Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle - Production

Production

Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle began with an inspiration of the four-member team, Clamp, to link their works set in a realistic world with their works set in different fantasy worlds. Prior to beginning work on Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, Clamp had created the manga Cardcaptor Sakura, from which the two main characters are taken. Clamp decided to draw Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle by using a style first conceived by Osamu Tezuka, named the "father of manga" and often credited as the "father of anime", known as Osamu Tezuka's Star System. In this system, characters with the same name and design are used in different settings, drawing mostly from the vast character pool of its own works and occasionally from others' works. Unlike characters under the Star System, three months prior to the release of Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, the Young Magazine began serializing Clamp's xxxHolic, a manga whose two main characters, Kimihiro Watanuki and Yūko Ichihara, are two of the same characters used in Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle; both series run in parallel. Like many of their other works, each member of Clamp had a role different from their other projects instead of retaining set roles. For Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, Mokona drew the main characters, whereas Tsubaki Nekoi and Satsuki Igarashi drew the side characters and backgrounds; Nanase Ohkawa was the sole person in charge of the storyline; the other members of Clamp were not told in advance how the plot would unfold. There are some reference to Chobits

A special interview with Ohkawa and Kiichiro Sugawara, Clamp's editor from the Weekly Shōnen Magazine's Editorial Department, took place after the story of Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle had progressed past the arc from Ōto Country. Ohkawa has stated that the group is very conscious of the fact that Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle is the title in Shōnen Magazine with the youngest readership and that it is their very first foray into the shōnen demographic. Thus, the members of Clamp ensure that they employ a drawing style and dialogue appropriate for young male audiences; the manga incorporates furigana that makes reading Japanese easier. To aid in this effort, the group holds conferences with Sugawara where they discuss the plot. Ohkawa stated during the interview that the only time the story significantly changed was during Country of Jade arc; It went from a "horror story with vampires" to a "detective mystery".

The members of Clamp had some difficulty adjusting from their typical style after deciding to publish with Weekly Shōnen Magazine. Because their typical thinner lines did not give the desired impact, Ohkawa expressed the group's desire to make their lines thicker, and to use simpler layouts similar to the other stories already present in Shōnen Magazine. She stated that they used their original artistic style to attract initial readers and then slowly transitioned to a new style. Sometime around when the story arc focused on the Country of Ōto took place, their art style had gradually been changing again; at this point they were thinking of returning to their original style. They were still adjusting to a weekly schedule; many of their previous works were on a monthly schedule. Sugawara expressed concerns about the strain on the artists of concurrently doing a weekly issue of Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle linked with xxxHolic, but in the end he whole-heartedly approved. In accordance with Ohkawa's desire for each to have a well organized story, Clamp avoids putting references between the two stories too frequently. The main idea was connecting these two series was to have protagonists from two different manga with different personalities and designs. However, during the ending they would be stated to share the same existence, and had to go on different paths. As Tsubasa is connected with xxxHolic, the characters' designs are also meant to be similar; Like xxxHolic, the artwork is sometimes influenced by Ukiyo-e art style which leads to the characters have longer limbs. When asked if another series influenced Tsubasa in the concept of parallel worlds, Ohkawa replied that she was not a fan of sci-fi series and pointed that all worlds shown in the series were other works from Tsubasa. At the same time, she wanted to segregate Tsubasa from previous works. She also explained that while some characters are the same, their traits and personalities were modified due to different backstories.

When thinking about including character goods with the volume releases, Sugawara came up with the atypical idea of releasing a deluxe and normal edition of the manga after contemplating the inconsistency of novels getting both a soft-cover and hard-cover release, but manga only received one version. Because it was a new concept, the group experienced several mishaps such as accidentally placing a vertically flipped illustration on the first deluxe edition. The group also decided to use another atypical practice of keeping catchphrases that appeared in the magazine identical to the ones that appear on the frontispieces of the deluxe editions.