-Are there any characters you have a strong emotional attachment to in a work you didn’t direct?
Yamada: Free!’s Gou-chan is the cutest ever. I absolutely love her. Her long skirt, her perfectly fitting uniform, her somewhat thin ponytail…. She just looks cute. She’s not just girlish too; she’s got some boyish traits in her as well. Like her hair color is the same as her onii-chan’s.
Takemoto: Yamada-san’s love of high school girls is too much. (laughs)
Yamada: I love them. I would always compete to do Gou-chan’s cuts with Free!’s Usumi-san. (Hiroko Utsumi was the director for Free!) I think I may love Gou-chan more than she does. (laughs)
Takemoto: Utsumi-san talked with me one time saying “Takemoto-san…. I’m worried that Yamada-san and (Taichi) Ogawa-kum love Gou-chan too much!’ (laughs) You let your love of Gou-chan show way too much. (laughs) (Director Utsumi-san wanted you to) Enjoy drawing the guys instead!
Yamada: But it was natural for me to draw Gou-chan when her scenes came up in the episode I directed, so I didn’t feel guilty about that. (laughs) It’s not like I switched from a different cut. (laughs)
Ishihara: Utsumi-san directed episode 5 of Chuunibyou and an episode of Hyouka. I don’t think that anyone else would have drawn Houtarou’s (Oreki from Hyouka) rear with as much vigor as she did. (laughs) Women have a fainter drawing stroke, so when I saw that the storyboards for episode 5 of Chuunibyou were so thin during the school swimsuit scene, I had her re-do it.
Takemoto: Yamada-san loves high school girls. Utaumi-san loves high school boys. (laughs)
Yamada: However she continues to draw muscles as much as she wants until she’s pleased with how they look.