Overview
Sorachi Hideaki was born in Hokkaido. His name is believed to be originated from his hometown, a sub-prefecture named Sorachi. His height is 162CM, and his blood type is AB. Currently he is associated with Shuueisha's Shounen Jump department.
Career
He began his mangaka career after debuting his very first work, Dandelion, in the 42th issue of Shounen Jump, 2002. Later, he worked on an one shot manga, "Shirokuro" and the manga was published in 2003's Shounen Jump Magazine.
Sorachi is considered by many to be a late-bloomer : Winning awards at his late 10s, moved to Tokyo to become assistant for a few famous authors, which later on finally debut his own work at his early 20s - which is a rare case in Japan, where mangaka started themselves as early as their late 10s. However, he is considered to be a rare case where 2 of his early works gained serialization right from the start. Such mangaka that gained a considerable reputation is considered to be uncommon in the industry.
During 2004, he started his serialization on Gintama. At first his editors thought that his works could not survive in the JUMP world due to the "Survival of the fittest" environment of it. He was commented by many to have a weak start, odd concept and title, as well as possessing an art style that is not considered by many as a professional. Due to that, his work was situated at the below average ranking for 10 weeks (which almost got called for cancellation). However, his popularity soon rise gradually from the 11th week onwards, and the first Gintama tankobon, which is released on the same day as Death Note was surprisingly hard to obtain due to only 30,000 copies printed at that period. 2 years after the serialization, it became one of the top ranking serialization in the magazine, which prompted an anime release, and eventually the movie release of the show. Gintama is currently considered to be one of the most famous manga in Japan right now, after the Big Three.
Aside from Gintama, he also created a few one shot works for JUMP's sister magazine Jump SQ, one of them is 13, which ran it's serialization in year 2008, third issue.
Trivia.
- Sorachi is known to look similar to Tetsuya Takeda.
- Sorachi's self potrait is a Gorila.
- Sorachi is also known to be a smoker.
- Sorachi has a female Papillon dog name "Chappi"
- Sorachi's favourite historical figure is Sakamoto Ryouma.
- Sorachi has an elder sister, who she appears often as a commenter in his tankobon works.
- Sorachi once stated that the reason of becoming a mangaka is due of the final scene of Laputa: Castle in the Sky. Similarly, his favorite Ghibli movie is Kiki's Delivery Service
- His favorite manga is Dragon Ball and Slam Dunk. However, his very main inspiration seems to be manzai, which explains the use of tsukkomi and boke in his works.
- Sorachi is also nicknamed "Sorachintama", but the nickname is rarely used.
- Sorachi and Sugita Tomokazu, the seiyuu of Gintoki Sakata once had a few conversations before. However they don't talk about Gintama, nor the anime itself.
Works
Dandelion - Debut work, 2002
Bankara - One shot, 2010
Gintama - Serialization, 2003
13 - One shot
Shirokuro - One shot
Samuraider - Discontinued at sketch phase
Sorachi has a cameo appearance in the manga, "Gintama", several times as a monkey/ape.