Radical 7th Years

**Radical 7th Years** (過激派七年生 *Kageki-ha Nana-nensei*) is a 1965 gag manga by Fujio Akatsuka, serialized for a short time in Separate Edition Manga Sunday.

## Overview

By 1965, the success of Osomatsu-kun had lead to its reader demographic being much broader than that of its initial target audience of children. Manga Sunday, a seinen magazine which had already serialized Akatsuka's adult comedy one-shot Ostess Kariko, would take note of this as Akatsuka was readying up a new series for their Separate Edition publication.

The May issue of Separate Edition Manga Sunday would preview the concept of the new title, which would be an adult's answer to *Osomatsu-kun* with this mission statement:

***"A life philosophy learned in the seventh year of university- All should live their lives to an extreme degree."***

The title thus revolves around three college students too foolish and dysfunctional to ever be able to graduate, making them apt to stay eternally immature and young at heart. The start of "Student Movements" in colleges in Japan helped to keep the characters as chaotic as their title would suggest.

Unfortunately, as *Separate Edition Manga Sunday* would wind up a defunct publication soon after the start of the title, *Radical 7th Years* only lasted a grand total of five chapters and has no true wrap-up. The characters would also never exist long enough to dare catch on with Student Movement members in colleges, the way Nyarome would with Extraordinary Ataro several years later.

The fact that this series has fallen to obscurity is reflected on the Koredeiinoda website, which would treat one of the protagonists as originating from You Love Me-kun and having no trace of the other two main characters.

## Characters

A trio of students who have been in college for seven years, and don't look to be advancing any further any time soon. They all room in a house together, and are bugged by an obnoxious old lady living downstairswho seems to have feelings for them. The three men have their preferences set on a pretty, younger neighborhood woman known as Otama-chan and try to impress her however they can.

The trio are not name-dropped in the feature, though the Iyami-like man is known as "Mr. Kyouyou" in his next outing in *You Love Me-kun* and the Chibita-like guy is referred to as "Chibi" as a nickname.

## Serialization

* Separate Edition Manga Sunday: June to September 1965, as well as the September extra number issue

The following chapters comprise this series:

1. **"The Story of Searching for a Sponsor"** (スポンサーを探せの巻, June)
2. **"The Story of an Iron-Knee Date"** (ヒザ鉄デートの巻, July)
3. **"The Story of Docking"** (ドッキングの巻, August)
4. **"The Story of the Ninja Widow's Trick"** (忍法後家だましの巻,, September)
5. **"The Story of the Independence Test"** (自立度テストの巻, September special edition)

Aside from a brief reprint of chapter 1 in the *Weekly Manga Sunday* Extra Edition for January 8, 1966, there has never been a collected edition of this title or any attempts to reprint the entire feature.

The re-use of Mr. Kyouyou in *You Love Me-kun* at least gave some slight recognition beyond that, along with Otama-chan appearing as an escaped asylum patient in one of the series' chapters. The three men would make a surprise cameo together in the Osomatsu-kun chapter "Butamatsu-kun" as well, being shown as some Waseda students that Osomatsu encounters while turned into a pig.

## External Links

* Radical 7th Years write-up at the Akatsuka Preservation Society (Japanese)