Fusanosuke Natsume said that prior to entering university, Urasawa's style showed influence from Shinji Nagashima and Osamu Tezuka's 1970s work, but went on to claim that in 1979 it became aligned with that of Katsuhiro Otomo. When talking in 1997 about the future of manga, Urasawa opined that "Tezuka created the form that exists today, then caricatures appeared next, and comics changed again when Katsuhiro Otomo came on the scene. I don't think there's any room left for further changes." He has also expressed admiration for French "bande dessinée" artist Moebius and American novelist Stephen King. Although Urasawa's works like "Yawara!" had light entertainment with cute young girls, Natsume says Urasawa developed his own personal style with "Monster", which he described as realistic, or directorially based, with cinematic panel layouts similar to Otomo and gekiga artists. Natsume also noted that many of his characters resemble famous movie stars. Urasawa himself described his approach to manga as similar to storyboarding a movie, and acknowledged his work as adult-oriented, stating that even as a child he never liked manga aimed at children. However, he noted that he and Otomo both prefer to have their work called manga and not gekiga.