Satoshi Kon was born on October 12, 1963. While in college, at the Musashino Art University, Kon made his debut as a manga artist with the short manga Toriko (1984) and earned a runner-up spot in Kodansha's 10th Annual Tetsuya Chiba Awards. Afterward, he found work as Katsuhiro Otomo's assistant. Kon is credited by some, including TIME, magazine as one of the faces most responsible for bringing Japanese pop-culture to America. His feature length films, Perfect Blue, Paprika, Millennium Actress, and Tokyo Godfathers, were all distributed in theaters across the States and saw critical acclaim worldwide earning a number of awards in the process. Kon died on August 24, 2010 at the age of 46.