Sponsored by Tapas Entertainment
One of the most anticipated anime to come out in January 2024 didn’t originate from a Japanese series; it came, surprisingly, from a Korean series called Solo Leveling. Solo Leveling‘s story about a weak protagonist who rises and becomes the strongest hero is one that has resonated with readers, and it wouldn’t be wrong to suggest that Solo Leveling really helped popularize the concept of a hero who strives to become the most strongest/OP (overpowered) of them all and vertical storytelling as a whole.
Yet Solo Leveling‘s massive popularity didn’t come out of nowhere. To understand Solo Leveling‘s rise, we have to go all the way back to the beginning when it was first conceived as a web novel.
The Beginnings of the Weakest Hero
In a world where powerful human beings called Hunters fight against monsters that erupt from gates, there is no place for the weak–much less a place for E-rank Hunters who are regarded as a liability. Sung Jinwoo is the weakest of the weak, and is less of a Hunter than a slightly more durable human being. But as the sole breadwinner of the family, with his mother sick in the hospital, being a Hunter is the only thing he can do.
One day, Jinwoo encounters a dangerous double dungeon, and he’s not so sure if he’ll escape with his life intact this time. With his life hanging by the slimmest of threads, an opportunity of a lifetime lands in his lap when he gets chosen to be a Player where he gets to “level up” in strength, thus giving him the chance to surpass his limits and beyond.
That is Chugong’s story of Solo Leveling, or alternatively translated to Only I Level Up. Beginning as a web novel series in February 2017 on KakaoPage, Solo Leveling quickly became one of the most popular series on the platform. The main story concluded in July 2017 with side stories releasing thereafter and wrapping up in March 2018. The novel was later published by D&C Media in Korea with Yen Press licensing it for its English print release in February 2017.
As of this article’s writing, the web novel has achieved a whopping 470 million views on KakaoPage (with the combined global views for webtoon and web novel exceeding 14.3 billion.)
Solo Leveling’s Rising Popularity as a Webcomic
As the web novel’s popularity increased, so did interest in turning it into a scrolling webcomic. REDICE Studio announced that it would adapt the series into a webcomic with illustrator DUBU, of REDICE STUDIO, handling the artwork and Hyun-gun writing the adaptation. When the webcomic launched in March 2018, Solo Leveling gained a whole legion of new fans who were pulled in by DUBU’s exquisite artwork and the epic action scenes that were illustrated with so much care and attention.
Two years later, the webcomic was translated into English and published by Tapas and Tappytoon in April 2021 and June 2020, respectively. The webcomic ended with 179 chapters in December 2021 on the Korean platform and a few months later in April 2022 on the English platforms. Like the web novel, the Solo Leveling webcomic also reached astronomical levels of popularity with over 45 million accumulated views from the two English platforms, with readers constantly praising DUBU’s ability to breathe life into the series through his illustrations.
Even now, despite the series ending in 2021 on KakaoPage, it still remains one of the most popular webcomic series, consistently ranking in the top bracket of the “Top 300 real-time [1] rankings” list. As of this article’s writing, the webcomic has received over 510 million views on the platform.
The Loss of a Solo Leveling Icon
Given how incredibly popular the webcomic became, it was only a matter of time before the Solo Leveling anime adaptation was announced. And when the announcement dropped in July 2022, fans were thrilled, but there wasn’t anyone who was more excited about the news than the webcomic artist himself.
In Crunchyroll’s translation of his statement, DUBU wrote, “It feels like only yesterday that we got the offer for the anime adaptation. I feel so overwhelmed when I think that the anime is really being created right now.” After thanking fans’ love and asking that they extend that same love and support to the anime’s production team, he ended his message with, “If this anime gives new enjoyment to the readers, I’ll be very happy.”
Two weeks later, on July 23, 2022, REDICE Studio announced that DUBU, whose real name was Jang Sang-rak, had passed away. He would never see the series he worked so hard on come to life on screen.
DUBU’s death hit hard. Fans were devastated at the legend’s passing. Much of Solo Leveling’s success can be attributed to DUBU’s highly detailed and beautiful artwork and the loss of such talent dealt a significant blow to the webcomic world.
Half a year later, REDICE Studio announced a Solo Leveling side story to honor DUBU’s legacy, illustrated by DUBU’s disciples, credited as DISCIPLES (REDICE STUDIO). The content of the side stories leaned more towards a slice-of-life approach such as showing the reunion between Jinwoo and Cha Hae-In, Jinwoo adapting to life in the human world, and even a sneak peek of Ragnarok of Suho as a child and his life with his father’s shadow soldiers.
The side stories launched in January 2023 and concluded in May 2023 with 21 episodes. When readers scrolled to the end, they were greeted with a heartfelt note from the artists:
“To DUBU,” it read, “we owe all our achievements to you. Your presence has always been our beacon of strength. Your absence is still deeply felt, and our hearts overflow with gratitude and affection.”
That was going to be the last fans would hear about the webcomic for some time.
Solo Leveling Arises in an Anime
As if the name Solo Leveling, by itself, wasn’t enough to heighten the anticipation leading up to the anime adaptation, Solo Leveling unveiled some big names behind the production team, the first being the studio. A-1 Pictures had produced hits like Black Butler, Sword Art Online, Erased, Kaguya-sama: Love is War?, Your Lie in April, and 86 Eighty-Six which brought a sense of relief to fans that the beloved series was in good hands.
Director Shunsuke Nakashige, who worked on “BanG Dream!” and “Sword Art Online Alicization,” helmed the project. Before joining “Solo Leveling,” Nakashige directed and storyboarded “Mother of The Goddess’ Dormitory!” Noboru Kimura, who wrote the screenplay for “Spy Classroom,” joined as the leading writer. Character design was handled by Tomoko Sudo, who served as animation director for “Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku” and “Sword Art Online the Movie: Ordinal Scale.”
But perhaps the name attached that had the most buzz was the composer, the brilliant Hiroyuki Sawano. Sawano composed the scores for The Seven Deadly Sins, Blue Exorcist, and his most well-known series of all, Attack on Titan. Everyone who had heard Sawano’s previous compositions before knew that they were in for an epic soundtrack for Solo Leveling. And anime/K-Pop fans had another reason to be excited because the opening theme song for Season 1 was going to be performed by Tomorrow x Together and Sawano.
When the first episode of Solo Leveling aired on Crunchyroll, fans had to wait again. As soon as Solo Leveling dropped, the website crashed. Jinwoo’s arising had broken Crunchyroll. The popularity of the anime didn’t cease as the episodes continued airing, and as the final episode aired in March, Season 2, titled Arise from the Shadow, was announced – with release planned for January 2025.
Solo Leveling’s Other Ventures
Aside from the anime and webcomic, Solo Leveling has expanded its IP into other adaptations. Netmarble released a role-playing video game called Solo Leveling:Arise which had its global launch in May 2024. The game includes new Original Hunters, and some Original Hunters even had webcomic tie-in origin story one-shots.
In a 2023 interview with L’Internaute, Heaeun Kwak, the D&C Webtoon creative director, revealed that Solo Leveling was in the process of being turned into a live-action adaptation.
Kwak didn’t give any other information other than “it was in the works,” although, there were rumors that the live action may be produced by a studio in the United States as early as 2021. Since that interview in October 2023, all has been quiet on the live action front.
A New Beginning – Solo Leveling: Ragnarok
Though the original story of the weakest Hunter may have ended, that didn’t mean Solo Leveling had to. Nearly six years after the conclusion of the web novel, Solo Leveling rose again in the form of a sequel web novel series called Solo Leveling: Ragnarok, published in April 2023. Just as Jinwoo’s legacy has passed down to his son Suho, Chugong, the original writer of Solo Leveling, has opted to do the same and has given his blessing to the writer, Daul, to continue and expand the world of Solo Leveling.
Ragnarok follows Jinwoo’s son Suho who has, so far, lived a rather uneventful life – other than the fact that his teenage years have been plagued with nightmares about an ant soldier and his parents have been missing ever since his first year in high school, he’s a pretty normal teenager.
That is, until a gate spawns right on campus while he and his classmates are at an art gallery. Things look dire and he’s seconds away from dying when a system greets him as a Player and the ant soldier from his dreams appears before him.
The Ragnarok web novel is ongoing and has garnered more than 70 million views as of this article’s writing and has ranked consistently in the top bracket on KakaoPage.
A webcomic adaptation of Ragnarok was announced in July and released on July 31 with REDICE Studio developing the series and REDICE Studio’s JIN as the artist. The story debuted with 2 million views on the first day. The sequel webcomic is rated 9.9 on KakaoPage as of this article’s writing.
And now, fans can finally read Solo Leveling Ragnarok in English: the debut is set for this week on November 11th! In addition, the novel is currently available to read on Tapas.
Solo Leveling‘s astronomical rise has been nothing short of amazing. Just as Jinwoo rose from being the weakest to the strongest being, Solo Leveling has risen to become one of the biggest names in the webcomic world. And with the success of its anime adaptation, it has, no doubt, helped with opening the door for more Korean manhwa and webcomics to “level up.”
Sponsored by Tapas Entertainment
