is a Japanese mixed-media project created by Natsu Matsumai and Yūki Kodama. The project began with a manga series written by Yukino Kitajima and Yūki Kodama as the artist, with Yū Wazu adapting the original designs for animation. The manga, Hamatora: The Comic, started serialization in Shueisha's Young Jump magazine in November 2013. An anime television series, Hamatora: The Animation, by the studio NAZ premiered on TV Tokyo and ran for twelve episodes between January 8 and March 26, 2014. It was followed by a second series by Lerche starting in July 2014, Re:_ Hamatora. Additionally, a role-playing game titled Hamatora: Look at Smoking World developed by FuRyu was released in July 2014. Other related titles include a light novel and a stage play.
The series takes place in the year 2014 when selected humans called Minimum Holders have been discovered to possess supernatural abilities. The story focuses on Minimum Holder Nice who forms a detective agency called "Hamatora" based in Yokohama and he starts gathering a large number of allies such as his partner Murasaki and assistant Hajime as well as enemies including several criminals. The anime stars Ryōta Ōsaka, Wataru Hatano, Hiroshi Kamiya, Emiri Katō, Kiyono Yasuno, Jun Fukuyama, and Yuichi Nakamura among others.
The series has earned mixed criticism from publications for manga and anime. While the elements of mystery have been praised, the themes and animation have been less well received. It has also been often compared with X-Men for its plot and characters.
Plot
The story of Hamatora revolves around a 17-year-old teenager called Nice, who runs a private investigation agency called 'Hamatora' in Yokohama, Japan with his partners Hajime and later, Murasaki. In the world there is the existence of Select humans called whom have been discovered to possess supernatural abilities known as 'Minor Miracles' or 'The Minimum'. These people are trained in the Facultas Academy to develop their potential, and are given highly advanced classes and training to do so. As a result, those who graduate from Facultas are given extreme benefits and privileges that enable them to be highly successful in life, such as being entitled to any job or career they want with ease. The existence of minimums and minimum holders is kept extremely confidential and secretive from the general population of the world.
The events of Hamatora The Comic takes place in the year 2013, with Nice having left Falcutas Academy early in his senior year. Due to Nice both being a genius and a prodigy, Murasaki, the second highest ranked graduate from Falcutas, is tasked with the mission of bringing Nice back to Facultas by any means necessary. As Murasaki first meets Nice, his impressions of him leave Murasaki feeling insulted and angered that someone as easy going as Nice could be superior to him. As Murasaki observes Nice on his jobs though, Murasaki finds himself assisting Nice and comes to see the potential Nice actually possesses as well as acknowledging his genius. He also dwells on Nice's views on Facultas' workings and his opinion of how people with Minimums are not slaves and are free to live their lives responsibly.
Sayuri Akatasuki requests for Nice and Murasaki to rescue her sister Shizuku, a Minimum Holder who can generate fire, from a criminal family. Nice and Murasaki finish their job but Murasaki is tasked to leave Nice and to take Shizuku back to Facultas as part of the Academy's dark dealing with the mafia family. As Murasaki takes Shizuku to Facultas, Nice, Hajime and Sayuri are attacked by Facultas and the Hamatora office is destroyed. As Murasaki hands over Shizuku, he struggles on the decision he made and ends up trying to rescue Shizuku from Facultas. Nice, who managed to save himself, Hajime and Sayuri before defeating the Facultas agents, ends up saving Murasaki, but during the confrontation with Facultas and the mafia family, Shizuku apparently dies. In the week that follows, it is then revealed that Shizuku survived and faked her death so that she and Sayuri can live a new life without fearing her Minimum or Facultas and the Mafia family. Murasaki has since left Facultas and has joined Nice as a Hamatora P.I., which is now located in Cafe Nowhere along with Birthday and Ratio's 'Odd Jobs' Business and Honey and Three's Bodyguard business.
During the anime, Murasaki has joined Nice as a Hamatora P.I., where they prefer to sit around all day with their friends and wait for clients. During their Jobs, Nice finds similarities in the working of several crimes he investigates and the existence of non-innate Minimum Holders; people who possess a Minimum but were not born with it. Nice and Murasaki are warned by their friend, Art, a non-Minimum Holder who still managed to graduate from Facultas, about a Minimum Holder serial killer who extracts the brains to create more Minimum Holders.
The culprit is Moral, a former professor from the Facultas Academy who wishes to give everybody Minimums in order to achieve equality. For this, he has to kill several Minimum Holders and use their brains to create a substance he calls 'essence' that enables him to create 24 non-innate Minimum Holders for every Minimum Holder brain he possesses. While his overall purpose in this is to create equality, what Moral truly wants is to save Nice, as he believes that Nice is tortured by solitude as he is the number one student of Facultas, also calling him the accumulated wisdom of humanity, and therefore has no equal.
Moral kills Art and starts assuming his identity to dismiss Hamatora from the case. He starts a riot in order to expose the existence of Minimum Holders, and Momoka also leaks information exposing the existence of Facultas Academy and Minimum Holder identities, causing a disturbance in society as normal people treat Minimum Holders in a hostile manner, while Minimum Holders fight back to ensure their right to exist. After discovering Moral took Art's face, Nice confronts him in person to get revenge for his best friend's death. The two face off in a ship that Moral is using to perform terrorist attacks on non-Minimum Holders. As Nice defeats Moral, the murderer is killed by a resurrected Art. As revealed in Re: Hamatora, Art survived Moral's attack thanks to Regeneration Minimum, and has since been collecting new abilities. He becomes the leader of a gang called Freemum, composed of Minimum Holders who are against the Minimum Agency. Using Freemum and Momoka, Art succeeds in leaving Nice as his only potential enemy. He tries killing Nice to trigger Hajime's Nihilist Minimum, which erases all Minimums in Yokohama. Shortly afterwards, Nice is revived by the powers of Art's late brother, Skill (his heart had been transplanted by Moral years ago during an incident). As a result, the people in Yokohama recover their lost Minimums thanks to Skill's own power. Nice defeats Art, and six months later they reconcile.
Characters
Kagura
The impulsive founder of the detective agency "Kagura", Haru works in the manga as the only detective with Tsukiko's help whereas in the anime he is the half of the "Qi Shinto VR duo" along with his partner Eisuke. He is a former member from an academy of Qi Shintos who left to start a life as a detective, obtaining several allies. He is constantly in need of money, partly due to the fact that he does not care about the cost of a job request more than what it entails. Despite his seemingly carefree nature, Haru is a genius thinker and able to quickly assess information. He always wears a pair of bracelets around his hand which he uses to activate his Shinto ability, known as in the anime and in the manga, allows him to have a set of armor and move at the speed of sound. In Re: Hamatora, using the Qi causes a strain in his body. He is the top-ranked graduate of the Takamagahara Academy and went there alongside Kensuke and Konosuke. His existence is regarded as classified information. He tried to abandon that place alongside Tsukiko in order to see the world, but was shot in the process; his life was saved by Akito, who transplanted Konosuke's heart into Haru's body, saving his life, and left shortly afterwards to discover Tsukiko has amnesia. He detests the academy due to how it judges people based on whether or not they have power and believes power should not be necessary to determine one's worth. In the finale it is revealed Haru has Konosuke's heart as well as his Qi, allowing him to grant others Qi.
The rather reserved other half of the "Qi Shinto VR duo" along with his partner Haru. He is originally an agent of Takamagahara sent to capture Haru, but ended joining him. He is a rational thinker and unlike Haru, prioritizes the cost of a job request over content. He has a bit of an existentialist outlook on things. His Shinto ability known as in the anime and in the manga, is activated when he removes his glasses and greatly hardens his body, giving him super-human like strength. Using the Qi in Re: Hamatora weakens his body. He is a prodigy who is ranked second among the Takamagahara Academy graduates. He dislikes how Haru always manages to surpass him and wishes to defeat him once in order to be acknowledged by him.. In Re: Hamatora, Eisuke tries confronting Kensuke but gets beaten up by Yakuza. While he survives, his Qi disappears, and returns to the group. In the finale, he recovers his Qi. Hirata has commented that while the series its share of comedy, there is also drama in some parts of the story that could result in the viewer becoming emotional. He compared the series with a festival due to the viewer's feelings. He added "The story will be followed with that feeling, what end will be met the complex case intertwined."
A gluttonous girl who spends most of her time at the Nirai Kanai Café. In the manga, she is Haru's only ally and accompanies him to all of his cases. She is one of Kagura's founders. She suffers from memory loss. Tsukiko is a test subject from Takamagahara. She was the first person to survive to a certain experimentation by Akito and was kept in the secrets. In Takamagahara, she met Haru who named her as she was simply known as "success No.01" and invited her to see the world alongside leaving the academy. Her Shinto ability, while initially unexplained, makes her a strong combatant and is said to be able to rival Haru. Her Shinto also heals her wound and is able to unleash a berserk state. By Re: Hamatora it is revealed the Qi is known as the triggered by despair which was first activated by seeing Haru nearly dying. It has the power of nullifying every other Qi around her which cause her friends to go through sideeffects of their powers until they will lose it.
Kōzuki Yakuza
Rie is a Qi Shinto who runs an 'Kōzuki Yakuza' business located in Nirai Kanai Cafe. Her demeanor sometimes gets her into trouble such as when she is wrongfully arrested by the police for a bombing while trying to impress some girls. Rie possesses an unknown disease which nearly caused her death during her childhood. By surviving the surgery that saved her from that death, he defies Junko's stigma and becomes friends with her. She is determined to live as long as she can because he wants to prove Junko wrong by being alive. Her Shinto ability is the which involves electrical manipulation which she activates by biting the tip of a Katana and blitz attacks her enemies. Using it in Re: Hamatora causes her to start absorbing electricity. Besides that her terminal disease is back in later episodes and requires help from Yakuza in order to heal.