Alternative TitlesEnglish: Pluto Japanese: プルートウ
Information
Type: Manga
Volumes: 8
Chapters: 65
Status: Finished
Published: Sep 9, 2003 to Apr 1, 2009
StatisticsScore: 8.681 (scored by 3807 users)
Ranked: #452
Popularity: #178
Members: 7,685
Favorites: 500 1 indicates a weighted score
My Info
Popular Tags
mystery sci-fi |
SynopsisBased off of a story arc from Osamu Tezuka's Tesuwan Atomu, Pluto follows the Europol detective Gesicht as he tries to uncover the mystery behind a string of robot and human deaths. The case becomes much more puzzling when evidence leans toward the murders being the work of a robot, which is something that hasn't happened for 8 years.
(Source: ANN) |
Related MangaParent story: Astro Boy
Reviews
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Beatnik
100 of 127 people found this review helpful
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65 of 65 chapters read
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| Overall |
9 |
| Story |
9 |
| Art |
9 |
| Character |
9 |
| Enjoyment |
10 |
Naoki Urasawa, now an established author of pot-boiling epic thrillers such as Monster and 20th Century Boys, delivers again with Pluto, a sci-fi mash-up of Osamu Tezuka's Tetsuwan Atom.
This excellent sci-fi revolves around AI robots and dispenses with the explanation of Asimov's Law of Robotics for Dummies and just gets right on with entertaining your brain with explorations of the theme of sentient life born from humanity's hands. You're either a sci-fi reader and will immediately swim in the narrative, or new to all this and thrash around unknown waters because Urasawa is not interested in holding your hand, he just wants to tell the bold story using the 'World's Strongest Robot' story arc of Tetsuwan Atom as a jumping point.
Urasawa even takes a supporting character of the original manga and turns them into the main protagonist, rendering Astro Boy himself into a supporting high profile cameo, and a great one at that. This entire concept of one artist dipping into another's world is fascinating and full of wild possibilities. Tezuka's imaginative universe coupled with Urasawa's tension-filled narrative is a joy to read, especially after a few volumes when crisis after crisis befalls characters pushing them to the limit.
Blade Runner, I, Robot, Ghost in the Shell, The Animatrix, to name a paltry few, the list is long and varied. All of sci-fi's greatest literature and movies play with these ideas of the relationship between AI/robots and humans, as did Tezuka and as does Urasawa. But with Pluto there is no vague posturing of whether they can fit into human society, these ideas are already established by the time the story starts.
A brilliant decision as there are already many stories about the border between acceptance and antagonism of robots, the threat of their uprising against humanity culminating in apocalyptic war, but not as many stories about robots being treated as valid citizens of countries, with jobs and families of their own, some of them even revered and idolised by the masses while others are disliked for their metallic bodies. Yes it’s an allegory for race relations, but so is all sci-fi an allegory for something, at least it’s not hackneyed in the hands of a seasoned writer like Urasawa. (uh, except for a robot-hating character called Adolf, but anyway...)
The backdrop to Pluto is great future-retro design. Skyscrapers with inexplicable tubes for commuters flowing around and between them, sleek efficient cars wrapped in glass, long roads swirling around cities. It’s a heightened fantastical futurescape full of idealism. Urasawa's characters are distinguished by their noses as usual, with different races differentiated easily, you dont ususally ever get confused with who is who in his tales.
What kick-starts this story is when a major robotic figure, loved by all, is murdered brutally. Fans of Urasawa rejoice, we have yet another exciting mystery with procedural investigation, a cast of many witnesses, suspects, criminals and cameos. This manga began publication the same year a certain country was attacked and occupied by another, and that event permeates this story, for better or worse is up to you, but its integrated well by tying many threads together into the whole mystery. The first robot victim that opens the story was one of 7 of the most powerful robots in the world. Someone is going round bumping them off. Europol detective Gesicht is on the case.
A methodical man troubled by nightmares, he is as brooding as Urasawa's previous protagonists yet having the added depth of being a robot himself. This main character is so great because there is that classic dichotomy and juxtaposition of man and robot, the constant questioning of motive and intent, the internal conflict of the character and the external conflict of his work life and private life. By robot law instilled into every AI, robots aren’t allowed to take human life, yet all surface evidence of the crimes in the story point that they could not have been perpetrated by a human, so our detective has his work cut out for him to solve the mystery while resolving the issues in his mind.
At heart Pluto is a mystery/crime thriller, and there are great intriguing cliffhangers to each chapter. We follow Gesicht as he investigates crime scenes, questions people and we also get the occasional and obligatory “regret to inform you” scene which is turned on its head. You don’t know if you're meant to laugh at the blocky metal robot in a kitchen apron being told her husband's been killed, but the pathos through dialogue and composition ends up with gravitas.
You shouldn’t be laughing at our metallic friends; they've got intelligence and emotion as much as their creators. As is amply demonstrated through many chapters with robots attempting to attain the higher level of consciousness lived by their creators. When some of them die, in their last moments they're perplexed by how much humanity they show in death and it’s poignant.
So when Gesicht gives his chapter-one ending statement with steely determination, we're firmly in the passenger seat, riding shotgun for some great sci-fi thrills.
"I will search for the killer. Whether he is robot or human, he is possessed by a demon." read more
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JephCassidy
20 of 26 people found this review helpful
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65 of 65 chapters read
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| Overall |
9 |
| Story |
9 |
| Art |
9 |
| Character |
9 |
| Enjoyment |
9 |
Pluto by Naoki Urasawa and Osamu Tezuka. The overall base of Pluto is taken from (according to Anime news network) a story arc of Astro Boy and uses some of its characters. Naoki's touch comes in with the main character detective Gesicht (almost a reincarnation of detective Lunge, from Monster, with more emotion), in the art and in the thriller suspense that comes in at the beginning followed by the intricate plot depth that continues throughout the manga.
Story: At the beginning the story starts off as a mystery/thriller with the series of robot murders and then slowly turns into more of an action/mystery. The interesting part with Pluto is that it touches a bit on the psychology of robots while having the horrors of war to begin a cycle of hatred that plays a major role throughout the story affecting the characters deeply.
Characters: For those of you who have read Astro Boy or is just familiar with the cast of characters will realize that Atom is "Astro Boy" and notice the return of Dr. Ochanomizu and Tenma Umatarou also as I mention above that detective Gesicht is very similar to the of Monster's detective Lunge with some alterations. The characters do a very good job of following the story and are very well developed.
Content: One of the things that surprised me about Pluto was the content, it has (I believe) no blood or language (being that half the characters are robots). Absolutely no nudity or anything like it. Mainly anything content wise would be all the lives lost in the war talked about and some of the crimes committed that are mentioned. Overall probably one of the cleanest mangas i have read so far.
Art: The art is (if you are familiar with any Urasawa's other works) easily recognizable. Being somewhat similar to Death Note's having a very realistic portrayal of people versus some of your mainstream art leaving out the real detail of human features allowing Urasawa to really capture the full impact of human emotions.
Conclusion: I having watched the animated version of Monster am already a fan of Urasawa and if you are likewise you will really enjoy Pluto also. Urasawa starts off by sucking you into the story right alongside the characters all the way to the end.
Should you happen to be new to any of Urasawa's works Pluto in and by itself is a very good manga and I also suggest you check out some Urasawa's other works such-as Monster anime or manga (the anime directly follows the manga), 20th Century Boys or any of his other works.
read more
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Same mangaka. Both series have the typical epic/seinen Urasawa stile and great characters.
Well, Pluto is, first of everything, a manga by the same author, Naoki Urasawa. And they both contain misterious stories, wich characters are involved in a continuous spiral of sensational developments (sorry, i translated it with google) that bring them to an emotional finale. For the excpetion that Pluto is an original work by Osamu "God" Tezuka, and it's already a genious strike, because it tells a story settled in the future, where characters are protagonists of a mistery involving a beast who is destroying the most powerful robots in the Earth. Somebody could see some relevance with the writer Philip K. Dick and the "robots laws"; Monster, instead, is one of the most memorable thriller manga of all times, with a unique villain and a moltitude of brilliant characters. So, here's for you two wonderful mangas by a really talented author. Enjoy.
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You will find yourself mesmerised by the amazing storytelling, dramatic character development, and the enveloping mystery of the plot in these two publications.
Pluto is a remake of osamu tezuka's Astro boy.
Thriller + futuristic science fiction = MASTERPIECE..!!!
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Related Clubs20+, Claim A Killer Club, CNCFixins, Critics and Connoisseurs, God of Manga (A.K.A. Urasawa Naoki), Lordcrab86's Fun House!, Manga Experience, Manga Marketplace, Manga Masterpieces Club, Mari's Club XD, Recommendation Club, seinen & josei, The All-Over Otaku Club Okawari, Virus, We wanna watch these series as an ANIME!!!
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External LinksOfficial Site, MangaUpdates, Wikipedia
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