[spoilers] Could've been a masterpiece, but too many loose ends

Nov 2, 2023 3:23 AM

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Oct 2018

212

The author is really good at setting up mystery and emotional moments, but no matter how you look at it, it feels like he changed the direction of the story at about 70% and then proceeded to finish it quickly. Which is a very believable scenario, if you consider that his other stories are much longer. The original manga probably didn't sell as well as expected or there were some other issues, so the author decided to wrap everything up quickly... which is a shame, because I think it could've easily been his best work otherwise.

Other people already pointed out how out of nowhere the Teddy Bear (which literally did nothing and the way he supposedly manipulated Abdullah / Goji was never explained) was as well as the ending with him, but there are some other issues that I think most people missed. In the first episode, it is made clear that humans were killed by a human-sized enemy, not the giant robot which is Pluto. It was also stated that the being noticed jumping away from the first victim's apartment wasn't a robot. Which alone raises some questions - how could a robot determine from such a distance that something wasn't a robot? It can only imply that the culprit was Goji, but he actually was a robot and only mistaken for a human because of his behavior, it wasn't like someone could randomly see his silhouette from a kilometer away and declare "it's not a robot". This scene is at the 24-minute mark in the first episode, and it made me assume that the culprit is some kind of superhuman, strong enough to contend with robots. Which to my disappointment didn't lead anywhere, because this scene is just a plot hole, or rather a red herring the author left in the story and then pretended to forget about because he changed the direction of the plot he had in mind while making his manga, and which then ended up in the anime as a result without any possible explanation. According to Atom's investigation in the second episode, the culprit and the victim drank tea together, which again couldn't have been Sahad, but is really possible for Goji. BUT, there was a hurricane, and only Sahad / Pluto could create them. The fight with Brando also doesn't make that much sense from what we learned later in the story, and the event between Sahad and Uran isn't clear at all, either. I feel that the mysteries of the first few episodes weren't answered in a satisfying manner at all. Like, how was Darius actually connected to Sahad and Co? And even some important plot points like Sahad's ability to manipulate plants were ignored. Remember guys, he was created the Pluto flower BEFORE he got his giant mecha form. It was heavily implied that Pluto / Sahad was an artificial intelligence that isn't connected to the physical medium, guess what, it didn't get anywhere.

And the last but not least, the timeline of the events revealed in the last episode makes no sense. Robot Goji "awakened" AFTER Abdullah was killed in the war... even though the war started because of the rumor about Goji, the genius robot maker, to begin with. Okay, it can be explained that a second personality was born based on an individual who didn't even exist. But then who and how created Sahad, the super robot who can manipulate life, and who got a degree in a university before the war? One of the most important questions - the origin of Pluto, wasn't answered. And all the points I made are more subtle than, let's say, the Teddy Bear stuff, which doesn't fit into the narrative at all.

In the end, even despite those obvious problems the story has, I enjoyed it as a whole as I still can turn off my brain for the most part while in the middle of watching the show. But I can't help, but feel cheated after I finished it because the author ended up lying to us more than once, hiding his lies behind emotional moments and "metaphors".

What are your thoughts, guys? Did you notice something I missed, or maybe some things were more clear in the manga?

Nov 2, 2023 3:42 AM

iirayuki

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Sep 2016

576

thats a little too much to read but i kinda agree, the teddy bear felt kinda random tbh, and i felt like the anti robot group didnt get a proper conclusion. like, what happened to them in the end? only the guy who went after gesicht got arrested and what happened to them wasnt really explained. and the teddy bear was genuinely confusing bc what was its purpose

Nov 2, 2023 3:46 AM

CrunchyCrobat

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Oct 2020

756

The whole thing about the robot not being able to tell that Abullah makes sense, cause even atom and gesitch, the two of the strongest and smartest robots could not tell if he was a robot or a human, so a weak police guard robot would obviously make that mistake, so it probably was Abullah going around killing the humans

As for sahad's powers, god knows where that came from, or who knows, maybe that's something you would know if you know the wider astro boy lore, cause this is still a reimagination of one of astro boy's stories

Also from what I gathered, the whole reason thracia pointed fingers at Persia was to destroy the 7 super robots in the first place, as gotten from the president there saying that now no one will be able to touch thracia (which is a real American move to pull considering it is based on America)

Nov 2, 2023 4:23 AM

Kawaii_swan

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Mar 2022

140

The teddy bear AI was behind behind all of it.

The rumors of Persia having mass destruction robots, it’s destruction and influencing Dr.Abullah to believe he was going to create the perfect world by annihilating everything.
The hint was Atom’s sister explaining that Pluto is being used by someone who is also being used (Dr. Abullah) but doesn’t realize it.

The teddy bear AI wanted to take over the new world. I wonder who created it.

The ending sort of did fall short though.

Kawaii_swanNov 2, 2023 4:26 AM

Nov 2, 2023 4:28 AM

cassieDmonkey

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Dec 2022

it wouldn't been way better if it was longer

Nov 2, 2023 6:27 AM

Bruh_epic

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Apr 2021

386

I agree 100%. With how much stuff was introduced in the story, some things wrapped up too fast and others were never fully explored. Had so much potential to be even better. Everything it did was good tho, just could’ve done way more.

Nov 2, 2023 6:44 AM

Von_Oberstein

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Apr 2023

I don't think that the writer outright "lied" to us. It's more like he decided to left some mysteries up to our own interpretation, as I'm sure that most, if not all of these unexplained plot elements have some kind of in-universe explanation.

That's pretty much how Urasawa prefers to build the intrigue in his manga. If you're familiar with his other works, like Monster or 20th Century Boys, then you already know how much Urasawa enjoys ambiguity over thorough explanation.

Nov 2, 2023 7:49 AM

removed-user

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Jul 2018

561872

I think the Thracian President and Roosevelt (the ultimate computer / teddy bear) is used by Urasawa to try to maintain a core message from Tezuka about the futility of the lust for power and how it's better to work for peace. The Sultan in "Greatest Robot on Earth" wants to use Pluto to rule the world by defeating all seven robots, but when a stronger robot (Bora) is made to beat him they end up destroying each other. The Sultan ended up with nothing after destroying so much in his recklessness.

at a superficial level Darius XIV might seem more like the Sultan in that he's a militaristic "Muslim world" leader and Abullah's superior, and while that message might apply to him when he was the ruler of Persia, when we actually see him in the series he's an already defeated, vengeful madman telling some doomsday prophecy (he was oppressive to robots and is now talking about them ruling the world, as is pointed out in the courtroom) . He and Abullah are used to show a message against revenge and the cycle of hatred instead. The President who we see at the end realizing that his effort to make Thracia a prosperous superpower through warfare was in vain more resembles the lesson the Sultan was supposed to learn (but is less of a cartoon villain).

There's also the real world Iraq war parallel here. The war didn't end when Saddam Hussein was ousted and Bush gave his infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech. The American army continued to occupy while transitioning a new government, and an insurgency or "Resistance groups" consisting of loyalists to Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party (who weren't allowed in the democratic government) and Islamists Shi'a and Sunni (including al-Qaeda) continued. They attacked and did nasty things both to Americans (and allies) but also at times to the new government, people they considered traitors, other religions, etc. of course including civilians. Like Abullah they had understandable reasons to be angry but reacted in destructive, harmful ways. Perhaps Urasawa felt that if he just left the story like that it could be taken as a one-sided critique, and risk being seen as too soft on the invaders. By splitting the villain's role up like this he gets have it both ways.

I'm not saying it was done in the best way. Even in the manga it seemed a bit out of place, so any anime adaptation would have had trouble on how to go with that. I think it improved upon some dialogue, but delaying introducing it until episode 5 probably made it seem even more out of nowhere, rather than having it teased from earlier on. I was seriously wondering before that point if they were just going to remove it to avoid confusing the audience.

Nov 2, 2023 9:03 AM

Beat_Jerker

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Aug 2020

1296

the robot sahad was created by the human abullah before he died in the war, i remember a scene where sahad meets abullah and is shocked because he thought abullah was dead.
and the police robot detecting that abullah was not a robot makes sense because even atom had problem detetcting if abullah was a human or not and the goji rumor was started by thracia and ig everyone just roiled just with it and started calling abullah's second personality goji too, that's the only explanation i could think of. Although i do agree that many things didnt get satisfying answers but i wouldn't classify most of the things you stated as "plot holes". The show is definitely far from perfect and does indeed have it's flaws but it was pretty solid imo

Nov 2, 2023 9:12 AM

#10

-j0n

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May 2021

240

i aint reading allat

Nov 2, 2023 9:41 AM

#11

MyOwnGod

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Oct 2018

212

Reply to Kawaii_swan

CrunchyCrobat said:
The whole thing about the robot not being able to tell that Abullah makes sense, cause even atom and gesitch, the two of the strongest and smartest robots could not tell if he was a robot or a human, so a weak police guard robot would obviously make that mistake, so it probably was Abullah going around killing the humans

The police robot wasn't "not being able to tell if Abdullah is a robot", his wife sounded 100% sure that it wasn't a robot from just a tiny fragment she got, I assumed back then that robots have some sort of identifying system. It's the other way around, actually, robot sense that Abdullah is a robot in terms of his body, but not his mind, that's what confuses them, so from the distance they would've assumed that he's a robot. Also, as I said, the second victim was killed with a mini hurricane and as far as we know only Sahad could create them, and it's implied that he acted as the killer only using Pluto-body.

Kawaii_swan said:
The teddy bear AI was behind behind all of it.

The rumors of Persia having mass destruction robots, it’s destruction and influencing Dr.Abullah to believe he was going to create the perfect world by annihilating everything.
The hint was Atom’s sister explaining that Pluto is being used by someone who is also being used (Dr. Abullah) but doesn’t realize it.

The teddy bear AI wanted to take over the new world. I wonder who created it.

But how exactly he did anything? He literally did nothing other than talking to the president. His powers weren't even implied, lol. As someone else said, I can only assume that there's some kind of connection to the story in Astro Boy, but I somehow doubt it.

Nov 2, 2023 11:13 AM

#12

TaifSux

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Jan 2021

110

Reply to -j0n

i aint reading allat

@JoN- Yet you oneped a disscussion thread and commented on it.

Nov 2, 2023 11:16 AM

#13

TaifSux

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Jan 2021

110

Monstly becuase it was a reimagined arc of Astro...Really a small portion of it..So getting it all wihtout having a deeper knowloge on astro boy lore is kinda not possible.

So author had very little freedom on the story other than just follow the events from different perpectives.

Nov 2, 2023 1:57 PM

#14

Yemi_Hikari

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Jun 2008

771

Reply to MyOwnGod

MyOwnGod said:
The police robot wasn't "not being able to tell if Abdullah is a robot", his wife sounded 100% sure that it wasn't a robot from just a tiny fragment she got, I assumed back then that robots have some sort of identifying system.

I think his wife was trying her best to explain what she saw, which was 100% not a robot because robots need an AI to function, so if her husband couldn't discern an active AI in the robot they both very well, particularly since they're older models, have come to the conclusion that it is 100% not a robot, because it doesn't agree with what they know about robots. We later learn that Pluto is able to do something outside of this realm of possibility, which is to control bodies remotely while still being able to use his powers.

Nov 4, 2023 7:29 AM

#15

MMDDUDE

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May 2021

145

Reply to -j0n

i aint reading allat

You really thought you did something with this💀💀. Get a driving license💀💀

Nov 6, 2023 1:59 PM

#16

LoomyTheBrew

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Feb 2014

901

I completely agree with your feelings. I enjoyed it, but the plot left a lot of things unexplained. I seriously have no idea what the teddy bear AI even is? There was zero explanation. And how the hell did Brau escape and make it all the way to the US? The cracks in the story are pretty big….

Nov 6, 2023 4:42 PM

#17

gswelcome

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Aug 2008

1684

I wish there was more about that anti-robot organzation, was introduced but then never really used past that one assassin and manipulating the brother of the guy that Gesicht killed but once they were wrapped up they disappeared. Anti-robot sentiment was introduced as an issue in society and showing how broken robots treated like literal trash. Nothing was done with it though, a scene of a bunch of robed dudes chanting was pointless.

Ending was real abrupt as well, after the climax the anime just ended wish there could have been a more eased landing than the hard braking...

Nov 6, 2023 8:06 PM

#18

Oppai_Loli_God

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Apr 2021

332

Could have been a masterpiece, but we never got to see Gesicht's Wife and Atom get together at the end and fuck each other aggressively. "Can I see you again" was code for "Can you come over and fuck my brains out in my bed, so I can forget about Gesicht's small penis and his inability to satisfy me".

I didn't see any black robots either, what a load of shit that is, women, both human and robot, would want the metallic BBC.

Nov 8, 2023 7:17 AM

#19

copypasterCPS

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Aug 2018

208

Reply to Oppai_Loli_God

@Oppai_Loli_God least degenerate anime fan

Nov 8, 2023 9:15 AM

#20

Truly_Evil

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Oct 2020

200

Reply to Oppai_Loli_God

@Oppai_Loli_God
This cracked me up 😂

Nov 8, 2023 2:27 PM

#21

YanYan

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Aug 2021

3383

It needed to be longer ^_^

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[spoilers] Could've been a masterpiece, but too many loose ends

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