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. 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.īlade Runner, I, Robot, Ghost in the Shell, The Animatrix, to name a paltry few, the list is long and varied. This entire concept of one artist dipping into another's world is fascinating and full of wild possibilities. 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. the bold story using the 'World's Strongest Robot' story arc of Tetsuwan Atom as a jumping point. 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 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. The clock is ticking, and Gesicht has to figure out who is behind these brutal killings before time runs out.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.

Seven of the remaining greatest robots built by humanity are on the murderer’s list, including Gesicht himself, as well as humans connected to preserving the International Robot Laws, which grant robots equal rights. The clues lead Gesicht to realize the killer is a robot, which would make it the first case in the past 8 years where a human is killed by a robot.

Gesicht, a German Europol robot detective and a war veteran, is investigating a series of robot and human murders around the world, where the killer leaves behind his signature mark on the victim two pointy objects jutting out of their skull resembling horns. Set in a distant future where humans and sentient robots have come up with a peaceful coexistence after several years of a brutal war, Pluto drives its plot through post-war PTSD and a message of anti-war. The manga series ran from September 2003 to April 2009, publicized by the magazine Big Comic Original. Urasawa and Nagasaki's Pluto is based on Tezuka’s Astro Boy storyline known as “The Greatest Robot on Earth' from 1964.

Pluto by naoki urasawa