"Manga is virtual. Manga is sentiment. Manga is resistance. Manga is bizarre. Manga is pathos. Manga is destruction. Manga is arrogance. Manga is love. Manga is kitsch. Manga is sense of wonder. Manga is... there is no conclusion yet."
Osamu Tezuka (November 3, 1928 - February 8, 1989), a.k.a. The Father of Manga, is widely credited for laying the foundations for much, if not most, of modern Japanese comics and animation. His prolific output and activity throughout the years has been legendary in the industry, with only a fraction having even been translated for foreign consumption. He created over 700 comics with more than 150,000 pages total, the second TV anime ever made, the first one with an episode length of 25 minutes, and the very first Shoujo. His production spans more or less every conceivable genre, and is sometimes so complex it does it in the same manga.
The Elvis of Japanese manga and anime, just that instead of being inspired by blues, he was inspired by various different influences, both Japanese (traditional Japanese Ukiyo-e
art, and the wide-eyed art styles appearing around the 1920's-1930's from Shoujo manga artists like Junichi Nakahara and Kamishibai paper theater shows like Jungle Boy) and American (the 1930's-1940's Golden Age Animations from Disney, Fleischer, and Terrytoons).
Tezuka re-uses quite a few of his own characters, as well as making expies of them via his "Star System", inspired by the Hollywood Star System. If you want an overview of his work that you can carry on hand, check out the book The Art of Osamu Tezuka.
His works include:
- Adolf
- Alabaster (His least known and most controversial work. A surprisingly bloody, violent series with racial overtones. Subverts most of his other recurring characters: for example, the classic 'Ideal Hero' type from his other series is a narcissistic and sadistic rapist here.)
- The Amazing 3 (Wonder 3 in Japan)
- Ambassador Magma
- Apollo's Song
- Astro Boy (Tetsuwan Atomu, the second anime series ever produced and the earliest popular one)
- Ayako (Another extremely dark work revolving around an especially heinous case of Break the Cutie)
- Bambi (Adaptation of the Disney movie)
- Barbara
- Bagi, the Monster of Mighty Nature
- Big X
- Black Jack
- Blue Blink (The last anime Tezuka worked on before his passing. He passed while the anime was still in production, and it finished without him.)
- The Book of Human Insects
- Brave Dan
- Buddha (a highly embellished biography of Buddha)
- The Crater
- Don Dracula
- Dororo
- In the Beginning: The Bible Stories
- Jungle Emperor (aka Kimba, the White Lion.)
- Lion Books
- Lost World
- Marvelous Melmo
- Metropolis (One of his earlier works, although the anime adaptation was produced after his death.)
- Midnight
- MW (A suspense-thriller centered around the twisted relationship between Father Garai, a guilt-ridden, secretly gay delinquent-turned-priest and his lover, Yuuki Michio, an amoral monster — and occasional Creepy Crossdresser — who plans to cause The End of the World as We Know It. Today it is chiefly remembered for the well-known but unsubstantiated
fanon theory that the main villain of Naoki Urasawa's celebrated Monster series was inspired by Michio.) - Next World
- Ode to Kirihito
- Phoenix (Was meant to be his grand masterwork, alternating between tales of the distant past and the distant future until the two converged at the present. Sadly, he Died During Production, leaving it unfinished.)
- Princess Knight
- Rainbow Parakeet
- Roppu-kun
- Swallowing The Earth
- A Thousand & One Nights, a +2-hour long anime film loosely based on the Arabian Nights. First known hentai anime film.
- The Three-Eyed One
- Triton of the Sea, also to be published in US thanks to Kickstarter
- Unico, which was even published in the US thanks to Kickstarter
- Unico: Black Cloud And White Feather
- The Fantastic Adventures of Unico
- Unico in the Island of Magic
- Unico: Awakening (A re-imagining of the original Unico series and first new Unico manga after his death)
- Vampires
Tropes associated with the work of Osamu Tezuka:
- Anyone Can Die: Even in his child-oriented works, he doesn't hesitate to confront the audience with the death of beloved characters. He even killed off Astro Boy and only brought him back after massive backlash from fans.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: In Octagon Manor, republished within The Crater, a disenchanted young manga artist travels to said manor, a place where it's said you can change your life by placing your mind into another timeline. However, he is warned, you can only do this once, and must never regret your actions for a moment or you'll be ripped apart. Entering the manor, he is placed into the timeline of a champion boxer and hero to children...but finds himself manipulated into throwing a match and wrecking his career by his crooked fiancee. In despair, he wishes he'd become a manga artist, as he wanted to when he was a boy, and...you can guess the rest.
- Badass Adorable: Tezuka is notable for creating very heroic protagonists (such as Astro Boy, Bokko/Captain Bunny, Unico, and Kimba) who are not only extremely cute, but are capable of taking dangerous tasks.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Frequently. He even has a character based on himself in different roles, for example a cameo as a taxi driver in Adolf or as nameless mangaka who gets involved in a story in Black Jack. In reprints of Astro Boy, he is seen discussing the stories with Astro as a sort of introduction.
- Cerebus Rollercoaster: His entire body of work shifts back and forth from seriousness to silliness. A specific work of his that would qualify on his own is The Crater, with many gags, bizarre supernatural plots and Cruel and Unusual Death.
- Cloudcuckoolander: His author avatar is one, often played as a Small Name, Big Ego Large Ham. His Real Life obsession with art, working, and insects might indicate a case of Truth in Television.
- Creator Thumbprint: Medical knowledge (Tezuka was a trained surgeon), animals and nature.
- Crossdresser: Pick a Tezuka character, any female Tezuka character. Yeah, there's a 70% chance that they have crossdressed at some point.
- Darker and Edgier: He went with the general taste shift of the public towards more mature themes (gekiga) during the end of the 60s with works such as MW and Ayako.
- This is now considered an important decision in the history of manga: Tezuka, who was and still is the most influential and popular mangaka in Japan virtually made the Gekigaka's themes suitable for the mainstream market. On the long term this prevented anime and manga from falling into the Animation Age Ghetto in Japan.
- This is now considered an important decision in the history of manga: Tezuka, who was and still is the most influential and popular mangaka in Japan virtually made the Gekigaka's themes suitable for the mainstream market. On the long term this prevented anime and manga from falling into the
- Disneyesque: Part of his art style is this, his female characters in particular. The rest is much more reminiscent to the zany, extravagant Mind Screw Fleischer Studios cartoons.
- Fan Art: He loved the Disney Duck family stories by Carl Barks and frequently sent greeting cards◊ to him with his own drawings of them interacting with his own characters.
- Fan Disservice: If (female) nudity is involved in one of his works, then you can be sure there is some kind of cruel rape or disturbing torture or death scene somewhere near the next page.
- Sometimes it's just plain bizarre: In Ode to Kirihito, a woman mastered a risky stunt in which she is fried when stark naked.
- From Clones to Genre: His work almost necessitated it, as he codified so many manga tropes, others had to make other tropes in order to stand out.
- Furry Fandom: If the recent discovery is any indication.
- Not that surprising anymore if you already saw the shapeshifting snake girls in "1001 Night".
- Another good clue would be the sheer amount of animal characters he used in his stories.
- Green Aesop: Lots and lots, especially Unico, Astro Boy, and Kimba.
- Kid Hero: Astro Boy (A robot-boy), Unico (a baby unicorn) and Kimba (A lion cub, at least for most part of the story), who are often considered three of his most iconic characters. There is also Kenichi (a recurring character from many of his stories), Sapphire from Princess Knight(Who is only 15 years old) among many others.
- Improvised Lightning Rod: Used in the Tear Jerker ending of Movement 1 in the unfinished Legend of the Forest.
- Innocent Aliens: The alien trio from W3 (The Amazing 3) are a group of aliens disguised as a duck, horse, and rabbit. The trio befriend a human and go on adventures on Earth and learn about humanity and human life during their travels.
- Living Legend: Gekiga pioneer Yoshihiro Tatsumi covered this in his autobiography A Drifting Life: Tezuka was considered a god-like genius by his peers even before he hit age 30 or became a national icon.
- His eventual death almost overshadowed the death of Emperor Hirohito, who died the month before him. Nowadays Tezuka is strongly associated with the Showa period and as the 90s were coined by recession, his death is coincident with the End of an Era.
- Loads and Loads of Characters: His Star System.
- Pun-Based Title: Monster of the 38th Parallel. You have to be very old to get the reference (selfsame parallel refers to The Korean War) and fluent in Japanese (度 could also mean "degree" instead of "parallel", referring to human fever temperature - the manga has a Fantastic Voyage plot).
- Raygun Gothic: Most of his works are known for this aesthetic.
- Reused Character Design: Tezuka never made up a new character design if he could recycle an old one. Essentially, his characters were "actors" playing different roles in his various manga.
- Red Baron: Manga no Kami-Sama, meaning "God of comics". Often narrowly translated as "God of manga".
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: Out of all his characters, Unico (alongside Katy the Cat) from the Unico series is one of Tezuka's cutest characters. Helped that Uncio was created in 1976, when cuteness was starting to become popular in Japan.
- The same goes for Bokko from The Amazing 3 (W3/Wonder 3) who is a female alien that disguised as a rabbit to learn about life on earth.
- Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Varies depending on the work. Astro Boy generally has an optimistic tone, while the infamous Alabaster is downright nihilistic. Black Jack is well-regarded for sliding the scale up and down.
- Strictly Formula: Somehow he managed to avert this, but there his full-length stories are usually consisting of multiple sub-plots - with sometimes each one having a distinctive protagonist - that later resolve in a Grand Finale.
- He somewhat lampshaded his signature style in Apollo's Song, that is essentially the same story with same characters in completely different settings.
- Trope Codifier: Of nothing less than the entire Anime industry. He also made Ur Examples of "Graphic Novels" years before the term was coined and is the Trope Maker of many narrative and illustration techniques in manga and anime. His single most important technical innovation was his signature "cinematographic" style, which basically means that a single action is drawn over the course of multiple panels, which was nothing but revolutionary in the world of comics. This technique was ridiculed by established mangaka of the 50s as a waste of space but he was Vindicated by History. And how.
- War Is Hell: Almost every single work of his deals with this at one point, it's possibly the most important and universal theme of his oeuvre.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Obviously Astro Boy, but also Metropolis and others.
- World of Ham: Subtle delivery wasn't something his characters were too interested in.
