Naver Line Manga Original 'Sunbae-neun Namjaai', Japanese Animation Production

The original webtoon of Naver Webtoon's Japanese service, 'LINE Manga,' will be produced as a Japanese animation.

LINE Digital Frontier, which operates LINE Manga, announced on the 3rd that the Japanese original webtoon 'Senpai wa Otokonoko' will be produced as a TV animation through Japan's ANIPLEX.

ANIPLEX is a subsidiary of Sony Music Group in Japan and is a global comprehensive entertainment company centered on animation. Its representative works include the globally popular animation 'Demon Slayer' and the game 'Fate/Grand Order.'

The animation original 'Senpai wa Otokonoko' is a first-generation Japanese webtoon discovered in LINE Manga's amateur creative space, 'Indies.' LINE Manga has been operating the Indies system since 2015, modeled after Naver Webtoon's 'Challenge Comics,' allowing anyone to showcase their works online.

The webtoon 'Senpai wa Otokonoko' was first introduced on Indies in December 2019 and, supported by Japanese readers, was confirmed for official serialization on LINE Manga within 16 weeks. It has expanded overseas serialization into languages including Korean, French, and Thai, reaching a global cumulative view count of 180 million.

A Naver Webtoon official stated, "Since the early stages of overseas expansion, we have been striving to create an overseas webtoon ecosystem based on Korea's creator-win-win model, and the local creative ecosystem has grown remarkably to the extent that local production companies interested in webtoon adaptations have taken notice."