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Prolific manga-ka/radio personality Naoki Urasawa has announced plans to launch a new series this summer that taking aim at the rise of AI in comics. Titled Saigo no Manga Kyoushitsu (translated as 'The Last Manga Classroom'), the series will be published by Shogakukan, with whom he's worked nearly exclusively for the past decade. 

"In this era where AI can do everything... what are you trying to challenge?" reads the announcement for Urasawa's The Last Manga Classroom, with the character saying, "What is a must-have item?"

Urasawa is well-known to his fans for being a proponent of physical media, to the point of disallowing his manga to be available digitally until changing his mind in 2021. He has spoken out about the usage of AI, and specifically about it being used in manga creation before.

"We originally wanted to do the tasks AI is doing for us now. So getting AI to do those things means we're letting them have all the fun," Urasawa said in a TV interview. "Actually, all the stages of art are fun for me, from sketching to coloring and shading, I want to do the shadowing myself. I feel like letting AI take over all the work will make things no fun for me."

The Last Manga Classroom will be serialized in Shogakukan's popular Big Comic Original comics anthology, which his seminal works Pluto, Master Keaton, and Monster debuted - but this time, it'll be part of its special issue released every even-numbered month on the 12th, titled Big Comic Original Zoukan.

Related: Manga legend Naoki Urasawa is back with a Monster thematic sequel... but its a music video

Of course, Urasawa isn't slowing down; he will be illustrating The Last Manga Classroom with his two assistants, simultaneously to keeping his other serial manga Asadora!, as well as his weekly radio series with comedian Junji Takada, titled Junji and Naoki.

The Last Manga Classroom by Naoki Urasawa debuts August 12 in the Japanese manga anthology Big Comic Original Zoukan. Plans for an English-language release haven't been announced, but a majority of his past works have eventually been translated and released by VIZ Media. 

Each week, Popverse's resident anime expert Trent Cannon runs down the latest and, dare we say "greatest," in anime and manga in Popverse Jump. Some recent columns have included... 

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