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The story
Manga artist Shun Saeki, the artist behind Food Wars! (Shokugeki no Soma), announced on X on November 1 that his exclusive contract with Shueisha has come to an end. He says he won’t be taking long-term work for now, but is opening himself up to new jobs in art, illustration, character design, and similar fields. On 5ch, alongside curiosity about what he’d been doing since Soma wrapped and how an art-only manga artist makes a living going forward, discussion also covered doubts about the exclusive-contract system itself and comparisons with the recent activity of other art-credit artists like Jun Watanabe.
Manga artist Shun Saeki, known as the artist for Food Wars! (Shokugeki no Soma), which ran in Weekly Shonen Jump, updated his X account on the 1st to announce that his exclusive contract with Shueisha has ended.
Alongside an illustration from his signature work Food Wars!, he wrote on X: “[Report and Announcement] I, Shun Saeki, have completed the long-standing exclusive contract I held with Shueisha.”
He continued: “My heartfelt thanks to everyone who has supported me over the years. With this, I’ll be taking on new work. That said, I won’t be accepting long-term commitments for the time being. Available for: art duties, illustration, character design, and similar jobs. I hope this leads to some wonderful new connections. Thank you very much.”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Mixing ecchi with cooking was a genuinely novel idea.
Huh, is that what kind of series it was?
Wasn't that serialized in Shonen Sunday?
I remember finding that combo kind of gross.
Looking forward to some 'thin' material from him from here on. (slang for racy doujinshi)
but apparently he turned the exclusivity down himself because he wanted to try his hand at a different magazine.
Guess he's finally able to cut that tie.
How's he going to make a living now?
Why would that be?
A good third of Food Wars! was basically ecchi anyway.
Kentaro Yabuki's daughter is apparently understanding about it, but family isn't always that simple. (Yabuki draws ecchi titles like To Love-Ru)
Look forward to Professor AI's next work.
Wonder if this guy's going to follow in their footsteps.
He originally came from drawing adult manga anyway.
There are still people out there who didn't know he started out in adult manga……
There are still people out there who didn't know he started out in adult manga……
Jun Watanabe still has an ongoing series.
Someone with this guy's track record should find work fast, but he hasn't had a series in Jump since Soma ended, so who knows.
I'll bite — Jun Watanabe still has an ongoing series,
and every now and then his X posts where he draws and studies popular 'bishoujo' characters go viral…
You're seriously out of the loop, lol.
Honestly though, what the story writer on Daimon Take 2 is doing these days is the real mystery.
Where'd you even get that idea?
Kodansha's Otowa Group and the Shogakukan/Shueisha Hitotsubashi Group are rivals.
he still gets paid monthly, and the exclusive contract just stays in effect the whole time.
Is it the same deal for Masanori Morita and the Ninku author?
Weekly Shonen Magazine absolutely never shows nipples.
Not even a 'nipple pass' in the collected volumes.
At least Jump has stuff like Yuragi-sou with its nipple passes — that's something.
I don't want to see talent for ecchi go to waste like it did with Atsushi Ohkubo. (slang for a scene where nipples slip past censorship)
I'm pretty sure there was a nipple pass in the collected volume though.
Shueisha locks artists in exclusively —
you get a contract fee for the duration.
That's where the line 'You can only read Sensei So-and-so's work in Jump!' comes from.
I once asked whether AI could write a mega-hit manga.
It can produce something average or market-friendly, and the quality keeps improving,
but apparently it can't create something that truly resonates.
Setting the Ninku author aside, doesn't Morita have a regular series going?
He was still serializing up until two years ago.
That's probably the short-run serialization in Grand Jump, right?
That's part of it, but I was also wondering if editors just aren't bringing him a steady stream of new projects anymore.
Honestly, that series was like 90% carried by the art.
Background and Key Points of the Discussion
An “exclusive contract” is a Shueisha system where the publisher pays a star artist a contract fee in exchange for not working for rival magazines, and the contract can stay active even during stretches when the artist isn’t actively drawing. The thread raised questions like whether an art-only artist loses work once the writer’s story ends, citing the Kinnikuman author and Jun Watanabe’s recent activity to illustrate how tough a career built purely on art duty can be. The fact that Saeki originally came from adult manga drew some “didn’t know that” reactions, and that point ended up being the most divisive part of the thread. Note that neither “the reason the contract ended” nor “details of his next work” were specified in his own announcement — claims that his wife pressured him over divorce, or that it’s tied to a cancelled serialization, are all thread speculation with no confirmation. Readers should keep that distinction in mind.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News Plus) thread “Manga artist Shun Saeki’s exclusive contract with Shueisha ends — artist of signature work Food Wars!.”
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