Hunter × Hunter
The first "Hunter × Hunter" anime adaptation was produced by the company Nippon Animation and directed by Kazuhiro Furuhashi, who had previously directed the "Rurouni Kenshin" television series. A total of 62 episodes of "Hunter × Hunter" were broadcast on the Japanese terrestrial television network Fuji Television from October 16, 1999 to March 31, 2001 during the same Saturday evening timeslot as the anime version of Togashi's previous series "Yu Yu Hakusho". Additionally, "Hunter × Hunter" has aired on the satellite television station Animax. Although it closely follows the manga, the violence in the anime version is lessened for younger audiences. Marvelous Entertainment has released all episodes of the series in Japan on DVD in 13 separate volumes between September 20, 2000 and September 19, 2001.
Seishi Kishimoto
Kishimoto's first manga was the one-shot "Trigger" published in Square Enix's "Gangan Powered" in 2001. With the story he wanted to write about "faith and parent-child relationships," but had trouble fitting it within the page limit. He began his first serialized work, "666 Satan", in "Monthly Shōnen Gangan" in 2001. The manga continued for six years and has been translated and released in several foreign countries, including in North America by Viz Media. A year after "666 Satan" ended, Kishimoto launched "Blazer Drive" in the debut issue of Kodansha's "Monthly Shōnen Rival", preceded by a prequel one-shot, "Tribal", in the final issue of "Comic BomBom"; Blazer Drive ran through 2010 and received a video game tie-in. He then created the one-shot "Jūniji no Kaneganaru", which was published in the monthly shōjo magazine "Aria" in 2011. In the January 2012 issue of "Monthly Shōnen Rival", Kishimoto debuted "Kurenai no Ōkami to Ashikase no Hitsuji", which ran until 2013.