High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Hetalia: Axis Powers is a webcomic, later adapted as a manga and an anime series, by Hidekaz Himaruya. The series presents an allegorical interpretation of political and historic events, particularly of the World War II era, in which the various countries are represented by anthropomorphic characters. Hetalia is a portmanteau combining hetare and Italia. This is to make light of Italy's apparent cowardice during World War II. Himaruya originally created Hetalia as an online webcomic, and so far two tank bon have been published by Gentosha Comics, the first on March 28, 2008 and the second on December 10, 2008. The series was later adapted into drama CDs, and an anime series created by Studio Deen has also begun streaming online. On January 8, 2010, the anime series' international distribution was announced to be handled by Funimation Entertainment. The main historical events portrayed in this work occur between World War I and World WarII.