is a Japanese novel written by Akinari Asakura. It was published by Futabasha in May 2022. The novel received a manga adaptation illustrated by Ōtori556 in July 2025 and a live-action film adaptation in September 2025.
Plot One day, Taisuke Yamagata, who works for a major house builder, is suddenly named a "murderer" on the internet after an image of a female college student's corpse is shared from a social media account that is thought to belong to him. Taisuke, who has no recollection of the incident, pleads his innocence, but no one believes him at all, and in the blink of an eye, all of Taisuke's personal information is exposed, causing a huge uproar on the internet, and Taisuke ends up being chased from all over Japan. Taisuke makes a desperate escape as he tries to find the real culprit who committed the crime.
Characters
Media Novel Not Me That Went Viral is a novel written by Akinari Asakura. He previously wrote stories about young people in their adolescence. He decided to broaden his readership by choosing the theme "online shaming", a topic he believes that "everyone in modern times could potentially be involved in". It was published by Futabasha in 2022.
Publications May 19, 2022: Not Me That Went Viral (), , Futabasha June 12, 2024: Not Me That Went Viral (), , Futabasha
Manga A manga adaptation of the novel illustrated by Ōtori556 began serialization in Futabasha's Manga Action magazine on July 15, 2025. It was. The first volume was released on September 25, 2025, coinciding with the release of the live-action film adaptation. As of May 2026, two volumes have been released.
Volumes
Live-action film Tamio Hayashi wrote the scripted of the film first, after which Atsuhiro Yamada was picked as the director. After reading the script and noticing that the humor is the same as in the original work, he decided to make the film in a "lighthearted, entertaining style." He then decided to pick Hiroshi Abe as the main actor. Abe plays as Taisuke Yamagata.
Many of the scenes were filmed in Hamamatsu. The film's theme song is performed by Wanima.
A live-action film adaptation was announced in January 2025. The first trailer was released on April 25. As part of the promotion of the film, Shochiku launched a fictional social networking service called , where no matter what photo someone posts, it is guaranteed to go viral. It uses an AI that has been trained to understand the thought process behind "unreasonable fault-finding" on social media; then the AI will thoroughly search for flaws in the image posted by a user, automatically generating a scenario for online outrage.
It was released on September 26, 2025, and was screened in over 300 theaters across Japan.
Analysis Not Me That Went Viral is told from multiple perspectives. Ossy from Dengeki Online noted that the novel uses "narrative trickery in its writing", while the live-action films "cleverly uses its structure to mislead the audience."
Toshiaki Endo of Real Sound noted that Asakusa has "woven a large mechanism" into the novel's story, adding that he depicts the "selfish way in which individuals think, more than the mechanism of the internet that amplifies and spreads information."
Reception The book reached 3rd place at The Asahi Shimbun Weekly Top Seller on September 10, 2022. It was nominated for the 37th Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize in 2023. The book was a finalist and won the Excellent Award at the 7th National Middle High School Bibliobattle in 2024.
Kensuke Nonami of The Asahi Shimbun praised the novel, calling it a "cleverly crafted piece". Maki Tomokazu of Sponichi praised the film, stating that it "flows smoothly from beginning to end", and that, "in a good way, it doesn't try to be flashy".
References
External links (novel) (manga) (live-action film)