Astro Cat

Week ten: manga and the Japanese comics tradition

Astro Cat (1986) 

by Osamu Tezuka

This manga focuses on a young boy named Tsugio and a small cat that he found, who looks remarkably like the popular manga character, Astro Boy. This inspired the name Astro for the cat. Very early in the story, Tsugio and Astro get hit by a car, which turned out to be driven by aliens who used their otherworldly technology to revive the two (as well as his bicycle) and return them as if nothing had happened. The aliens referenced Tsugio's memory when reviving Astro, causing them to give Astro all the powers of Astro Boy by mistake. I thoroughly enjoyed this whimsical origin story, as well as the following adventures that Tsugio and Astro encounter as the story progresses. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Asterios Polyp

Week eleven: comics as contemporary literature Asterios Polyp  by David Mazzucchelli This 2009 graphic novel by American cartoonist David Mazzucchelli immediately caught my attention with its bold colors and style. Some pages featured very visually interesting layouts that differ from the usual format of comics, which includes many of the ones that we have been reading in this class. The story revolves around a man named Asterios Polyp, who is an architect and a college professor from New York. As seen in the art as well as the story itself, this graphic novel "explores the idea of duality," which I find to be very fascinating. 
Read more

Persepolis

Week nine: a wide world of comics Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi For this week's reading, which focused primarily on European works, I was able to find Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel, Persepolis, online and available for viewing. From what I read of this graphic novel, I was surprised by how much I found myself enjoying it. It is an autobiographical story of the author's childhood in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. Before reading this, I was not very familiar with the events and intense situations of the time (the 1980's). After I was drawn in by the uniquely simplified and appealing art style, I remained captivated by the real history and the childhood perspective from which the events were explained. Although serious, this viewpoint allowed for a less grim outlook than what may be expected based only on the subject matter. Marjane was very religious as a young child. The novel continuously depicts her daily "big discussion with God." These conve
Read more

Maus

Week seven: Maus and the legitimization of the graphic novel Maus  by Art Spiegelman  Art Spiegelman's  Maus  takes the horrifying event of the Holocaust and explores it in a more palatable way in order to give the reader a sense of entertainment as they learn about the past experiences of his family. The events are explained through the author's interview with his father, who was a Holocaust survivor. This perspective makes the personal details unique to the father while also keeping it relatable to the reader because it isn't a direct first-hand account.  This graphic novel manages to tell its story in a somewhat fun way without making light of the subject matter. The most creative and significant way that Spiegelman achieved this was with the personification of animals to represent different nationalities and religions. For example, Jewish people are depicted as mice, German people are depicted as cats, and Polish people are depicted as pigs. This is a clever
Read more