Chibi Maruko-chan Anime Celebrates 1,500 Episodes With 1-hour Special

The staff of the Chibi Maruko-chan anime announced on Sunday the anime will celebrate its 1,500th episode with a one-hour special that will air on May 1. The staff also revealed a special logo to commemorate the achievement.

The 1,500th episode will feature two stories. The "Maruko to Yamazakura" (Maruko and Mountain Cherry Trees) story will center on beautiful cherry trees, and the "Maruko, Kin-chan ni Aitai" story will center on Maruko's desire to see "Kin-chan" from a television program.

The original Chibi Maruko-chan manga inspired a television anime that is almost consistently the #3 rated television anime series after Sazae-san and Detective Conan. (Chibi Maruko-chan airs on Fuji TV on Sundays at 6:00 p.m., before Sazae-san at 6:30 p.m.) The first anime series ran from 1990 to 1992, and the ongoing second series premiered in 1995.

The manga's creator Momoko Sakura passed away due to breast cancer at the age of 53 in August 2018. She serialized the manga in Shueisha's Ribon magazine from 1986 to 1996. The comedy manga, which follows the everyday life of a third-grade schoolgirl, has about 32 million copies in print. Sakura launched a four-panel version in a Japanese newspaper in 2007, and she ended that version in 2011.

The Chibi Maruko-chan manga is getting new chapters drawn by Sakura Production, which is staffed by long-time assistants of Sakura. The manga is running irregularly in Ribon.

Source: Chibi Maruko-chan anime's website, Mainichi Shimbun's Mantan Web