While I was distracted by hololive VTuber Hoshimachi Suisei being part of Forbes Japan’s 30 Under 30 2025 list and appearing on the cover of its newly released October 2025 issue, more focused minds than mine spotted someone from the anime industry in the list: the animator Kerorira, who is also the character designer of the popular Bocchi the Rock! anime adaptation.
Kerorira (real name Kiyoki Rikuta, born in 1995) is listed under the Art & Style category, alongside names like artist Sawako Naso and fashion designer Hana Yagi. His profile mentions his involvement in Bocchi the Rock!, My Dress-Up Darling, and Trapezium, and that he is currently mostly involved with CloverWorks productions.
Also noted is the animator training project spearheaded by Keiichiro Saito (the director of Bocchi the Rock! Season 1, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End) and Kerorira at CloverWorks. The project was announced in May 2025 and aims to build up both human resources and a production system.
Kerorira’s contributions are many. Some of the titles he has worked on (non key animation roles will be listed in brackets) include:
• Umamusume: Pretty Derby Road to the Top (Episode 1 assistant animation director)
• “Page of Lambda” Opening Animation
• Synduality Noir opening animation
• OSHI NO KO Season 2 opening animation
• Do It Yourself!! (also co-animation director, Episode 4)
• Encouragement of Climb Next Summit
• Made in Abyss: The Golden City of the Scorching Sun opening animation
• Rent-A-Girlfriend Season 2 opening animation
• Akebi’s Sailor Uniform
• CHARMS!! first animation PV (direction and character designer)
• Sonny Boy [on the Saito-storyboarded-and-directed Episode 8]
The animator, whose cute and simplified style of drawing characters is instantly recognizable, is also credited as visual director for Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club The Movie – Finale – Chapter 1. His name is missing from the website staff credits of Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club The Movie – Finale – Chapter 2, but the upcoming movie still has the Kerorira-fied aesthetic introduced by its predecessor.
A Bocchi the Rock! staff interview (translated by Sakuga Blog) revealed that Kerorira had an involvement in the anime’s beginnings. According to the show’s animation producer Shota Umehara, Kerorira had told him about his interest in working on a potential adaptation, and the conversation’s timing coincided with an actual offer from Aniplex arriving at CloverWorks, causing Umehara to ask fellow CloverWorks producer Yuichi Fukushima to continue discussions. Umehara also consulted Kerorira on what he liked about the manga to learn “what aspects the fans took to and what they would want to see, and tried to leverage that for the anime production.”
That interview also revealed that Kerorira proposed Saito as a director candidate, and that the character designer contributed “somewhere between 500 and 600 cuts as a key animator,” which Umehara noted to be “an incredible amount.”
The upcoming second season of Bocchi the Rock! Season 2 has Kerorira sharing character design credits with Keito Oda (whose name is listed first), who is effectively Kerorira’s successor for the sequel.
You can view the rest of the Forbes Japan 30 Under 30 2025 list here. The 30 Under 30 list highlights “young people changing the world.”
Source: Forbes Japan
