Tank Tankuro (タンクタンクロー, Tanku tankurō) is a 1934 manga written and drawn by Gajō Sakamoto. The comic features the eponymous character, a robot-like character with a round iron body who could transform into various shapes and produce anything he wanted from the hole in his belly. He fights his archenemy, Kuro Kabuto (Black Helmet). [1]
Tank Tankuro is considered one of the first robot and science fiction manga, inspiring characters like Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy and Fujiko Fujio's Doraemon ; [1] however it was preceded by the 1929 comic story Jinzō ningen (Artificial human) by Suihō Tagawa. [2]
Sakamoto published Tank Tankuro's stories as a yonkoma for the Chugai Shougyou Shimbun (current Nihon Keizai Shimbun ). He felt he needed a bigger space for his stories and turned to Kodansha, presenting a draft to the editor of Yonen Club magazine. The draft was accepted, and Sakamoto published Tank Tankuro's stories in the magazine for four years. [3]
In 2010, a collection of Tank Tankuro's stories was published in English by Presspop. [4] It was reissued in 2017 by Fantagraphics. [5]
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and written narrative, usually, dialogue contained in word balloons emblematic of the comics art form.
In science fiction, mecha or mechs are giant robots or machines typically depicted as piloted and as humanoid walking vehicles. The term was first used in Japanese after shortening the English loanword 'mechanism' or 'mechanical', but the meaning in Japanese is more inclusive, and 'robot' or 'giant robot' is the narrower term.
Shōnen manga is an editorial category of Japanese comics targeting an audience of adolescent boys. It is, along with shōjo manga, seinen manga, and josei manga, one of the primary editorial categories of manga. Shōnen manga is traditionally published in dedicated manga magazines that exclusively target the shōnen demographic group.
In Japanese popular culture, lolicon is a genre of fictional media which focuses on young girl characters, particularly in a sexually suggestive or erotic manner. The term, a portmanteau of the English words "Lolita" and "complex", also refers to desire and affection for such characters, and fans of such. Associated mainly with stylized imagery in manga, anime, and video games, lolicon in otaku culture is generally understood as distinct from desires for realistic depictions of girls, or real girls as such, and is associated with moe, or feelings of affection for fictional characters.
Naoki Urasawa is a Japanese manga artist and musician. He has been drawing manga since he was four years old, and for most of his professional career has created two series simultaneously. The stories to many of these were co-written in collaboration with his former editor, Takashi Nagasaki. Urasawa has been called one of the artists that changed the history of manga and has won numerous awards, including the Shogakukan Manga Award three times, the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize twice, and the Kodansha Manga Award once. South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho called him "the greatest storyteller of our time", while Dominican-American writer Junot Díaz proclaimed Urasawa to be a national treasure in Japan. By December 2021, his various works had over 140 million copies in circulation worldwide, making him one of the best-selling authors of all time.
Frederik L. Schodt is an American translator, interpreter, and writer.
UFO Robot Grendizer, known also as Grandizer, Goldrake and Goldorak, is a Japanese animated television series and manga created by Go Nagai. The series is the third entry in the Mazinger series, later relegated into a spinoff series. The series, produced by Toei Doga and Dynamic Planning, is directed by Tomoharu Katsumata and written by Shozo Uehara. It aired on Fuji TV from October 5, 1975, to February 27, 1977. The robot's first appearance in the United States was as a part of the Shogun Warriors line of super robot toys imported in the late 1970s by Mattel, then in Jim Terry's Force Five series. A remake of the original anime series is set to premiere in July 2024.
Microman was a science fiction toyline created, manufactured and marketed by Takara Co., Ltd. from 1974 to 1984 as well as from 1998 to 2007. The Microman line was a series of 3.75-inch-tall (9.5 cm) action figures with accompanying vehicles, robots, playsets and accessories. Unlike other toylines at the time, Microman figures were marketed as being the "actual" size of cyborg beings called "Micros" that hailed from a fictional planet known as "Micro Earth" and disguised themselves as action figures while on planet Earth.
Astro Boy is a Japanese television series that premiered on Fuji TV on New Year's Day, 1963, and is the first popular animated Japanese television series that embodied the aesthetic that later became familiar worldwide as anime. It originated as a manga of the same name in 1952 by Osamu Tezuka, revered in Japan as the "God of Manga". It lasted for four seasons, with a total of 193 episodes, the final episode presented on a Saturday, New Year's Eve 1966.
Patalliro! is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Mineo Maya. The comedy manga was serialized in Hana to Yume from 1978 to 1990, before switching to Bessatsu Hana to Yume in 1991, and now currently is serialized on the app Manga Park (マンガPark) since 2020.
The Heart of Thomas is a 1974 Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Moto Hagio. Originally serialized in Shūkan Shōjo Comic, a weekly manga magazine publishing shōjo manga, the series follows the events at a German all-boys gymnasium following the suicide of student Thomas Werner. Hagio drew inspiration for the series from the novels of Hermann Hesse, especially Demian (1919); the Bildungsroman genre; and the 1964 film Les amitiés particulières. It is one of the earliest works of shōnen-ai, a genre of male-male romance manga aimed at a female audience.
Inio Asano is a Japanese manga artist. Asano created the acclaimed manga series Solanin, which was released as a feature film in Japan in April 2010, starring Aoi Miyazaki. He is also famous for the series Goodnight Punpun and Dead Dead Demon's Dededede Destruction.
Robotan (ロボタン) is a Japanese anime and manga series created by Kenji Morita. The series revolves around household robot Robotan, who is created By Kan-chan and lives with an everyday Japanese family as a domestic servant and friend to the children. Like Doraemon, his good intentions don't always work out, with comic consequences. The original series was produced by Daiko Advertising. Production moved to Tokyo Movie Shinsha for the 20th-anniversary color remake New Robotan (1986) under director Masaharu Okuwaki.
Akira Sasō is a Japanese manga artist and educator. He has won a Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize and two Japan Media Arts Awards, the latter for his manga Shindō (1997–98) and Maestro (2003–07).
Atom: The Beginning is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Tetsurō Kasahara, with writing contributions by Makoto Tezuka and Masami Yuki. It was serialized in Hero's Inc.'s Monthly Hero's magazine from December 2014 to December 2020 and transferred to Comiplex online website in November 2020. Its chapters have been collected in 20 tankōbon volumes as of March 2024. An anime television series adaptation aired from April to July 2017.
Hero of Robots is a Taiwanese trading card arcade game developed by International Games System and published by SNK that debuted in 2011.
Nami Sano was a Japanese manga artist. She made her debut in 2010 with the one-shot title Non-Sugar Coffee. She later published two series, Haven't You Heard? I'm Sakamoto (2012–2015) and Migi & Dali (2017–2021), which were both adapted into anime series.
Massive: Gay Erotic Manga and the Men Who Make It is a 2014 manga anthology edited by Anne Ishii, Chip Kidd, and Graham Kolbeins, and published by Fantagraphics Books. Collecting works from Gengoroh Tagame, Jiraiya, and numerous other artists, it is the first English-language anthology of gay manga.
Waai! is a Japanese manga magazine which was published by Ichijinsha from April 24, 2010 to February 25, 2014, for 16 issues. The manga in Waai! focus on male characters who engage in cross-dressing, willingly or due to circumstance; the magazine also includes articles, interviews, and reviews. Its sister magazine Waai! Mahalo (わぁい!Mahalo) was published for 6 issues from April 25, 2012 to December 25, 2013, and only contains manga.
Sunroom Nite is a Japanese manga one-shot written and illustrated by Keiko Takemiya. It was originally published in the December 1970 issue of the manga magazine Bessatsu Shōjo Comic under the title Yuki to Hoshi to Tenshi to.... It is the first work in the shōnen-ai genre, a genre of male-male romance manga aimed at a female audience.