Manga fans are known for their patience, and no one deserves that accolade more than fans of the wildly popular Sci-Fi battle manga Terra Formars, which is coming back after a five-year-long hiatus. The manga stopped due to the health issues of the writer, Yuu Sasuga, but it seems that the author has recovered and is ready to bring back his world of mutated humanoid cockroaches and generically enhanced humans fighting for survival.
The announcement of Terra Formars‘ upcoming return to serialization in Shueisha’s Weekly Young Jump was completely unexpected, after five years of silence. The publisher has also created and shared an exciting promotional video that will surely get fans even more hyped for the return of the series, and was promptly shared on X by the reliable source of manga news, @MangaMoguraRE.
The trailer showcases some of the best scenes from the manga, along with the amazing art by Kenichi Tachibana. Terra Formars will be back in issue 18 of Weekly Young Jump, on April 4, 2024.
Terra Formars starts from a cool and original premise. In the near future, Earth scientists figure out that the best way to terraform the planet Mars, and make it inhabitable, is to seed it with a modified algae that can absorb sunlight and purify the atmosphere, and cockroaches, to spread the algae across the planet as they feed. Five hundred years later, the first human expedition to Mars is wiped out after discovering that the cockroaches have mutated into humanoid, intelligent, and super-strong beings. New expeditions are sent, with multinational crews of genetically modified humans to exterminate the cockroaches, but they will face further evolved enemies, treachery among their ranks, and the mysteries of Mars.
During its run, Terra Formars achieved great heights of success. As of November 2018, shortly before the hiatus, the series had over 21 million volumes in circulation. It also spawned two anime series, an OVA adaptation, and a live-action film directed by the legendary Takashi Miike. The story has all the classic elements that make shonen exciting, including brutal fights, and over-the-top characters, but also a markedly mature tone (it is published in Shueisha’s seinen magazine) and beautifully detailed art.
Yuu Sasuga’s illness was never disclosed, but it was specified that he needed medical treatment, so it was not one of the sadly common cases of a manga creator falling ill due to overwork. It can be surmised that Sasuga is now healthy, a hypothesis supported by the news that, in January of this year, he was nominated as a judge for Ultra Jump‘s new manga award, along with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure‘s creator Hiroiko Araki.
Fans can only hope that this is the case. If the series will be able to reach the same heights of success again, Terra Formars‘ return after five years could shake up the manga landscape.
Terra Formars is available from Viz Media. The anime is available on Crunchyroll.
Read on Viz
See on Crunchyroll
Sources: @MangaMoguraRE; AnimeNewsNetwork
