note: This was not released in English. As a rule, I don’t cover non-English language releases here, so I thought I should point that out. If you are unfamiliar with Black Jack, there are several volumes of the regular series available in English.
I haven’t been good about posting these articles, which is mostly because I always back out of my topics at the last minute out of a fear of not knowing enough about them and looking like an idiot. I’ve got two others in mind, one of which I was going to post this weekend… but I got this yesterday, and I had to talk about it immediately.
This magazine was published by Akita Shoten in 2005. It’s a tribute to Black Jack done by various artists of note, reinterpreting old Black Jack stories with varying degrees of faithfulness. When I say “various artists of note,” I mean people that work for Akita Shoten, mostly artists from Shounen Champion (the magazine that Black Jack ran in). There are a handful I recognized, but many are artists that I wasn’t familiar with and probably just had a story running in Shounen Champion when this came out.
There are 18 stories total, which comes up to about 600 pages. I was very entertained.
Once again, forgive my poor image quality, I do not have a scanner and these were all taken with a digital camera in less-than-ideal lighting conditions.
Also, some of this is definitely NSFW.
As an example of my poor image-taking skills, here’s the cover with a horrible glare spot.
I thought the cover was pretty awesome. It’s drawn by Shiro Nishiguchi, who I think is probably the same artist who draws the covers for the Akita Black Jack bunkoban. They’re pretty rad/horrifying, as you can imagine by the extremely lifelike portrait here. The poster inside the magazine is a clean and much larger version of the cover illustration.
This is about a third of it. The details on the hand are pretty incredible. I cut it off, but the hand looks like a photograph, putting this Black Jack firmly in the uncomfortable world of hyper-realism. Talking about realistic portraits of manga characters is something I could do all day, so I’m going to resist the temptation for the time being.
Anyway, the entire magazine uses a lot of kanji with no furigana, which means I can’t make heads or tails of it. It’s pretty unfair, since even Pinoko is stumping me with her dialogue most of the time. It’s not hard to figure out what’s going on though, and I recognized a few of the stories from their originals. Forgive me if I get some of the details wrong. Unfortunately, this also means I’m not going to be able to give proper titles for any of these.
The magazine opens up with a story by Go Nagai, which was awesome. Seeing who the story was by, I unconsciously hoped that everyone kept their clothes on. But I got a little mad at myself, since I figured Nagai would refrain from his usual sense of humor since that would be considered pretty tasteless and frowned upon.
Oh, Go Nagai. I love you so. Poor Sapphire.
As far as I can tell, Go Nagai’s story isn’t really based on an original Black Jack story, but I could be wrong about that. Basically, a bunch of Tezuka’s main characters show up at Black Jack’s house in the middle of the night with various problems. Sharaku is first, and I can’t tell what his complaint is, but his third eye opens and scalpels fly at Pinoko and Black Jack. He leaves with a bandage over the third eye. Next is Hyakkimaru, who seems to want an upgrade.
Presumably because he can kick a lot more demon ass with a machine gun and a flamethrower instead of a wussy sword and cannon combo. Sapphire shows up next, and I believe her problem is that she is both a woman and a man, much like her “spirit” is in Princess Knight. I should have suspected, since that is right up Go Nagai’s alley, God bless him. The little cupid that gave Sapphire her two hearts shows up to take her male heart back and Sapphire rides off with Prince Charm (which is, if I’m not mistaken, his real name). Before leaving, Prince Charm punches Black Jack for seeing Sapphire naked.
The creepy thing is that Go Nagai is closer in style to Tezuka than any of the others in the magazine. Aside from the goofiness, this looks a lot like a Tezuka story, especially since it’s got the cast in it. It’s worth noting that Cutey Honey and Black Jack ran in Shounen Champion at the same time, a fact which amuses me to no end.
Sadly, I would not have recognized Go Nagai’s style if his name hadn’t been romanized on the title page. It’s a real shame that Go Nagai’s work has been largely untranslated, the man is a genius when it comes to ribaldry.
Another artist of note is Masayuki Taguchi. He draws Battle Royale, which was just finishing its run in Shounen Champion when this magazine came out. I probably made the same face you’re making right now, and then made a very sincere wish that everyone’s clothes stay on.
Goddammit, Pinoko. (IMPORTANT NOTE: Pinoko’s clothes stay on.)
Taguchi’s story is a remake of a Black Jack story, but I can’t remember if it’s one that’s been translated into English. Basically, a sculptor loses his arms, and Black Jack makes him robot arms so he can go back to practicing his craft. The armless sculptor plot device is something that was used in Phoenix, too. I mention that only because it”s a really odd gimmick to reuse, and it’s strange that both instances made it into the small amount of Tezuka work that has been translated in the US.
For some reason, Taguchi draws Black Jack with the scar running the wrong way across his face. This may be to cover the skin graft and scar, since his hair is hanging on the correct side and completely covers it most of the time. And to be fair, it is kind of weird that Black Jack’s hair hangs over the side of his face without the scar.
I liked his takes on Tezuka’s characters. Here is a weirdly cartoony Higeoyaji with Lamp, who keeps a lit candle behind his ear at all times. Higeoyaji may give me nightmares.
I especially liked his fresh-looking Sharaku, who plays the sculptor. His third eye is either on his hat or under an x-shaped bandage the entire story, a really awesome detail. For some reason, Sharaku was a favorite of the artists in the magazine. He appeared more than Lamp, Ban, Hamegg, or anyone else.
Anyway, here’s the x-shaped bandage and a look before the robot arms.
I also got a big kick out of Taguchi’s pretty-boy Black Jack.
Another artist of note was Matsuri Akino, the woman who draws Pet Shop of Horrors. Her series Genju no Seiza and Kamen Tantei were both published by Akita Shoten, though I lack the energy to do the proper research that turns up what magazines they ran in (probably Suspiria or Mystery Bonita).
She gets the color page in the middle of the book.
Her story is something about a mother switching her baby with another (presumably healthier) one at birth, getting guilty about it, then everything working out in the end. There was a lot of talking, so I’m a little foggy on the details, and it wasn’t one I recognized from the Black Jack stories I’ve read.
For those who’ve wondered what Black Jack would look like as a shoujo manga, here you go.
Now, there are two types of stories in this magazine. Everything is categorized as Black Jack Alive (the first half of the magazine) or Black Jack M (the second half of the magazine). They were collected into tankouban under both titles, two volumes each, which means there is at least one more issue of Black Jack magazine. I’m not very clear on the difference, unless it is just that the Black Jack Alive stories are more free interpretations of the original stories and the Black Jack M stories are strict adaptations. The Black Jack Alive stories did seem to verge from the originals and/or were less serious than the originals, and two of them I would not have believed to be based on a regular Black Jack story at all. The story that I noticed to be closest to the original was a Black Jack M story.
It’s “You Did It!,” which I think must be famous for being one of the only appearances of Astro Boy outside of the Astro Boy series. It’s been published in America already in Astro Boy volume 22, but we’ll see it again in Black Jack 9 in a few months. Here, it’s a Black Jack M story drawn by Souta Kazamaturi, who I am completely unfamiliar with (the romanization doesn’t seem quite right, and that may be why I’m not finding anything). Above, you can see Kazamaturi’s interpretations of Astro Boy and Hamegg. It’s very, very faithful to the original. The original is one of those uncomfortable, morally ambiguous Black Jack stories, made more so by the fact that Astro Boy is playing the lead, who stabs himself and blames it on Hamegg in order to avenge his brother.
I couldn’t remember if Hamegg played the villain in this story, but he shows up wearing one of his tacky suits and seems to be acting like a jerk in the courtroom later in the story, so I’m pretty sure that’s him. I like the more realistic character design here. Or, at least, more realistic than we usually see him. You can also see the Black Jack design for this story, which is kind of unremarkable.
This was a Black Jack Alive story I recognized from what had been translated into English. Vaguely. I would doubt myself on this, but there is an article in the middle of a magazine that confirms that it is a remake of the story “Dirtjacked,” from volume 2 of Black Jack. It is a very creative remake. They both have the same basic plot, which is that Black Jack is stuck with some patients when a tunnel they were driving through caves in. The original was about a bus full of little kids, while this one features Rock Holmes. The art is very dark, and this magazine is very old, so I couldn’t get a lot of images from it, but it was one of my favorites. Drawn by Naoki Serizawa, of Samurai Man “fame.” Maybe not “fame,” but Samurai Man was translated into English.
My favorite story in the whole book was one drawn by Kyo Natsuki. Kiriko shows up at Black Jack’s house while Black Jack is away, and when a patient suddenly arrives, he and Pinoko are forced to do the impossible Black Jack surgery in his stead. It’s drawn in a goofy style, which makes the Kiriko/Pinoko situation much more hilarious.
Kiriko makes faces through the entire thing, which is pretty awesome. This is a Black Jack Alive story, and I’m pretty sure I’ve read the original, though I can’t place enough of the details to be able to say for sure. Pinoko saving a baby bird sounds familiar, but the article in the middle shows Black Jack performing the surgery in the original story. I’m guessing the original probably didn’t have Kiriko in it.
Actually, this bothered me enough to check. It hasn’t been published in English yet, it’s based on a story called “The Suicide Aspirant” from volume 13 of Black Jack.
What else… well, as much as I dislike Pinoko, one of my favorite things was seeing all the different artists’ interpretations of her.
She frequently opened the stories here. All five of these are from the first few pages of their respective stories.
There were also a lot of pretty stylish interpretations of Black Jack.
See also: the back cover, which has color portraits done by every artist in the magazine.
Two of those images above might be from the same story, but I thought they were all lovely in their own way. The one on top is from a story drawn by Ayumi Tachihara, whose style is pretty cool and looks extremely familiar. The only series I could find by her (?), however, was called Maji, a fairly long-running Shounen Champion series.
The second image is from a story that might be an adaptation of “On a Snowy Night” from volume five of Black Jack. They both share invisible patients that Black Jack operates on, except in the adaptation, the girl is actually invisible and not a ghost. Also, the other character you can see in that image looks suspiciously like Kei Kisaragi. I would think it was her, but she and the patient hook up at the end of the story, something that would never happen in a Black Jack story since she’s his lost love and all that.
Now, I’m not such a big fan of Black Jack that I search out paraphernalia. I didn’t keep feeding “Black Jack” into Yahoo Japan auctions until I found this magazine. I’m not a big enough fan of any series, really, to do that.
Well, except one.
I had known about the Black Jack Alive stories for a few years, and I knew that Yasuko Aoike drew one of them, but I… I didn’t know it was a From Eroica With Love crossover until I saw this magazine. I could have bought the tankouban, but this magazine was actually cheaper, and the tankouban wouldn’t have had this boss poster (which is the opposite side to that portrait I showed at the beginning of the post).
The story is called “Lord of the Rings,” and involves the Major seeking out a man who appears to be trying to hire Black Jack. He is married (?) to a woman that Dorian and company are chatting up so that they can steal her ring, a key to a vault full of paintings and other valuables. Surprisingly, James is the one who steals the ring, but for whatever reason, he decides to swallow it.
Obviously, all the characters meet up after awhile. When the Major shows up to arrest the husband, somehow he, Black Jack, Dorian, Bonham, and James are locked in the vault together. The only way out is with a ring. You would think that would naturally lead to Black Jack operating on James to remove it. That wouldn’t be very funny, so Dorian instead says something that completely repulses James.
I’m sure this is a high point in Ms. Aoike’s career. My favorite detail here is not James’s bloodshot eyes, or that horrible/appropriate screentone, but this panel:
She never draws those characters with cartoony faces. Especially the Major. And they’re just so disgusted.
It ends a few pages after this, with the group breaking out of the safe, the Major collaring the husband on the other side, Eroica paying Black Jack with a handful of jewels, and James picking up all the money that the husband had tried to pay Black Jack with. The last panel is a beautiful mimic of the touching moral scene that Black Jack stories usually end on, with Black Jack walking off through the trees, the main Eroica characters watching him, and Dorian yelling “Good Luck!” in English.
I think it’s pretty safe to say that no lesson was learned.
I didn’t actually enjoy the story since it was too over-the-top (vomit jokes aren’t for me, even in From Eroica with Love), and it was also slightly marred by the fact that Black Jack bore an uncomfortable resemblance to Klaus.
Then again, looking at all her work since From Eroica with Love, all the male leads look like either Dorian or Klaus (except for the monks), which can be kind of hilarious. That Black Jack could put on the Major wig and pass himself off as a NATO spymaster isn’t too surprising.
They look Black Jack up in the NATO database at the beginning of the story. I still find it amusing and anachronistic when the characters in From Eroica With Love use modern technology, even though I’m reading some of the current stories where they call each other up on cellphones and are otherwise of the times.
The most surprising thing of all about this story is that it IS based on a real Black Jack story – one called “Lost Youth” that appears in volume 16 of Black Jack. We won’t get to read it for a few years, but I have to wonder what the parallels are, and just who in Tezuka’s cast of characters play the parts that Eroica, the Major, and James are playing here.
Anyway, this was the most blatant crossover, and it totally did not go with the rest of the stories. All the same, I love that it was allowed to happen, and that Aoike decided that’s what she wanted to do as her Black Jack tribute. A vomit joke is probably up there with Go Nagai’s naked Sapphire on the taste scale, and I applaud them both for their efforts. There was actually only one other story I suspected of being a crossover, but it seemed relatively serious and was in the Black Jack M half, so it may not have been a crossover at all. The Eroica story stood out in particular since it kept in with the comedic spirit of Eroica rather than the mood of Black Jack (I think the only other overtly comedic stories were by Go Nagai and Kyo Natsuki).
One last, more general note about these stories. It’s worth noting that, amid all these stories, there is very little surgery happening. When it is shown, there isn’t much detail, and it’s mostly just Black Jack shown briefly at the operating table. I am missing out on the dialogue, obviously, so I can’t say how much medical banter is going back and forth (it’s apparent in at least a couple stories that there’s quite a bit). Basically, I’m seeing what Black Jack is like without the medical background that Tezuka brings in. My favorite parts of the original Black Jack stories are the insane and detailed operations and the crazy medical conditions that people seem to come in with. It really made me realize and appreciate just how much research, knowledge, and thought goes into every one of those original Black Jack stories.
