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Astro Boy Celebrates 70th Anniversary With Treasure Box of Classic Manga Items

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Every Japanese robot story ever made (arguably every shonen manga ever!) owes a debt of gratitude to Astro Boy, aka Tetsuwan Atom or Mighty Atom. Osamu Tezuka’s classic Showa Era hero will celebrate his 70th birthday with a special collection, Astro Boy 70th Treasure Box [FAMILY TIME].

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Astro Boy 70th Treasure Box [FAMILY TIME]

 

The Treasure Box will come out at the end of July in Japan. It will contain seven items (one for each decade, I suppose). The main one being an 80-page art book that will feature prints of the raw manuscripts for Midoro ga Numa no Maki (The Midoro Swamp), and Uran-chan no Maki, two Astro Boy stories. I’d call them ‘classic stories,’ but that sounds redundant. Everything about Astro Boy is classic by default.

Uran-chan, aka Astro Girl, was Astro Boy’s little sister, which seems to fit with the ‘family time’ theme of the collection.

Astro Boy 70th Treasure Box [FAMILY TIME]

The Midoro Swamp manuscripts will include parts omitted from the original. There will also be full-size color reproductions of Uran-chan no Maki manuscripts, as seen in Monthly Tezuka Magazine Leo (from Mushi Production, Tezuka’s own studio).

The collection will also include a booklet of Chiitan no Maki, a story from the Tetsuwan Atom Club fan club newsletter. Chiitan was Astro Boy’s baby brother. Astro Boy’s first appearance was in the manga story Ambassador Atom/ Captain Atom in 1951.

Astro Boy 70th Treasure Box [FAMILY TIME]

The Treasure Chest will also include a commentary booklet, stickers, and a storage case for the items. It will be put out by Fukkan (literally ‘Reissue’), as seen here, and will also be available at Amazon Japan.

Note: They also appear to have misspelled Tezuka as Teduka, but that’s just the Nihon-shiki romanization variant.

Fukkan, Tezuka Productions
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