Obake no Q-Tarō (
Japanese: オバケのQ太郎,
Hepburn: Obake no Kyū-Tarō) is a Japanese
manga series by
Fujiko Fujio about the titular obake, Q-Taro, who lives with the Ōhara family. Q-Tarō, also known as "Q-chan" or "Oba-Q", is a mischief-maker who likes to fly around scaring people and stealing food, though he is
deathly afraid of dogs.
The story is usually focused on the antics of Q-Tarō and his friends. The manga was drawn in 1964–1966,1971–1974,1976 by the duo
Fujiko Fujio (Hiroshi Fujimoto and Motoo Abiko). An English manga volume was published in Japan as Q the Spook.[1]
There are three
anime series adaptations of Obake no Q-Tarō. The first was shown on the
Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) in black and white, and ran from 1965 to 1967. The second series, produced in color, ran from 1971 to 1972 on
Nippon TV. The third series ran from 1985 to 1987 on
TV Asahi.
The series was broadcast in the United States in the 1970s as Little Ghost Q-Taro, making it one of only three works by Fujiko Fujio to reach North America.[2] In France, one of the episodes of the 1965 series was aired in November 1967 as part of
ORTF Chaine 2's Japanese week, complete with French subtitles.[3]
A human friend of Q-tarō, Shōta Ōhara is an elementary school student. Q-Tarō calls him "Shō-chan" (正ちゃん) and Shota calls Q-Tarō "Q-chan" (Qちゃん). His grades are generally poor, and he was once second from the bottom of his class.
Shota's older brother and the eldest son of the Ohara family who is a middle school student. Unlike Shota, his academic ability during his middle school days are average. Whenever Shinichi is at home, he usually spends his time listening to music, specifically enjoying records from the Beatles and Elvis Presley.
Doronpa is an American obake. Q-Tarō tends to have a rivalry towards him due to the fact that U-ko idolizes Doronpa's intelligence and he likes to annoy Q-Tarō because he is Japanese.
Ramen chief character, he also appears too as a ramen chief in
Doraemon, he appears as a teacher in
Ninja Hattori-kun, he appears as a Michio's father in
Ultra B
Ohara's neighbor and Doronpa lives with him. And he resembles from
Doraemon
Reception and impact
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adding to it. (March 2015)
The popularity of the 1965 anime adaptation caused a cultural phenomenon called "Oba-Q boom" (オバQブーム Oba-Kyū būmu), which made the series have an 30% audience rating, high popularity with children and spawn a variety of Toys, songs and clothes, as well a host of imitators. The reason of Q-Tarō's popularity was that the series was grounded in everyday Japanese life, with Q-Tarō questioning the structure of Japanese society and the comedic situations that occurred because of Q-Tarō misinterpreting it.
[4][5][6]
Pac-Man creator
Toru Iwatani cited the series as inspiration for the designs of the
Ghosts in the Pac-Man video game series.[7] In the manga series To Love Ru, the ghost character
Shizu Murasame has a fear of dogs as an homage to Little Ghost Q-Taro.[8]