Review by Woodrow Phoenix

The prototype autonomous robot A106, mostly called ‘Six’ is standing outside the isolated house that is Professor Hikozo Saruta’s holiday home, hidden deep in the countryside. Inside the house are the young genius inventors who created him, Hiroshi Ochanomizu and his partner Umataro Tenma, along with Ochanomizu’s sister Ran; Moriya Tsutsumi, the shining star science grad of Lab 1; and Professor Saruta’s daughter Tsukie, a partly bionic, special investigator with the International Crime Enquiry Organisation. Outside, towering over the human-sized Six is Ivan, a gigantic Russian military robot seven or eight stories high. Ivan has been sent to destroy Six and capture the hiding humans. He launches into his attack program with great force but at the same time he seems to be also trying to communicate privately with Six, the same way that Six tried to reach his opponents during the robot wresting matches days before (see Atom: The Beginning 02).

Osamu Tezuka’s Astro Boy stories are filled with moral and ethical problems underscoring the action as he explores what it means to be a thinking, feeling entity, and the equally big question of who has the right to decide who qualifies. The blend of thought experiment and adventure is what made his work so special and influential. The creators of ATOM: The Beginning don’t skimp on that key element in this prequel, but they haven’t yet reached the point where they can weave the philosophical discussions into the action as smoothly as Tezuka. Everything just halts for pages while the characters work through an intellectual problem, as in a sequence here where Six’s desire to speak to another robot is finally answered, and another where his creators realise the gravity of what this means.

Kasahara’s delicate blend of cartoony and stylish drawing for the characters makes the extended talky sequences interesting to look at with many great design touches. Those moments work much better than his crowded and weirdly paced action scenes which tend to be panels you have to patiently wade through to reach the next part of the story.

Atom: The Beginning 04 is an enjoyable read as the various strands of this adventure start to join up in an unpredictable way, and there’s another robot wrestling tournament coming up next issue. The stakes are increasing: this one’s international. What kinds of new robots will Six encounter next? See Atom: The Beginning 05.