Kakushi is a manga artist who runs his own company, G-PRO. Being that his primary work involves ecchi, he is determined to keep his manga artist career a secret from his daughter, Hime. Kakushi is a single father, his wife having disappeared in an accident off the coast of Japan. His name is a pun on one of the Japanese words for 'secret' (かくしごと, Kakushigoto). In the present, he has been in a coma for a year after suffering from an accident at his warehouse job.
Hime is a sprightly fourth grade elementary school student and daughter to Kakushi. She is also depicted as a third-year high school student in flash-forward segments, who knows of her father's secret, and has been waiting for him to wake up from his coma. Her name is a pun on one of the Japanese words for 'secret' (ひめゴト, himegoto).
Aogu is Kakushi's chief assistant at G-PRO. He often requires instructions from other people, and his name is a reference to this fact; shiji o aogu (指示を仰ぐ, "ask for instructions").
Ami is an assistant at G-PRO. She generally sports a flat, uninterested demeanour; she also keeps secrets of her own, such as her manga artist pen name. Her name is a reference to the kakeiami (カケアミ) style of cross-hatching.
Kakeru is the newest assistant at G-PRO; his primary duty is to erase mistakes on the manga manuscripts. His name is a reference to erasing, or literally "using an eraser" (消しゴムかける, Keshigomukakeru).
Tomaruin is the long-suffering editor at Weekly Shōnen Magazine responsible for liaisoning with the G-PRO firm. He repeatedly drops off manga materials at the Goto home, threatening to reveal Kakushi's secret to his daughter. He is regarded as a ditz, and once mistaken for a pervert; however, he generally means well. He has a crush on Nadila. His name is a reference to the phrase tomaru insatsuki (止まる印刷機, "Stop the presses").
Nadila is an Indonesian migrant worker who occasionally comes to clean the Goto home. She teaches Hime how to cook Indonesian food, befuddling her father. In another segment, Tomaruin mistakes her for a dukun.
Rokujo is Hime's elementary school teacher. She is a fan of Kakushi's work and always helping him keep his secret to Hime. She is named after the number 61 (六十一, Roku Jū Ichi).
Senda is a 17-year-old high school student and aspiring idol. She is also work as a volunteer art instructor and very closed to Hime after she being a fan of her. Her name is a pun that means "I want to be the center of an idol group".
Imashigata is Kakushi's wealthy father-in-law, who has been at loggerheads with him seemingly ever since his daughter passed away. However, it is shown he still cares for Hime, going so far as to buying her a grand piano when she wants to practice.
In March 2020, Kodansha USA announced the acquisition of the manga for an English language digital release, with the first volume being released on March 17, 2020.[14]
Anime
An anime television series adaptation was announced on the tenth volume of the manga on November 15, 2019.[2] The series was animated by Ajia-do Animation Works and directed by Yūta Murano, with Takashi Aoshima handling series composition, Shuuhei Yamamoto designing the characters, and Yukari Hashimoto composing the series' music. It aired from April 2 to June 18, 2020, on BS-NTV, AT-X, Tokyo MX, and SUN.[3][15] The opening theme song is "Chiisana Hibi" (ちいさな日々) by Flumpool, while the ending theme is Eiichi Ohtaki's 1981 song "Kimi wa Tennen Shoku" (君は天然色).[16]
Funimation acquired the series and streamed it on their website, AnimeLab, and Wakanim, as well as producing an English dub.[17] Following Sony's acquisition of Crunchyroll, the series was moved to Crunchyroll.[18]
18-year-old Hime Gotō receives a key to a mysterious and secret building, which is revealed to be a storehouse filled with manga manuscripts written by her father, Kakushi. The current story is set 8 years ago, when Hime was 10 years old. When Hime was born, Kakushi, an ecchi manga writer, vowed never to reveal his job to his daughter for fear of being repulsed by her, going as far as to store his manuscripts faraway, revamp the office building to make it look ordinary, and leave the house in a suit. However, when a new editor Satsuki Tomaruin arrives at the house instead of the office, Kakushi redraws the character on the manga-present T-shirt he is wearing to something unrecognizable.
Kakushi saves a cat from a river using his donut pillow in public. For classwork, Hime wants to write about a wish for her father. Inspired by a friend whose mother believed in men getting promotions and prestige, she hopes for her father to "become important", much to Kakushi's worry. Consulting his assistants Aogu Shiji, Ami Kakei and Kakeru Keshi, he lands into a dilemma as in society, becoming famous is similar to becoming important but it is also akin to exposing his secret. When Hime and her friends attempt to find the cat saviour, they almost find Kakushi but are scared away by a silly legend. In bed, Hime tells Kakushi that she wished for him to become important because she thought it would make him happy. Kakushi tells her that he would happy if she grew up well.
2
"Beach Sandals and B4" Transliteration: "Bīsan to Bī-yon" (Japanese: ビーサンとＢ４)
"And Yet Everyone Gets Their Turn in the End" Transliteration: "Soredemo Hachi wa Mawattekuru" (Japanese: それでも鉢は廻ってくる)
April 30, 2020 (2020-04-30)
"You're Spending the Night!" Transliteration: "Tometane!" (Japanese: 泊めたねっ！)
Kakushi becomes a judge in a manga contest for aspiring artists, following Satsuki's suggestion and Hime's opinion that he should fulfill his duty, even if he does not want to. He practices by judging Kakeru's work. While at home, Hime receives a stack of boxes containing applicants' manga work, prompting Kakushi to call Satsuki and question the situation before telling him to send the work to the office.
After receiving Kakushi's feedback on the applicants' manga work, Satsuki decides to add a smiley face to each one, thinking the feedback was too serious. This causes readers to criticize Kakushi for not taking the contest seriously. Back at home, Hime asks Kakushi if he has ever fulfilled a duty he did not want to, and he replies that his current duty is raising her well and that she will eventually have similar duties as she grows up. This makes Hime eager to take on a duty of her own, so she asks for a puppy.
After a long day of manga work, Satsuki informs Kakushi that G-PRO's work has failed a quality test and they must fix the last eight pages before 5 AM. To help Kakushi focus, Satsuki books him an overnight stay at a hotel, but only because Nadila will also be there. Satsuki is later shocked to find that G-PRO has also arrived to help, mistakenly thinking they are having a bathrobe party. Meanwhile, at home, Hime invites Naru to stay overnight after a family argument, and Nadila joins them later after a canceled appointment. Ichiko captures photos of Satsuki, mistaking him for a stalker, and she and Naru join the group.
The next day, Hime gives Kakushi a handmade gold medal for being everything to her. Flashing forward to the future, 18-year-old Hime realizes that Kakushi has been creating these present-age boxes for her and hugs one.
The end of the year approaches; at G-PRO, Kakushi tasks his team with finishing the proofs for both issues six and seven of their manga ahead of schedule, so as to be able to take time off until January 8. However, Kakushi himself has no motivation to go through with it. Whilst shopping, Hime wins a hot springs trip to Izu for herself, Kakushi, and Roku, valid from January 6–31; with this newfound motivation, Kakushi manages to finish issue seven. Unfortunately, he catches a cold immediately after, confining him to his futon. All of his friends (including those who think he is romantically interested in them) come to check up on him; in the morning, he feels better and gets up, only to find his room covered in marriage proposals. They leave for Izu shortly after.
At the inn in Izu, Kakushi worries about not being able to keep an eye on Hime in the gender-segregated onsen; he gets Rasuna and Aogu (who he'd bribed with a free trip) to watch her. However, Hime finishes in the onsen before the two even get a chance to enter. Walking back to their room, Kakushi asks an inn attendant about a sealed-off room; she replies that it is being remodelled into a showroom, as it was where a literary classic was written. In the dining room, people spontaneously start telling others about their secrets; Kakushi almost reveals his manga artist career when a scream is heard. Rasuna says she saw a shadow in the room, and the inn attendant admits it is actually haunted by the ghost of the book's author. Later at night, Roku runs into the room, prompting Kakushi to chase him; he discovers that the shadow was actually that of a civet's. Marvelling at the room's history and quietude, he decides to work on his manuscripts, and is mistaken for the ghost by a group of young boys peering in through the window.
In the present, Hime reflects on how Kakushi had told her that he'd taken up a new calling in life. Meanwhile, Rasuna and Satsuki talk about why Kakushi quit his job; a newspaper reporting on a group of people lost off the coast of Japan is shown.
11
"Saishukai: The Last Chapter Doesn't Bother Her" Transliteration: "Saishūkai Heiki Kanojo" (Japanese: 最終回平気彼女)
In the present, Hime is sitting on the porch of the home-turned-warehouse when a boy her age greets her, and calls her "Sis". He reveals that Kakushi is the love child of a kabuki actor and his mistress. Somewhere else, Satsuki and Rasuna discuss this revelation, and speculate that Hime's maternal grandfather resented Kakushi not because he was a manga artist, but because he was born into a family of kabuki actors. Meanwhile, Naru Senda, now a reporter for the Weekly Bunshio, interviews a worker at the company Kakushi went to work for after he gave up being a manga artist. He reveals that Goto was crushed beneath a stack of mangazines he was moving, because its structural integrity had been damaged - someone had taken out a copy to read. As a result, he has been hospitalized for over a year by the time the series started. Satsuki and Rasuna further discuss how Kakushi's finances had spiralled, not the least because he was searching for his wife. When Hime entered lower secondary school, a tabloid picked up that story, causing him to quit his career.
However, Hime managed to get through upper secondary school just fine, having inherited her art skills from her grandfather. It comes out that the boy's mother, Kakushi's half-sister, was the one who'd sent Hime the key; Kakushi had requested she sell everything inside in order to help Hime survive should anything happen to him. At Tokyo Women's Medical University Hospital, Kakushi suddenly regains consciousness, and Hime and everyone else rush to his side. However, Kakushi does not recognize Hime, asking who she is. It turns out that he does retain most of his memories, only losing the past seven years of his life. To him, Hime is still a 10-year-old girl. Kakushi wishes to get back into drawing Tights, not knowing the series had ended years ago, and his former assistants oblige him. Hime sees his father work for the first time. Kakushi asks the now 18-year-old Hime if she is a new assistant, and asks her to keep an eye on herself.
On the hospital's rooftop, Hime and Ichiko discuss how, if Kakushi should ever regain his memories, he would stop drawing manga again. Hime states it is for the best that he does not. Hime returns home and greets the now-grizzled Roku, breaking down and crying. At the hospital, Kakushi's assistants discuss how the best form of therapy for him is to continue drawing manga; this draws Satsuki's ire, given that Rasuna is one of their company's top creators au courant. Hime talks to Kakushi alone, and posits that drawing manga is what makes him the happiest; Kakushi rebuts her by saying that he would like to see a happy, healthy, and grown-up Hime instead. Tearful, Hime runs out of the hospital room and rushes to join up with her friends, retrieving old manuscripts that Kakushi does not remember drawing to show him. Kakushi begins to remember, and finally recognizes Hime as his daughter, and promptly attempts to hide the manuscripts from her. Later, it is shown that Hime's keeping a secret too: she is drawing her own manga. The G-PRO staff are reunited as "New G-PRO" as Kakushi proposes a new series to Satsuki.
Film
On December 12, 2020, it was announced that the series would receive a theatrical compilation film.[20] The film premiered on July 9, 2021.[21] Funimation streamed the film.[22]
Reception
In 2017, the series was ranked 18th at the third Next Manga Awards in the print category.[23]
Notes
^The title has a double meaning; kakushigoto can also be written as (隠し事, "A secret") or (描く仕事, "A drawing job").[1]
