Mohiro Kitoh is a Japanese manga artist and character designer born on August 8, 1966, in Aichi Prefecture near Nagoya. He graduated from the Nagoya Institute of Technology before working as an ordinary salaryman. He later changed careers, becoming an assistant to manga artist Shota Kikuchi and beginning his own creative work. Kitoh made his debut as a manga creator in the late 1980s, winning a grand prize for a short story in Weekly Shonen Sunday in 1987. His first serialized work, Vendémiaire no Tsubasa, ran in Monthly Afternoon magazine from 1995 to 1997.

Kitoh is best known as the creator of the manga Shadow Star, also known as Narutaru, which was serialized in Monthly Afternoon from 1998 to 2003. The series follows young children who befriend strange starfish-like alien creatures, but the story takes dark turns involving violence and psychological instability. Shadow Star was adapted into an anime series in 2003 and was among the jury-selected works at the 2001 Japan Media Arts Festival. His most famous work is Bokurano, serialized in Monthly Ikki magazine from 2003 to 2009. The story involves fifteen middle school students who are tricked into piloting a giant robot to defend Earth, only to discover that each pilot dies after their battle. The manga was adapted into an anime in 2007, though director Hiroyuki Morita made significant changes to the story with Kitoh's permission. In 2010, Bokurano won an Excellence Prize in the Manga Division at the 14th Japan Media Arts Festival Awards. Kitoh also provided illustrations for a light novel series titled Bokurano Alternative from 2007 to 2008.

Beyond these major works, Kitoh has produced a wide range of other manga series. Noririn, serialized from 2009 to 2015, focuses on a salaryman who loses his driver's license and takes up cycling, reflecting one of Kitoh's personal hobbies. Other works include Hallucination from the Womb, Nanika Mochigattemasu ka, Futago no Teikoku, and Hayabusa-chan mo Tondemasu. His most recent series is no-boulder, an indoor rock-climbing manga published from 2021 to 2024. Kitoh has also worked in other media, designing the Third Angel character for the animated film Evangelion 2.0 You Can Not Advance and designing the Septentrion invader characters for the video game Devil Survivor 2.

Kitoh has a distinctive and readily identifiable artistic style. Characters are typically drawn tall, thin, and gangly for their ages, with small facial features and subtle expressions. Female characters generally lack the exaggerated proportions common in many manga, and male characters are rarely muscular. Nudity appears frequently in his work, though it is typically presented without sensuality and often associated with brutality or psychological distress. His storytelling approach is consistently cynical and pessimistic, focusing on the cruelty and vulnerability of human beings, particularly children. Graphic depictions of violence, psychological instability, bullying, and sexual violence recur throughout his works, which has led to censorship or halted publications in some countries. His narratives often explore themes of death, sacrifice, the value of individual life, and the dark aspects of human nature without romanticization or exaggeration. Despite the heavy subject matter, his art style retains a certain cuteness that creates an unsettling contrast with the grim content.

In the Japanese manga industry, Kitoh is regarded as one of the three great artists associated with Monthly Afternoon magazine, alongside Hitoshi Tomizawa and Riichi Ueshiba. His works are known for their willingness to kill major characters and explore emotionally disturbing territory, earning him a reputation for uncompromising storytelling. Later in his career, Kitoh has dealt with health issues including spinal stenosis, for which he underwent surgery in August 2017. He has continued to create manga, with recent works shifting toward sports-themed subjects such as cycling and rock climbing, reflecting his personal interests and rehabilitation activities.