Crows (manga)

Crows (Japanese: クローズ, Hepburn: Kurōzu) is a Japanese high school delinquent manga series by Hiroshi Takahashi. It has the same setting and also shares some characters with Takahashi’s later manga QP and Worst. As of April 2009, it had sold more than 46 million copies worldwide.[6][7]

The series was adapted into a two episode OVA by Knack Productions in 1994 which covered the first three volumes of the manga. It inspired three live-action films: Crows Zero in 2007, Crows Zero 2 in 2009 (both directed by Takashi Miike),[8][9] and Crows Explode (directed by Toshiaki Toyoda) in 2014.[10] The films are not direct adaptations but take place before the events of the manga. Several characters from the manga appear in the movies but not the main character Bōya.

Takahashi wrote a one volume side story called Crows Gaiden: Katagiri Ken Monogatari which was published in 2014.[11] A tribute manga called Crows Respect written by various authors was published by Akita Shoten in 2018.[12] Two manga spin-offs were released in 2017 in Monthly Shonen Champion. The first titled Crows: Explode, written by Kōsuke Mukai, Rikiya Mizushima and Takashi Hasegawa and illustrated by Tatsuya Kanda, began on October 6. The manga will be finished on October 6, 2020.[13] The second, Crows Gaiden: Housenka – The Beginning of Housen by Shūhei Saitō, about the beginning of Hōsen Academy, started on November 6.[14]

A beat-em-up game for the Sega Saturn titled Crows: The Battle Action was released in 1997, which was developed and published by Athena.

An action-adventure video game by Bandai Namco Games for PlayStation 4 titled Crows: Burning Edge was released on 27 October 2016, it sold 9,574 units in its first week of release.[15]