Nichijou (日常 Nichijō?, lit. Regular Life) is a Japanese
comedy manga by Keiichi Arawi (あらゐけいいち Arawi Keiichi?). The manga began serialization
in the December 2006 issue of Kadokawa Shoten's manga magazine Shōnen Ace, and
was also serialized in Comptiq between the March 2007 and July 2008 issues. An
anime adaptation by Kyoto Animation aired in Japan between April and September
2011. A PlayStation Portable game by Vridge and Kadokawa Games was released in
July 2011. The manga and anime series were initially licensed in North America
by Bandai Entertainment but both releases have been cancelled. The anime series
has since been licensed by Madman Entertainment.
The series follows the lives of a group of high school
students and their school. Various oddities and absurdities abound, such as a
robotic girl made by a scientist who is an eight-year-old girl, a boy who rides
a goat to school with his butler, a girl who can procure various guns out of
thin air, a cat that can speak and a principal who has wrestled a deer. Despite
its bizarre settings and characters, the students still lead normal lives.
Yūko Aioi (相生 祐子 Aioi Yūko?)
Yūko is an energetic high school girl with short brown
hair. One of her negative sides is that she is often too lazy to do her own
homework and always copies from either Mio or Mai. She knows that Nano is a
robot, but never tells anybody about it. While generally easygoing, her mood
will instantly change if insulted. Her nickname is Yukko (ゆっこ?).
Mio Naganohara (長野原 みお Naganohara Mio?)
Mio is bright and cheerful girl sporting light blue hair
and pigtails held by two small wooden cubes. She has a crush on Kōjirō
Sasahara. At first glance she might seem more normal in contrast to her friends
Yūko and Mai, but in truth she has a very short temper, and she is often prone
to tantrums. She often has to humor Yūko to make her happy. She is also a
talented manga artist who will occasionally draw dubious pictures of Kōjirō in
her notebooks, particularly yaoi.
Mai Minakami (水上 麻衣 Minakami Mai?)
Voiced by: Misuzu Togashi
Mai is a rather quiet girl who is very intelligent. She
is seen to be multi-talented, excelling at using projectiles, fishing, wood
carving and arm wrestling. In contrast to her looks she has a rather eccentric
sense of humor, often frustrating her friends with her pranks. She has two pet
dogs who also share their master's sense of humor.
Nano Shinonome (東雲 なの Shinonome Nano?)
Voiced by: Shizuka Furuya
Nano is an android schoolgirl that was built by the
Professor. She often worries about keeping her identity as a robot from other
people, despite the fact everyone already knows about it due to the noticeable
wind-up key exposed on her back. Her limbs will sometimes fall apart, revealing
dubious items that the Professor has installed without her noticing, ranging
from beam firing weapons to Swiss rolls. She is the Professor's caretaker and
also takes care of all the house chores.
The Professor is an eight-year-old genius scientist who
created Nano, often making various adjustments to her without her noticing but
refusing to remove the obvious wind-up key from her back on the grounds that it
is cute. Despite her intellect, she still acts like any child of her age. Her
favorite animal is the shark. She does not go to school—apparently because she
has already graduated—and instead spends her days playing around in the house.
Her name is never mentioned, but her family name is apparently Shinonome.
Voiced by: Minoru Shiraishi
Sakamoto is a black cat. He wears a red scarf created by
the Professor, which allows him to speak. As in cat years, he is 20 years
old—older than both Nano and the Professor—and speaks in a condescending tone
towards them and tries to act like the adult of the house, though to his shame
he occasionally succumbs to his cat-like habits. A running-gag is his tendency
to endure comically horrific physical-abuse at the hands of the Professor,
usually in the form of a childish booby-trap. His original name was Taisho and
was once Ms. Nakamura's pet cat.
Izumi Sakurai (桜井 泉 Sakurai Izumi?)
Izumi Sakurai is a young, constantly flustered and easily
frightened teacher. She tries to enforce the school rules, but is typically
unable to accomplish much. She is the older sister of Makoto Sakurai.
Manabu Takasaki (高崎 学 Takasaki Manabu?)
Manabu Takasaki is a male teacher who has romantic
feelings for Izumi, but is unable to tell her as he thinks too much and is shy
to admit it.
Principal Shinonome (校長先生 (東雲) Kōchō-sensei
(Shinonome)?)
Principal Shinonome is the bald principal at the school,
where part of the story is set. While known for his old jokes and puns, unknown
to most, he is a talented wrestler.
Vice Principal Kōsuke Ōra (教頭先生 (邑楽 耕介) Kyōtō-sensei (Ōra
Kōsuke)?)
Known for wearing glasses and a yellow tie, he hates the
Principal and doesn't hide the mean things he does to him.
Voiced by: Kaoru Mizuhara
Ms. Nakamura is a science teacher who is fixated on
Nano's robotic nature. She constantly schemes to capture Nano for study, but
her machinations invariably backfire.
Kōjirō Sasahara (笹原 幸治郎 Sasahara Kōjirō?)
Voiced by: Yoshihisa Kawahara
A rich flamboyant high school boy who acts like an
aristocrat when in reality his family are just farmers. He likes to ride his
goat Kojirō Sasahara (笹原 コジロウ Sasahara Kojirō?) to school
and is often seen with his butler.
Misato Tachibana (立花 みさと Tachibana Misato?)
Voiced by: Chika Horikawa
A peach haired high school girl who generally acts as a
tsukkomi towards Kōjirō whenever he does anything to annoy her. Misato,
however, does this by shooting him with various guns and heavy weaponry that
come out of nowhere, which he miraculously survives despite being injured. In
reality Misato has feelings for Kōjirō, but due to her tsundere attitude, she
constantly denies her feelings or shoots Kōjirō if he annoys her.
Tsuyoshi Nakanojō (中之条 剛 Nakanojō Tsuyoshi?)
Voiced by: Kazutomi Yamamoto
A student with a natural mohawk which he detests.
Tsuyoshi wants to be scientist in the future and thus doesn't believe in the
supernatural.
Haruna Annaka (安中 榛名 Annaka Haruna?)
Voiced by: Kaori Sadonaka
A girl with a large ribbon on her head. She unfortunately
sometimes runs into crazy individuals much to her confusion. She likes to read
manga.
Kenzaburō Daiku (大工 健三郎 Daiku Kenzaburō?)
Voiced by: Ryōta Yoshizaki
A brown-haired boy who is the president of the go-soccer
club. His rich father is the president of Daiku Industries.
Yuria Sekiguchi (関口 ユリア Sekiguchi Yuria?)
A quiet girl who is a member of the go-soccer club. She
has a crush on Daiku Kenzaburō, the president of the club.
Makoto Sakurai (桜井 誠 Sakurai Makoto?)
Voiced by: Takahiro Hikami
Makoto is Izumi's younger brother, who joins the
go-soccer club.
Voiced by: Kōta Yamaguchi
A boy with a large black afro. He is friends with
Tsuyoshi Nakanojō.
Weboshī is Misato's green-haired classmate, who has a
ponytail. Her real name is unknown.
Fet-chan is Misato's classmate. Ends her
sentences with "fe". Her real name is unknown.
Mihoshi Tachibana (立花 みほし Tachibana Mihoshi?)
Mihoshi is Misato's younger sister and a kendo student.
Yoshino Naganohara (長野原 よしの Naganohara Yoshino?)
Voiced by: Motoko Kobayashi
Yoshino is Mio's easy going older sister who
goes to college. She likes to wear costumes and often plays pranks on others.
She is also Misato and Mihoshi's senior in kendo, a sport she is naturally
talented at.
Nichijou began as a manga series written and illustrated
by Keiichi Arawi. Originally, the manga was meant to be a short, stand-alone
series which was serialized in Kadokawa Shoten's Shōnen Ace magazine between
the May and October 2006 issues. Starting with the December 2006 issue, the
manga began regular serialization in Shōnen Ace, and was also serialized in
Kadokawa's Comptiq magazine between the March 2007 and July 2008 issues. The
first tankōbon volume was released in Japan on July 26, 2007; as of October
2011, seven volumes have been published. The manga uses a combination of normal
comic format and four-panel comic strips. Bandai Entertainment licensed the
manga, but later cancelled its release.The manga is published in Finland by
Punainen Jättiläinen under the name Arki, which is Finnish for weekday.
See also: List of Nichijou episodes
A 26-episode anime television series produced by Kyoto
Animation and directed by Tatsuya Ishihara aired in Japan on TV Aichi from
April 3 to September 25, 2011 and was also simulcast by Crunchyroll under the
name My Ordinary Life.Prior to the airing of the anime series, an original
video animation episode, titled "Nichijou Episode 0", shipped with
the sixth manga volume on March 12, 2011.The series also incorporates skits
from Arawi's other manga, Helvetica Standard (ヘルベチカスタンダード Herubechika Sutandādo?),
which is published in Kadokawa Shoten's Gekkan NewType magazine. Bandai
Entertainment had licensed the anime,but its release was later cancelled.
However, Madman Entertainment still plans to release the series in Australia
and New Zealand in subtitles only. The series was re-edited into twelve
episodes for broadcast on NHK Educational TV in January 2012.
"Hyadain no Kakakata Kataomoi - C" (ヒャダインのカカカタ☆カタオモイ-C
Hyadain's U-u-u-u☆unrequited Love - C?) by Hyadain (episodes
1–6, 8–13)
"Hyadain no Jōjō Yūjō" (ヒャダインのじょーじょーゆーじょー
Hyadain's Amazing Friendship?) by Hyadain (episodes 14–16, 18-23, 25)
"Headlight, Taillight" (ヘッドライト・テールライト
Heddoraito Tēruraito?) by Miyuki Nakajima (episode 19)
A PlayStation Portable video game titled Nichijou:
Uchuujin (日常（宇宙人）
lit. Regular Life: Alien?) developed by Vridge and published by Kadokawa Shoten
was released on July 28, 2011.
The Nichijou anime has reportedly had low BD and DVD
sales, and did not come close to meeting the break even line according to
animation director Shunji Suzuki.The first DVD volume sold 924 copies in its
first week of sales,while the second and fourth BD volumes sold over 2,000
copies each in their first week.
