A Maomao Portrait Built Out of Fan Posts
A wall-sized board near the Hachiko-side ticket gates at Shibuya Station shows Maomao looking back out at the crowd. Up close, the image breaks apart. Every tile in it is a message a fan wrote to the show's production team.
Cosmetics and supplement maker FANCL collected those messages through an X campaign that ran from July 6 to August 20, 2026 under the hashtag #薬屋制作チームを応援したい, which translates to roughly "I want to cheer on the Apothecary Diaries production team." More than 1,700 posts came in. The company then arranged them into a portrait of Maomao, the apothecary pulled into the imperial rear palace whose nose for poison drives the series' mysteries.
The board occupies the Tokyu Den-en-toshi Line's Shibuya "Big 20" ad space near the Hachiko gate. It runs from Monday, September 21 through Sunday, September 27, 2026. In its PR TIMES release, FANCL asks visitors not to bring questions about the display to station staff, and to stand clear of foot traffic while viewing it.
An Eye-Care Brand Pitching the Animation Desk, Not the Audience
Most anime brand tie-ups point the product at viewers. This one points it at the crew. FANCL frames the whole campaign around animators and staff who spend long stretches of their day looking hard at a screen, and positions its eye-care brand Enkin as backing the "I want to do more" drive that comes with that kind of work. FANCL asked for the fan messages on those terms: support for the people making the show.
The product behind the campaign is Enkin Premium, which FANCL launched on February 17, 2026 and calls the top tier of an eye-care line built on 30 years of in-house nutrition research. A 30-day supply of 60 tablets runs ¥4,700 including tax. Alongside the astaxanthin, lutein and zeaxanthin already in the standard Enkin formula, the Premium version adds eriodictyol-6-C-glucoside, an ingredient FANCL says helps maintain moisture in the eyes.
Season 3 and the First Film Are Both Close
The mosaic lands in a busy stretch for the franchise. The light novel series by Natsu Hyuuga has passed 57 million copies worldwide. The anime adaptation, which started in October 2023, marked its second broadcast anniversary on October 22, 2025 by announcing both a third season and the series' first theatrical film.
Season 3 starts on Friday, October 2, 2026 and runs as a split two-cour production. OLM handles the animation on its own this time, and Yorushika performs the opening theme, "Kumo o Nuke Kazashimo e Watashi dake." Aoi Yuki and Takeo Otsuka return as Maomao and Jinshi. The film, titled 劇場版 薬屋のひとりごと 亡妃の秘宝 in Japan and The Apothecary Diaries: The Deceased Empress' Treasure in English, opens on Friday, December 11, 2026.
Looking Ahead
The Shibuya board comes down on September 27, so anyone hoping to see it in person has until the end of that week. Season 3's first cour begins October 2 in Nippon TV's Friday Anime Night block, with the second cour scheduled for April 2027.
For international viewers, Crunchyroll has carried the series worldwide outside Asia, with Netflix handling several Asian territories. No international release plans for The Deceased Empress' Treasure have been announced yet; the December 11 date is a Japanese theatrical opening.
Readers who want to get ahead of Season 3 have options in English. Square Enix Manga & Books publishes Natsu Hyuuga's light novels in print, J-Novel Club handles them digitally, and Square Enix also releases Nekokurage's manga adaptation in English.
©日向夏・イマジカインフォス／「薬屋のひとりごと」製作委員会