Hayashida, Q

Q Hayashida (林田球) is a Japanese manga artist born in Tokyo in 1977. She studied oil painting at the Tokyo University of the Arts before pivoting to manga, training herself rather than taking the traditional apprenticeship route. Her career began in 1997 with a one-shot, and she made her major debut with Maken X Another (1999–2001), a tie-in for a video game.

Her signature work, Dorohedoro, ran from 2000 to 2018 across 23 volumes and built a devoted cult following for its grimy, chaotic fantasy world, dark humor, and densely detailed artwork. It was adapted into an anime by MAPPA in 2020. Her current series, Dai Dark, continues in a similar vein with a science-fantasy setting. Hayashida is known for her mixed-media cover art, which uses layers of paint on textured paper.

She has discussed her childhood and artistic inspirations in interviews (see below), but otherwise maintains a high level of privacy about her personal life, to the point that her true name and face are unknown.

Interview (2010-04-21) with VIZ Media
Her Personal Blog with Various Interviews

1990s

1997
Sofa-chan (ソファーちゃん)

2000s

2000
Dorohedoro (ドロヘドロ) | Published in English as "Dorohedoro" (2000 - 2018)
魔剣X ANoTHER (2000 - 2001)

2010s

2011
Huvahh (フヴァッ)

2015
Tama (球) | One shot for Hanshin taigāsu sōsetsu 80 shūnenkinen zōkan (阪神タイガース 創設80周年記念増刊)

2019
Dai Dark (大ダーク) | Published in English as "Dai Dark" (2019 - present)