NBA and Japanese National Team Player Rui Hachimura Makes His Anime Debut

Toyama-born Los Angeles Lakers star Rui Hachimura will appear in a Crayon Shin-chan anime special on November 4. The collaboration is titled Buriburi wa Hachimura Special and will be shown on ANN (Japanese TV station). It also marks Hachimura’s first voice-acting role. “My family and I are huge fans of Crayon Shin-chan,” Hachimura says. “It was so much fun. It was literally a dream come true moment for me. I definitely want to be called back again!“

Rui Hachimura’s episode of Crayon Shin-chan anime is described as:
The Buriburi wa Hachimura Special depicts an episode where the savior hero Buriburizaemon, a figment of Shin-chan’s imagination, features. In “Buriburizaemon’s Adventure – Space Dunk Chapter,” the story unfolds from Shin-chan and Buriburizaemon calling out to Hachimura in a city resembling Los Angeles after getting hungry. Hachimura, absorbed in training, had forgotten to eat for 8 whole days. He eats piles of hamburgers together with Shin-chan and Buriburizaemon, but then the TV in the shop announces that the mysterious meteorite BEN-KI is approaching Earth…

Rui Hachimura was born in February 1998 in Toyama, Japan, and was selected ninth overall in the 2019 NBA draft. As part of the Meisei High School youth setup, Hachimura won three back-to-back All-Japan High School Tournament titles – the biggest high school tournament in the country. Hachimura’s honors include NBA All-Rookie Second Team selection in 2020, putting him among the top 10 best rookies in the NBA that year. The NBA and anime have seen multiple collaborations in recent years, including a My Hero Academia x NBA T-shirt line announced in July.

Yoshito Usui’s Crayon Shin-chan manga debuted in August 1990 in Futabasha’s Weekly Manga Action before moving to Manga Town in 2000. After Usui’s passing in 2009, the manga quickly concluded before New Crayon Shin-chan, created by members of Usui’s team, debuted in September 2010. The Crayon Shin-chan manga has sold over 50mn copies worldwide and spawned one of the longest-running anime in history, with over 1000 episodes since April 1992. The anime is produced by Shin-Ei Animation.

Source: Comic Natalie
© Yoshito Usui / Futabasha・Shin-Ei・TV Asahi・ADK