The World's Weakest Hero - Google Arts & Culture (2024)

July 21, 1996 was an unforgettable day for Kahokucho, Kochi Prefecture. It was the grand opening of the Yanase Takashi Memorial Anpanman Museum. Outside the museum, cars were in a line over 2 kilometers, waiting for their entry into the museum.

The turnout was a huge deal for Kahokucho, a small country town with a population of 5,000. Nobody had expected such a large number of visitors on opening day. The museum reached its annual goal of 100,000 visitors in just forty-nine days. The people of Kochi Prefecture were happily surprised at the reminder that Anpanman is a cultural icon in Japan.

Takashi Yanase - Manga Artist from Kochi Prefecture
Takashi Yanase is the author and creator of Anpanman. He was born in 1919. Yanase was a manga artist and a picture book author. He was also a poet, designer and editor. Yanase created many works in various fields until he passed away at age ninety-four.

Yanase was raised in Kahokucho, a town in Kami City, Kochi Prefecture. The Monobe river runs through this quiet country town surrounded by mountains. It is where the Anpanman Museum is located. Yanase looked up to Ryuichi Yokoyama, a manga artist also from Kochi Prefecture. With high hopes he moved to Tokyo to become a manga artist. However in Tokyo, Yanase struggled to get recognition for his manga. He kept drawing manga but also worked as a designer, writer for TV and radio, artistic director for theater and as an interviewer to make a living.

At the time, Yanase’s style of manga incorporated Ryuichi Yokoyama’s style of nonsensical comedic cartoons. However, other artists such as Osamu Tezuka were creating manga with a thorough story structure and these were gaining popularity. Yanase’s manga were pushed into a less popular genre. Yanase was struggling to be recognized as a manga artist but he did not give up. A memorable comic drawn by Yanase from that time is Mr. Bou. A comic strip that features a faceless main character. In Japanese, bou is a Chinese character used to represent anonymity or to unspecify a certain person. The comic strip feels ironic reflecting Yanase’s life as an unrecognized artist.

Yanase lost his younger brother to the Second World War. He was also conscripted and sent to China. On the front he faced unimaginable starvation. Yanase said, during the war the Japanese were taught the war was a fight for justice, but when it ended the facts were opposite of what we had been taught. When Japan lost the war, Yanase felt that justice as he had known it was overturned. This led him to question the true meaning of justice. The answer he he came up with; “Giving a piece of bread to a hungry man even if it means to sacrifice yourself.” He felt that was the kind of unwavering justice that every man could be responsible for.

Yanase described Anpanman as the “world’s weakest hero”, and true to this definition, Anpanman is full of weaknesses. His powers can’t be used if he gets wet and when he uses his power by giving away a piece of his face, he becomes weaker. Anpanman’s weaknesses was Yanase’s way of showing that “Real justice is not almighty, it gets hurt.” Anpanman’s story is not the tale of a chosen hero, but a tale of sacrifice to save a hungry person with love and courage. It was a new and unique definition of heroism.

Humorous and poetic words dot the hallways, characters peek out here and there on the floors and walls. There is no set route through the museum. The design allows visitors to explore the world of Anpanman and enjoy it at their own pace.

The Poetry and Marchen Hall, an art museum dedicated to Yanase’s picture books and illustrations, is located behind the Anpanman Museum. The art museum gives children who entered the Anpanman Museum, an opportunity to interact more deeply with drawings and fine-art. In an interview with Yanase conducted right after the museum opened, he spoke about his hopes for the Poetry and Marchen Hall.

“The Anpanman Museum is made mainly for children. I think some of those children will like the drawings and become interested in fine-art. The entrance is wide, as you go further it connects to a deeper high-brow world.”