Saturday 7 September 2019

tetsuwan atomu

On this day in 1963, among many other events of note as our faithful chronicler informs, Astro Boy, the first animated cartoon series imported from Japanese markets, was first broadcast nationwide in the US.
Known domestically as Mighty Atom (鉄腕アトム) and airing in those markets from 1952 to 1968 with several subsequent revivals and syndications, the manga by Osamu Tezuka (*1928 – †1989) follows the adventures of an android, burdened with human emotions as a surrogate child, but is passed off by his creator to a robot circus when he strikes the father as inauthentic and unnatural, being ageless. A sympathetic professor saves him from the circus and tries to impart something of the abiding nature of humanity in him. Watch the first episode at Doctor Caligari’s Cabinet at the link up top.