Man, I am so excited to be reading this book. I bought it...

Man, I am so excited to be reading this book. I bought it several weeks ago but just started on it a couple of days ago. It’s thick, over 600 pages, and deserves full attention, so I think it’ll take some time to get through.

But this is the book I knew I’d always love. I even considered buying the original Cadence Books’ editions from the mid-90s despite the fact that they’d sell for $50+ per volume and had terrible, terrible covers. Seriously - look at that cover up top and look at this cover right here:

Which book are you reading?

So, as I was saying, I always wanted to read these books and I was just waiting, anxiously, for Vertical to get to them. I just finished up Tezuka’s massive Buddha collection and I saw this beautiful orange and green cover staring at me from the shelves at Big Planet Comics. I didn’t even know it was released. 

It’s wonderful. It’s amazing how dark it is, tho. Buddha was heartbreaking at times and even a bit violent but this is the first truly dark Tezuka book I’ve read. One day, when I have his entire collection (probably impossible), I’m going to read it all in the order it was published. Tezuka worked in comics for so long, and only worked on his own manga, so I have to imagine you can chart his artistic and personal growth from a young age up until his death, a rare treat for a comic artist.

Before I started picking up the Blackjack books, all I knew from Tezuka was Astro Boy. Astro Boy is great, don’t get me wrong, but it’s kind of Mickey Mouse, and I’m an adult. I respected the books for the way they completely invented the language of manga and I loved “The Greatest Robot In The World,” obviously, but it was pulpy fun. I used to say Tezuka was Japan’s Will Eisner and Walt Disney, Urasawa was Japan’s Frank Miller, and there never really was a Jack Kirby or a Stan Lee or anyone else.

Well, once you get deeper into his catalog, you start to realize Tezuka was Japan’s Eisner, Disney, Lee, Kirby, Henson, Schulz, Ditko, etc, etc, etc. He was everybody. 

I honestly think Tezuka was probably the most creative, prolific, and imaginative artist, writer, and creator of the 20th Century. 

So get this book. Get all his books.