Blind soccer players and an illustration by Yoichi Takahashi (Provided by the Tokyo metropolitan government)
Paralympic heroes of the past and potentially the future meet popular manga artists’ creations in a new action-packed video produced by the Tokyo metropolitan government.
The video is intended to spread the appeal of sports for people with disabilities ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics. It will be screened at events in Japan and the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
Titled “Be The Hero” and about 2 minutes and 20 seconds long, the video features physically challenged athletes representing Japan in five sports.
An illustration for blind soccer, which visually impaired people play using their hearing, was drawn by Yoichi Takahashi, author of the famous soccer manga “Captain Tsubasa.”
Blind soccer players powerfully dribble down the pitch in the video, then the illustration portraying the same scene is shown behind the athletes.
Wheelchair tennis player Shingo Kunieda, who whacks a ball with a racket in the video, appears with an illustration of a female player drawn by Naoki Urasawa, the creator of the “Yawara!” judo girl manga series.
Three additional manga artists drew characters representing athletes of other sports: Eisaku Kubonouchi, who created the “Tsurumoku Dokushinryo" series about young company employees living in a bachelors’ dormitory, did an illustration for prosthetic-limbed track-and-field athlete Saki Takakuwa; Hiro Mashima, author of the “Fairy Tail” battle fantasy manga series, for goalball players; and Tetsuya Chiba, illustrator of the “Ashita no Joe” (Tomorrow’s Joe) boxing manga series, for wheelchair rugby players.
The metropolitan government conducted a survey in 2014 on Tokyo residents’ perception of the Olympics and Paralympics.
Although nearly 90 percent of the 1,910 respondents said they “know of” the Paralympics, a mere 2 percent said they had watched sports for people with disabilities at stadiums, the results showed.
“We decided on the collaboration with manga with the intention of creating images that are completely new, and everyone involved extended their full cooperation,” said a metropolitan government official.
“We hope that many people will take an interest (in sports for people with disabilities), no matter whether they are in Japan or abroad and what generation they are in, and actually go to watch the Games.”
The video is on the metropolitan government’s website (http://www.sports-tokyo.info/be_the_hero/).
The website also features a subtitled version of the video for people with hearing difficulties and one with audio descriptions read by voice actor Akira Kamiya for those with impaired vision.
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