YuYu Hakusho - Production

Production

Author Yoshihiro Togashi stated that he began working on YuYu Hakusho during a period of time around November 1990, though he forgot the exact time. As a fan of the occult and horror films, he desired to write and illustrate a manga based on his interests. Togashi had previously published an occult detective fiction manga titled Occult Tanteidan, of which he referenced positive reception from readers as a reason for continuing to create manga. When first producing YuYu Hakusho, he did not have a clear idea of what he wanted to call it. He used the tentative title "How to be a Ghost" while presenting rough drafts to his editors. Once given the go-ahead to begin publication, Togashi proposed "YuYu-Ki (Poltergeist Chronicles)" for the title, as there would be battles with demons and it would be a play on the title SaiYu-Ki. Because a series with a similar name (Chin-Yu-Ki) had already begun publication, Togashi quickly created an alternative: "YuYu Hakusho (Poltergeist Report)". He commented that he could have used "Den (Legend)" or "Monogatari (Story)", but "Hakusho (Report)" was the first thing that came to his mind. He contiguously developed the names of the main characters by skimming through a dictionary and taking out kanji characters he found appealing. "Yusuke Urameshi" is a pun, "Kazuma Kuwabara" is a combination of two professional baseball players, and "Hiei" and "Kurama" are "just names that popped into head". When he introduced the latter two characters in volume three, the author had early plans to make Kurama a main character but was not certain about Hiei.

The manga's shift from occult detective fiction to the martial arts genre after Yusuke's death and revival in the early chapters was planned by Togashi from the beginning. The series borrows many elements from Asian folklore, particularly Buddhist beliefs in the afterlife. Togashi came up with the concept of the Ningenkai (human world), Reikai (Underworld), and Makai (Demon Plane) as being parallel planes of existence in the YuYu Hakusho universe. He thought of them as places that one could not easily travel between using modern technology, but rather as a spirit lacking a material body. However, the idea for the "territory" powers from the Sensui story arc was parodied from a separate, unnamed work by Yasutaka Tsutsui. For his drawing materials, Togashi used drafting ink and Kabura pens throughout the creation of the series. While his style of artwork began with screentone, he gradually developed into minimalism. As the series progressed, he would draw figures and faces very detailed or "cartoony, sketchy and jumping with action" whenever he desired such effects.

During the years he worked on YuYu Hakusho, Togashi would calculate the personal time he had based on a formula of four hours per page without scripting and five hours of sleep per night. He wrote in his own dōjinshi Yoshirin de Pon! that he stopped the production on YuYu Hakusho out of selfishness. The author had originally wanted to end the manga in December 1993, at the climax of the Sensui arc. Although there was not a large demand from the editorial staff, Togashi was under a great deal of personal stress at certain points of the series' run, particularly during its final six months of publication. He claimed that, beginning with the Dark Tournament arc, inconsistent sleep resulting from overwork was causing him health problems. He noted himself as being very ill while working on the color pages for Yusuke's match with Chu. There were also many instances where he would create nearly entire manuscripts by himself, such as Yusuke's meeting with Raizen and the battle between Kurama and Karasu. Togashi was relieved at the conclusion of the manga.