Kimagure Orange Road

Kyōsuke Kasuga and his family had to move several times after being seen using their esper powers. Upon settling for the seventh time, Kyōsuke briefly meets a pretty girl who gives him her straw-hat and falls in love with her on sight. On the first day of school he learns this girl is his junior high classmate Madoka Ayukawa, who, contrary to his initial impression, is feared as a tough and no-nonsense delinquent. Their underclassman (and Madoka's best friend), Hikaru Hiyama, sees Kyōsuke use his powers to sink an impressive basketball shot and falls in love with him. Kyōsuke ends up dating Hikaru while constantly struggling with his feelings for Madoka due to his indecisiveness. Likewise, Madoka has feelings for Kyōsuke which she masks with her capricious nature for fear of hurting her friend Hikaru.

Kyōsuke Kasuga (春日 恭介, Kasuga Kyōsuke, voice: Tōru Furuya (Japanese), Yuu Mizushima (1985 Shonen Jump Special) )

Kyōsuke is the male protagonist in the love triangle. He and his siblings have supernatural powers and are described as espers in the series. They are forbidden from using their powers in public, lest they be discovered and exploited. Kyōsuke's esper powers include teleportation, telekinesis, and "time-slipping" (a kind of time travel) while falling from heights such as stairs. He can alter mechanical devices such as elevators and traffic lights. He can direct his powers to his ears to amplify his hearing and he has also demonstrated a hypnotism power as evidenced when he hypnotized himself to be more decisive. Kyōsuke is also rarely shown to use his powers to temporarily amplify his speed and strength. On very rare occasions—generally, when Madoka is directly threatened—his power has taken the form of raw energy that can shatter concrete walls or short out every light in a disco. Kyōsuke is a pretty gentle person and a bit of a goody-goody—when he sees Madoka smoking, he scolds her in a very nerdy way (and then uses his powers to destroy her cigarette). It is his indecisiveness that leads to the love triangle with Hikaru and Madoka. He is unable to decide between his feelings for Hikaru and Madoka. Due to the loose manner that he and his sisters relate to each other it's a running gag that many characters consider him a playboy and two-timing since it is believed he is dating Hikaru.

Madoka Ayukawa (鮎川 まどか, Ayukawa Madoka, voice: Hiromi Tsuru (Japanese), Saeko Shimazu (1985 Shonen Jump Special) )

The lead female character of the series. Despite appearing standoffish at first glance, she harbors a kind, altruistic personality underneath her tough exterior. Madoka has been friends with Hikaru and Yūsaku since childhood, and more recently has become friends with Kyōsuke. Though she has the reputation of a delinquent at school, she's dedicated to academics, is shown to enjoy studying, and is also a very competent saxophone player. When she's not in class, she works part-time at the ABCB cafe. In truth, her capricious behavior as a young delinquent is just a masking of her sadness and loneliness, due to the fact that she's a misunderstood loner. She starts to be seen in another light thanks to Kyōsuke, and also reveals her real kind and selfless personality to most of the other characters. Madoka always tends to put others above her, and really dislikes being a burden to them. However, when Madoka and Kyōsuke both confess their true feelings for each other, she tells Kyōsuke that he has to break it off with Hikaru, who must understand the truth of the things.

Madoka's parents are kind-hearted but workaholic professional musicians often touring outside Japan, so she lives in a large house with her older sister. After her sister gets married and goes to live abroad with her husband, Madoka lives there alone. The story involves the eventual shedding of her tough exterior after she becomes Kyōsuke's friend, as evidenced by the changes in her life after she meets him. She gives up smoking because of him, and the other characters note that she becomes friendlier and does better academically following Kyōsuke's arrival.

As revealed in the last episode of the anime (which occurred near the end of the manga run), Madoka also holds a special place in her heart for a mysterious man whom she met under a tree in the past. Madoka drastically changed her appearance starting 6 years before, after her encounter with present-day time traveling Kyōsuke, who in fact was stating his preferences based on the present-day Madoka. In the end, Madoka still did not know that Kyosuke was the mysterious man, but senses a connection to him.

Creator Izumi Matsumoto reports that his inspiration for Madoka was actress Phoebe Cates and Japanese pop singer Akina Nakamori.[4]

Hikaru Hiyama (檜山 ひかる, Hiyama Hikaru, voice: Eriko Hara (Japanese), Akari Hibino (1985 Shonen Jump Special) )

Hikaru is initially presented as being unpleasant, a brawler, and a tougher talker than Madoka. But once she becomes friends with Kyōsuke, it is revealed that she is actually kind, sweet and energetic, as well as very loyal to those she cares for. Hikaru is also somewhat child-like, specially since she is an only daughter and somewhat sheltered; when she gets extremely excited, she sometimes tends to revert to a form of baby talk, which is seen as cute by Japanese standards. She refers to Kyōsuke by the English word "Darling" (even before she knew his name).

Hikaru is two years younger than Madoka and Kyōsuke, and has the same birthday as Kyōsuke; she also is in the same classroom as Yūsaku Hino and the twins. She has feelings for Kyōsuke, who cares for her but more as a little sister than a prospect girlfriend, and has been Madoka's best and almost only friend for several years since she and Yūsaku were the only ones who were never afraid of her. Hikaru befriended Madoka when a bully took away little Hikaru's favorite medallion, and a pre-teen Madoka witnessed this and stalked the bully until he returned it to Hikaru, sealing the girls' friendship.

Manami Kasuga (春日 まなみ, Kasuga Manami, voice: Michie Tomizawa (Japanese) )

One of Kyōsuke's younger twin sisters, Manami is very reserved. She is kind, quiet and gentle, and depicted as the homemaker of the house—cooking meals, vacuuming and doing laundry — but it is revealed in both the manga and anime that she has a wild side that occasionally needs release. Manami's esper powers include teleportation and telekinesis. Part of her reserved nature includes avoiding excessive use of the power unless it is absolutely necessary.

She is especially fond of Madoka and would like to see Kyōsuke and her get together. However this never made it into the anime. As such the anime version shows no such preference, though she and Kurumi at times urge Kyōsuke to choose between Madoka and Hikaru. But even in the manga she is unaware of the situation between Kyōsuke and Madoka.

Kurumi Kasuga (春日 くるみ, Kasuga Kurumi, voice: Chieko Honda (Japanese) )

Manami's younger fraternal twin, Kurumi is very energetic and argumentative. She is also able to bring these qualities out in Manami as well. She is known to use idioms of her own creation, which can sometimes be misconstrued by others. Kurumi is the most comfortable with using her powers, often doing so without thinking about the consequences. Kurumi used her powers to run the 100-meter dash in 3 seconds at her old school, which resulted in the Kasugas moving to the town where the series takes place. Kurumi's other esper powers include teleportation and telekinesis. She also possesses the ability to hypnotize, and Kyōsuke is her usual victim; although Kurumi appeared to learn this from a book.

In the manga Kurumi wants Kyōsuke to end up with Hikaru. But, again, this storyline never made it into the anime, and the anime Kurumi shows no such preference despite sometimes urging her brother to choose between Hikaru and Madoka.

Takashi Kasuga (春日 隆, Kasuga Takashi, voice: Kei Tomiyama)

Kyōsuke's father, he works as a photographer and has no esper powers. He and his wife Akemi got together after she secretly helped him fulfill a test of character from her parents, and after her death he has raised the three Kasuga children mostly on his own.

The Kasuga grandparents

Kyōsuke and the twins' maternal grandparents, and the ones that they inherited "The Power" from. They live in the mountains, handling a ski resort. Both of them are psychics as well as very skilled with their abilities, which include teleportation and telekinesis. Their first names are never mentioned. They're very kind-hearted and affectionate fellows, and the grandfather is somewhat mischievous and lecherous as well. Grandpa Kasuga is voiced by Phil Ross in English.

Master (マスター, Masutā, voice: Yūsaku Yara)

Proprietor of the ABCB cafe located on Orange Road and Madoka's boss. He is one of the few characters who realizes how Madoka and Kyōsuke feel about each other, and does everything in his power to smooth relations between the two. In the manga he shuts down ABCB after it is discovered that Madoka was working there (Japanese middle school students can not hold jobs). In the novels it is revealed that he bounced back by opening one of the first cybercafes in Tokyo. He is voiced by Frank Page in English.

Seiji Komatsu (小松 整司, Komatsu Seiji, voice: Keiichi Nanba (Japanese) ) & Kazuya Hatta (八田 一也, Hatta Kazuya, voice: Naoki Tatsuta (Japanese) )

Kyōsuke's two bumbling sex-obsessed friends. They are also potential boyfriends for the twins, who are most likely using them as placeholders until someone better comes along. Kazuya Hatta is not to be confused with Kazuya Kasuga. Seiji's name has also been given as Masashi (most notably in the credits for "An Unexpected Situation"). In the novels, Kazuya becomes an aspiring manga author, and gets trapped inside of one of his stories, with Kyosuke bailing him out eventually. By the second film, they have achieved some success publishing girlie magazines.

Kazuya Kasuga (春日 一弥, Kasuga Kazuya, voice: Chika Sakamoto, Yuko Mita (1985 Shonen Jump Special) )

Kyōsuke's mischievous younger cousin, Kazuya looks like a younger version of him. On several occasions people have mistaken Kazuya being Kyōsuke's son, and at others their physical similarities have been openly mentioned. Kazuya has "The Power" as well. In both the manga and the anime he uses telepathy almost exclusively, with telekinesis being used on very rare occasions. Kyōsuke and Kazuya can swap bodies by banging their heads together, and many stories with Kazuya involve him doing so either to avoid something unpleasant, or to "help" Kyōsuke pick which female to focus on. In the manga Kazuya has two female friends, and his situation with them somewhat mirrors the situation between Kyōsuke, Madoka, and Hikaru.

Akane Kasuga (春日 あかね, Kasuga Akane, voice: Naoko Matsui)

Kazuya's older sister, and the same age as her cousin Kyōsuke. She is rather tomboyish, and both Komatsu and Hatta are intimidated by her. Akane can use "The Power" to make people see illusions. She has only been seen using this power to make herself appear as different people; it is unknown if she can create other types of illusions. The illusions appear to be both aural and visual. In the manga, this power works only on the person it is directed towards, so it is probably a mixture of telepathy and hypnosis, elements of "The Power" which have been demonstrated in other members of the Kasuga family. In the anime she uses it on both Hatta and Komatsu at the same time.

In the manga she develops a crush on Madoka, to the point of giving Kyōsuke a hickey while dreaming about Madoka. This leads to more than a few situations where she creates an illusion of herself as Kyōsuke in an attempt to determine just how the two of them feel about each other. Most of these situations end poorly for her and surprisingly, positively for Kyōsuke.

In the anime Akane has the same powers that Kyōsuke and the twins have, in addition to her illusion power. It is never indicated if this is true in the manga.

Akane's appearance in the manga and anime are quite different. In the manga she looks like a cross between Kurumi and Manami. In the anime her hair is shorter and darker, her face is more stark, and she has violet eyes. Akane only appeared in two of the OVAs (where she is shown to be rather infatuated with Madoka), and never in the TV series. She appears considerably more often in the manga, almost being a regular.

Yūsaku Hino (火野 勇作, Hino Yūsaku, voice: Masami Kikuchi (Japanese), Eiko Yamada (1985 Shonen Jump Special) )

Yūsaku initially appeared early in the series as a potential rival of Kyōsuke for Hikaru's affections, having harbored feelings for her since childhood. He asked her to marry him one day and she jokingly said she would if he became stronger and self assured. This sent him on the path of practicing karate for years. He views Kyōsuke as a womanizer on top of being a rival for Hikaru's love. Unfortunately for his romantic situation, he tends to get nervous and unable to speak in Hikaru's presence. As a result, she is mostly oblivious to his feelings, though she becomes very annoyed when Yūsaku becomes too pushy for her tastes.

Sayuri Hirose

Sayuri is an extremely cute girl who only appears in the manga, and whose seemingly innocent and pure demeanor hides a devious mind obsessed with breaking as many male hearts as possible. She carries a book where she tracks the various males that she has left heartbroken. At her first meeting with Kyōsuke, he leaves her to walk to class with Madoka. Because of this she becomes obsessed with both of them, and comes up with various schemes to wreck their relationship. Most of her schemes involve bragging to Madoka that she's going to steal Kyōsuke, and then playing the role of the damsel in distress toward the kindhearted Kyōsuke. Fortunately, the schemes invariably backfire—often quite spectacularly.

Because she first saw Kyōsuke with Madoka, Sayuri assumes that the two are dating. Although Sayuri sees Kyōsuke on one occasion with Hikaru, there is no indication that she ever realizes that Hikaru is the one publicly acknowledged as Kyōsuke's girlfriend. This makes her pivotal in the manga, as she is the one who tells Hikaru about the relationship between Kyōsuke and Madoka, forcing the events that occur at the end of the manga.

Hiromi

Hiromi only appeared in the manga. She was Kyōsuke's classmate at his previous school, and transferred to Kōryō about halfway through the manga's run. She enjoys messing with Kyōsuke's head, and neither the reader nor Kyōsuke is sure if Hiromi knows about "The Power".

Ushiko and Umao (牛子 and 馬男, Ushiko and Umao, voice: Katsumi Suzuki and Chisato Nakajima)

Ushiko and Umao are a newlywed couple that serve as one of the primary running gags in the TV series. Their appearance in an episode generally consists of them saying the same romantic lines to one another, followed by a chaotic event involving Kyōsuke or other primary characters, sometimes in the most ludicrous places. In the movie Kimagure Orange Road: I Want to Return to That Day, their appearance is limited to Umao, who appears on television holding a crying baby and begging for Ushiko to return to him.

Ushiko and Umao's names are references to farm animals. "Ushi" is the Japanese word for "cow," and "uma" means "horse."

Kimagure Orange Road was commissioned by Weekly Shōnen Jump after rejecting Matsumoto's work "Spring Wonder". Several short manga that were precursors to Kimagure Orange Road were created prior and later published in a collection called Graffiti.[5] Matsumoto later stated that Kimagure Orange Road was the first series to combine elements of science fiction and romantic comedy together.[6]

Matsumoto and his three or four assistants worked in a one-room apartment, with Matsumoto saying he sometimes had to work in the bathroom due to a lack of space.[5] One of his assistants was Kazushi Hagiwara. Because an art shift is seen in Kimagure Orange Road once it resumed from a Matsumoto health-related hiatus, it is rumored that Hagiwara was responsible for the change in style.[7]

Protagonist Kyōsuke Kasuga seems to have been based on Matsumoto himself, the author saying "His nature was always my own." The series' setting was inspired by the Umegaoka, Gotokuji and Shimokitazawa neighborhoods in the Setagaya Ward of Tokyo. The café ABCB seen in the manga was inspired by a real one called Genso Katsudo Shashin Kan.[5]

Kimagure Orange Road was an instant success.[5] The manga sold over 20 million tankobon volumes in Japan.[25] The Kimagure Orange Road anime series was broadcast in Japan and around the world, in countries such as Australia, France, Italy, Singapore, Spain and Turkey.[5]

• Official anime website (in Japanese)
• Kimagure Orange Road at Studio Pierrot (in Japanese)
• Kimagure Orange Road at eManga: English manga distributor
• Kimagure Orange Road (manga) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia