The second novel, Osamu Dazai and the Dark Era, is the story that changed everything. From the very start of Season 2 onward, each season would begin with a novel adaptation, typically set years prior to the start of the anime. The conclusion affects him and informs how he acts later when he discourages Atsushi from saving Kyouka before he's proved wrong by Atsushi's bravery.īy the end, it’s a clever adaptive choice that is often forgotten either because fans are unaware of its origin as a novel or because every other novel adaptation is more clearly labeled. It’s unclear why exactly this was changed, but it might have been to give Kunikida more of an arc within Season 1. In the novel, these events happened before the events of the anime, before Atsushi was brought into the Agency.Īs the title suggests, this case was Dazai’s entrance exam to the Armed Detective Agency, but in the anime, it's just another investigation set after Dazai becomes a full-fledged member. Anime watchers will recall Episodes 6 and 7 of Season 1, which involved an investigation of the Azure Messenger and its ties to an old investigation. The first novel is a very peculiar case, because, through the anime, the context of the story was altered considerably. Of the remaining two, one is a novelization of the movie Dead Apple by Hiro Iwahata, and the other is a novelization of the early episodes of the anime by Mari Kosaka, intended as a children’s book, funnily enough. For the sake of this article, this will only be a discussion of the novels written by Asagiri.

Most anime fans familiar with the existence of these novels might think that the anime only started adapting them at the start of Season 2, but in fact, the anime has been implementing them from the beginning. These novels, far from supplementary content, expand on the world of Bungo, as well as reveal insights into characters’ pasts and the events that have shaped the story fundamentally. Of the ten published, eight have been written by series author Kafka Asagiri, and while some have already been adapted, there are others that have not yet, begging to question which will come next. Across four seasons and one feature film, Bungo Stray Dogs has crafted a rich narrative that adapts not only the original manga but several of the novels.

Early light osamu dazai