Osaka

is a city in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. It has been one of the largest and most important seaports of Japan since the Medieval era.Following the February 2005 annexation of the town of Mihara, from Minamikawachi District, the city has grown further and is now the fourteenth most populous city in...

, Tools Committee

Another one of Rantarou's friends. He is a short, pudgy boy with a constantly runny nose who loves to eat. In fact, his weight seems to increase after every break. In the beginning, he started out as a crybaby, but gradually grew accustomed to the lifestyle. He is not good at schoolwork. The reason he was made to attend Ninjutsu Gakuen was to help with his success as an heir, being the son of a rich merchant. However, he does have advantageous qualities. In addition to being unusually strong, his sense of smell is greater than that of any dog. Under certain circumstances, his hair stands up straight and is stiff and sharp enough to be used as a lethal weapon.

Publication history

Rakudai Ninja Rantaro is being serialized in the children's magazine Asahi Shogakusei Shinbun in April through June and October through December.

Tankōbon

Tankobon

, with a literal meaning close to "independently appearing book", is the Japanese term for a book that is complete in itself and is not part of a series , though the manga industry uses it for volumes which may be in a series...

volumes 1 through 14 were published monthly beginning in 1993. Volumes 15 and onward have been published twice a year.