Review by Woodrow Phoenix
Atom: The Beginning is based on Osamu Tezuka’s classic adventure hero Tetsuwan Atom (Mighty Atom), or Astro Boy as we know him in the West. It’s somewhere between a reboot and an extension of the original adventures, using many elements of Tezuka’s works to create a detailed prequel to the first story featuring the heroic, dynamic little Atom. Rather than setting this tale in a 1960s-style retro future, the approach is from a contemporary angle with some new and some altered protagonists. This project is in collaboration with Tezuka Productions and Makota Tezuka is credited as ‘supervisor’ although there’s no information on what that means. Even if it’s just a title it credits the source material and also gives this series a high-profile platform supported on the giant shoulders of the ‘God of Manga’.
Written by Masami Yuuki, best known for Mobile Police Patlabor, and drawn by Tetsurō Kasahara, creator of RideBack, they feature two young robotic engineering students, postgrads at the Department of Cybernetics in Nerima, Japan. Hiroshi Ochanomizu is the slightly absent-minded, awkward polymath whose prodigious intellect is matched by his enormous nose. His partner in their rundown little lab tucked behind the main buildings is Umataro Tenma, a dark-haired, dark-eyed genius, a little dark in temperament too. The pair are working on creating a humanoid robot that can think for itself, but as this episode begins their research is on the verge of being shut down by the University unless they deliver some results.
Tenma is contemptuous of everyone else’s programming with the goal of “making robots look like they are autonomous”. He is determined that their “fundamentally!! different!” system will “bring autonomy to soulless machines” by “bestowing a concept of ‘consciousness!’” which he calls ‘Bewusstsein’, while Ochanomizu insists that this must include “Heart. Which is to say kindness, consideration, sadness … recognising what is important to oneself and taking the initiative to protect it. Even at the risk of one’s own life!”
Their prototype robot A106, called ‘Six’ for short, is “accurate, obedient and it’s got 1,000 horsepower!” Equipped with their cutting-edge Bewusstsein A.I. it’s also beginning to deviate from instructions, neutralising threats rather than smashing them. Tenma interprets this as a flaw while Ochanomizu thinks it’s the first sign of true autonomy. Whose opinion is correct?
Kasahara’s attractive drawings give distinctive looks and personality to all main characters, and impressively complex robot designs. Unfortunately one thing he hasn’t taken from Tezuka is clear, dynamic staging of action scenes. The last quarter sees Six entered in a robot wrestling tournament against a great variety of opponents and Kasahara’s crammed compositions featuring highly detailed robots are hard to follow. There’s a lot to enjoy here for fans of techno, mecha and cyber heroes, and as Six begins to show a glimmer of the heroic qualities we associate with Atom he faces a strong, fast adversary who could literally tear him to pieces. What good is an emerging consciousness against that? Answers in Atom: The Beginning 02.
