Happy! is a Japanese sports manga series written and illustrated by Naoki Urasawa. It was serialized in Big Comic Spirits from 1993 until 1999, with its 254 chapters collected into 23 tankōbon volumes by Shogakukan. The story follows a teenage heroine who embarks on a career as a professional tennis player to repay an enormous debt incurred by her brother to yakuza loan sharks, with the threat that if she fails, they will force her into a life of prostitution at a soapland. The series was adapted into two television movies broadcast on TBS in 2006. The Happy! manga series has over 18 million copies in circulation.

Plot

Since the death of her parents, Miyuki Umino has been raising her brothers and sisters alone. One day, she receives a visit from two yakuza who ask her to reimburse a debt of 250 million yen contracted by her older brother, of whom she has no news. To escape prostitution, she left high school and decided to start a career as a professional tennis player. Gifted in this discipline, she has already won many prizes, however now she must excel and win the biggest championships in order to quickly repay her creditor who would prefer to see her on the sidewalk.

Characters

Media

Manga

Written and illustrated by Naoki Urasawa, Happy! began weekly serialization in Big Comic Spirits in 1993. In December 1994, Urasawa began the semi-monthly series Monster and created both manga simultaneously until Happy! ended in 1999. Publisher Shogakukan collected the 254 chapters into 23 tankōbon volumes between February 28, 1994, and May 29, 1999. They republished the series in a 15 volume kanzenban edition between December 25, 2003, and June 30, 2004.

Volume list

Live-action films

The manga was adapted into two live-action television films that were broadcast on TBS in 2006. The first, simply titled Happy!, aired on April 7, 2006. It was released on DVD on November 29, 2006, including scenes not shown during the TV broadcast. The second film, Happy! 2 Watashi, Senpai no Tame ni Ganbarimasu (Happy!2私、先輩の為にガンバリます), was broadcast on December 26, 2006.

Reception

The Happy! manga series has over 18 million copies in circulation. In 2020, Mark Sammut of Comic Book Resources called Happy! Urasawa's "most depressing manga ever" and wrote that it "strikes a middle-ground between the author's more conventional earlier work and the character studies that would come to define his greatest projects".