Earlier this year, fans sent Nozomi Entertainment their questions for Mr. Haruka Takachiho, the novelist and creator of the Dirty Pair series. Then our friend Akane Hagio of SUNRISE, the company which co-produced the series, had the opportunity to sit down with Mr. Takachiho to chat about the questions… and talk about a lot more, as you’ll discover in this interview except! Fan Question: How do you balance the wacky escapades of the Dirty Pair with the sometimes depressing after effects? Takachiho: I don’t balance them at all. Writers don’t think about it like that. There is more of a natural fl ow to the process. I don’t think you can become a professional if you are always worried about balance. Sunrise: Is the balance created naturally by the characters in the story? Takachiho: Naturally, at the beginning, it is created very meticulously. The original Dirty Pair novels are written in the fi rst person from Kei’s perspective. Since I wrote it from Kei’s perspective, the story is subjective to Kei’s feelings and opinions. Practically speaking, what is actually happening in the story is different from Kei’s telling. It is Kei telling the story, so she bends the facts to make herself look better. I wrote a story where Crusher Joe appeared with the Dirty Pair a while back, and in it, the Dirty Pair were written in the first person, and Crusher Joe was written in the third person. Writing it this way, subtle differences in their stories appeared. Sunrise: Is it easier to write a story from the first person or the third person? Takachiho: Writing from the fi rst person has its advantages, but then describing a scene when the protagonist isn’t there gets diffi cult. When that happens, I have switched to writing in the third person. At these times, the third person is easier to use. Fan Question: Who is your favorite Lovely Angel, or other character, and why? Takachiho: I feel like it isn’t a good idea for writers to become too attached to their characters. That being said, I like the Dirty Pair as a pair of protagonists because they are so in your face. Sunrise: We are guessing there have been characters you didn’t like so much... Takachiho: Yes, that’s why I kill them (laughs). Sunrise: Can we include that comment? Takachiho: Yes, it’s fi ne. All writers do it. Sunrise: When Dirty Pair was adapted into an anime, were there any scenes that were handled differently than you would have liked? How much input did you have with the different series and movies? Takachiho: You raise a tricky point here, as I am a sci-fi author, and in my head, I have an idea of what sci-fi is. I write my stories based on that. Surely, this is different depending on the writer. When it was decided to go with the television show, naturally it was made without necessarily following my personal ideas on sci-fi. There were times when I thought “Say, that isn’t sci-fi .” But that had nothing to do with the value of the story or how entertaining it was. Throughout, I couldn’t help but try and determine if certain places were sci-fi or not. With the film version, I was very vocal and was a real nuisance. I really wanted to make sure the movie was sci-fi , and [I] made it clear from the beginning that if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be happy, but at the start, it seemed the director did not understand what I meant. Sci-fi people like us understand it, but I was having a hard time portraying it, so I had no choice but to get very hands on with this project. Sunrise: Are you talking about, for example, showing new technologies like computers? Takachiho: No, that’s not quite what I mean. It’s like I would have a scene in Tokyo but put a twist on it by having cars driving on the right-hand side, like in the U.S. Those kinds of things. Outer space also has its own rules. The atmosphere must be 3 Kelvin. Also, there is no air. A lot of people don’t understand there is no air in outer space. There are actually movies with people in outer space swimming to get around. What in the heck are they pushing off of to move? Both: That makes 100% sense! Takachiho: The point is there are rules. They go from the really easy to comprehend to the really heady and hard to understand. Once those rules are fully grasped and understood, then the writer has to write within the boundaries of those rules or else risk writing “untruths.” The problem the fi ction writer faces is how to do that. In the movie, wine played an important role. The establishment of the wine in the story felt a little simplistic, so we decided to fi ne tune and insert more details hinting to it. Sunrise: I have seen scenes of “swimming” to move in space. Thinking about it, it doesn’t make sense at all. Takachiho: <strong>Right</strong>! Another one is the idea of “dropping” something in outer space. In this day and age, we know enough about outer space that even a child would know that can’t look right. In 2001: A Space Odyssey, there is a scene of an astronaut in space drinking from a straw, and when he is finishes, the liquid goes back down the straw. It was the sci-fi fans who fi rst said, “That’s a mistake!” For more of the interview visit dirtypair.rightstuf.com! Special thanks to Akane Hagino, with SUNRISE, for helping make this interview possible! - NOZOMI ENTERTAINMENT Dirty Pair TV Series <strong>DVD</strong> Collection 1 Available November 2nd! Dirty Pair TV Series © Takachiho&Studio Nue • SUNRISE.