Menta1tan

hwoajin in the style of erica wester!

The person who inspired Hange, Zeke and Xavier’s characters

Now that the series is over, I’ve started reading through Isayama’s blog from the very beginning (2009) just to see what his mindset is like throughout the years.

I found out that the person who inspired Isayama to leave his hometown and become a mangaka is the movie critic, Machiyama Tomohiro. Isayama has listened to Machiyama’s podcasts religiously; he's listened to each one at least 2-3 times. He ended up meeting and working together with him on the live-action movies in 2015 (Machiyama was hired as the screenwriter).

The really interesting and funny thing is just how much Isayama loves this guy. At an event, some mangaka were asked to draw their 'first love'. Isayama drew Machiyama Tomohiro:

The Japanese fandom noticed at the time that he looks suspiciously similar to Xavier...

It turns out that Isayama loves him so much that he based Xavier, Hange and Zeke's characters off him. This is from Machiyama's twitter:

1st tweet: The last chapter of Shingeki no Kyojin was like the ending of Terrence Malick's Tree of Life. Thank you for your work, Isayama-sensei.

2nd tweet: Come to think of it, I made an appearance, too.

From Gekkan Shingeki no Kyojin Official Figure Collection 10:

ハンジには、｢アメリカ在住の映画評論家、町山智浩さんみたいな人だ｣という明確なイメージがあります”

“町山さんを知っている人なら、きっと｢ああ、なるほど｣と言ってくれるはず”

2016年01月 月刊進撃の巨人 公式フィギュアコレクションVol.10

"Hange is like the movie critic Machiyama Tomohiro currently living in America. If someone is familiar with Machiyama, I'm sure they will understand what I mean."

Also from Machiyama's twitter:

1st tweet: When I met Director Araki of the anime the other day, he told me, "Isayama said he based Zeke off you." I think I answered kind of flippantly, like, "Ok, that's cool." But is it Hange that's based off me, or is it Zeke? Come to think of it, isn't Hange a woman?

2nd tweet: It seems I've been split into many different characters.

So I decided to go looking for what exactly is it about this guy that Isayama took inspiration from. There is not much information about him in English. Despite the fact that he lives in California, he tweets in Japanese and is very famous in Japan. He is known for being very intelligent, well-read and eccentric. He's also known for being gay, single and childless at the age of 58. He is vocal about LGBT issues in both America and Japan. He is left-leaning politically - he went around interviewing trump supporters in a kind of tongue-in-cheek mocking way.

I listened to some of his podcasts in Japanese that Isayama posted and noticed Machiyama speaks quite quickly and excitedly and can be hard to understand at times lol. He has read a lot of books - he reviews films in his podcasts but he always references classic literature and is very smart and knowledgeable about many subjects. When hearing him talk, I can definitely understand how eccentric characters like Hange and Zeke are based off him!

I hope this has been interesting for any Hange, Zeke or Xavier fans! I will make more posts as I find more info

SN.E by rds- 2006

reibert doodle 💕

funky quack

‘don’t you want your favourite character to be happy???’ no? i want my favourite character to be interesting. i want me to be happy. which sometimes involves my favourite character being in exquisite agony