Berserk Manga Creator Kentarou Miura Passes Away at 54

Passed away due to acute aortic dissection

Publisher Hakusensha announced on Thursday that Berserk manga creator Kentarou Miura passed away on May 6 at 2:48 p.m. due to acute aortic dissection. He was 54. His family held a private service.

Miura was born on July 11, 1966 in Chiba prefecture. He made his professional manga debut with the “Futatabi…” (Once More…) story in Kodansha’s Weekly Shōnen Magazine in 1985.

Miura then published the one-shot version of the Berserk manga in Hakusensha’s Monthly Comicomi magazine in 1988. He launched the full Berserk manga series in Hakusensha’s Monthly Animal House magazine in 1989, and the series continued in Hakusensha’s Young Animal magazine until now. It has over 40 million copies in circulation.

The Berserk manga follows Guts, a superhumanly strong warrior who wields a large sword, as he wanders a dark medieval world filled with demons, corrupt and decadent nobles, and other horrors. Every night, he is assailed by demons, attracted to the curse branded on him after a traumatic event. He makes his way through the world on a quest to slay a former friend turned demon, who took everything away from him.

Hakusensha published the manga’s 40th volume in Japan on September 28, 2018. Dark Horse Comics published the same volume in North America in October 8, 2019.

The manga inspired a television anime series in 1997, as well as an anime film trilogy from 2012 to 2013. Another television anime series premiered in Japan in July 2016, and the second half of the new series premiered on April 2017.

Miura drew the King of Wolves (Oh-Roh) manga with famed Fist of the North Star writer Buronson in 1989. The story continued with Oh-Roh Den (Legend of the King of Wolves) in 1990. He launched the Giganto Maxia mini-series in Young Animal in 2013. More recently, he created and produced the Duranki manga with his Studio Gaga in the inaugural issue of Hakusensha’s Young Animal Zero magazine in September 2019.

Sources: Hakusensha, Mantan Web, Comic Natalie