By: Osamu Tezuka Publisher: Dark Horse Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: Dark Horse Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 216 Publication Date: June 21, 2002 Reading Level: Young Adult
Product Description: Dark Horse proudly presents another of the crown jewels of international graphic fiction -- Astro Boy! Created by the late Osamu Tezuka, a revered animator and cartoonist -- creating over 150,000 pages of comics in his career! -- and considered the Walt Disney of Japan, his Astro Boy was the first manga series to be adapted to animation and became a worldwide phenomenon, making Astro Boy the Mickey Mouse of anime -- a jet-powered, super-strong, evil-robot-bashing, alien-invasion-smashing Mickey Mouse, that is! Exciting, whimsical, and touching, Astro Boy hearkens back to the classic era of comics and animation, featuring stories that readers young and old will enjoy. Don't miss the opportunity to experience this landmark series, never before available in America, each volume featuring over 200 pages in an affordable and convenient pocket-sized format as currently collected in Japan!
The love of money is the root of all evil Once again, Tezuka Osamu serves up a hefty moral lesson, this time on slavery and greed, and how the lust for material gain can twist human beings into something ugly. Each of the four stories is entertaining, and surprisingly deep considering the simple style of art.
In the first story, Astro Boy seeks the mysteries of Robot Land, a fantasy robot theme park where robots act as characters from history and adventure. If it sounds familiar, Tezuka's story came out 10 years before Yul Brynner's similarly themed film "Westworld." However, the robots do not turn bad, but are rather being kept as slaves by the greedy Dr. Haido, who uses Robotland as a cover for his illegal gun smuggling operation.
The next tale, "Ivan the Fool," sees Astro Boy and some others on a trip to the moon. When they discover a valley of diamonds, and an ancient Soviet robot Ivan, the greed of one man and the incapability of someone who follows orders threatens to destroy the whole group.
The short story "A Day to Remember," a special day in future Japan where robot versions of dead family members come back to visit for a single day, in the tradition of the Japanese Obon festival. A time machine and a dead little boy who looks just like Astro Boy lead on to adventure.
Finally, in "Ghost Manufacturing Machine" a Hitler-like villain uses a machine to create an eternal ghost of himself that can live forever and inflict his evil on the world. Astro Boy and local hero-robot Platinum must fight against this unstoppable foe.
As with all the volumes in the Dark Horse Astro Boy series, the individual stories are not collected in any particular order, but do contain a brief introduction from Tezuka himself explaining his story, and what he thinks of it.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Not Available Comics
Trevor
