Dororo (2019 Anime)

[jeffbert]

i WATCHED THE 1ST 3 EPIOSODEs oops, [caps lock]! Anyway, looking at the episode guide for the B&W series, the 1st 2 stories stories were 2 episodes each.

Dororo ep guide, old site (wayback machine)
The advantage here, is that by merely changing the "en" in the web address to "ja" yields the Japanese language page.

Anyway, the graphic detail is much more intense/gruesome. Dororo is afraid of the dark. Is this correct in a time before even gas lights?

[jeffbert]

Quite a departure from the original version, but very well done. I keep forgetting to watch it! So, I watched the one about the giant centipede the other day, not quite what Tezuka would have done.

click for spoilerThe sacrificed girl was apparently consumed naked, as her robe/ kimono had been left behind. But when emerging for the beast's belly, she is both alive, & fully clothed.

[jeffbert]

How does it compare so far with the 1969 version? I haven't watched either of them and I'm choosing which one to start with.

O.k., I have watched the first 11 of 12 episodes. I think 12 per season. I just began taking screen caps & cropping images to past portraits over their B&W versions, adding the voice actors names, etc. Copied the synopses, added my own comments, etc. There are many similarities, episode titles often the same. But Tahomaru is not at this time, the total jerk he was originally. In fact, he is a fairly decent kid.

click for spoilerin Episode #11, The story of Banmon, part 1, my comments: Tahomaru overhears his parents talking about the sacrifice of his elder brother! He had already met Hyakkimaru, and seen him kill a large monster. He had been seeking the 16 year old boy whom a crazed woman had been saying would destroy lord Daigo's prosperty that the local villages had been enjoying. Most other areas were suffering drought.

[Tetsuwan Penguin]

I just finished watching the 24 episodes of Dororo on Amazon Prime. I'd seen most of the 1969 anime and might have read some of the Manga, and my memory is that the original story might mot have been 'finished', I don't think the 1969 anime reached a conclusion. I was surprised to see that Dororo was female, though it appears that was mentioned in the Manga (according to wikiapedia). The 2019 version is different in other ways from the 1969. Besides reaching a conclusion, and showing Dororo's true sex, it had the priest, the doctor that made Hyakkimaru's prosthetic body parts, and his mother and father as reoccurring characters.

The 2019 anime seems to have reached a final conclusion with the last episode. The story was contracted a bit from the original (only 12 demons instead of 48 as in the original). The beginning was also done starting forward in time, with the back story told in flashbacks instead of a straight time line as was done in the manga and anime. The artwork was more 'modern' and 'real' than Tezuka's original. Tezuka's artwork in general is more 'cartoon' like than today's manga, which tends to be very realistic. This anime follows the modern trend, although some of the characters were drawn very much like the Tezuka originals (such as Biwa hosi, the monk-priest). Also at one point where Dororo displays shock at Hyakkimaru's behavior (he was under the influence of a goul demon), Spider and Hyotantsugi show up.

One theme that struck me in both animes and the manga was how Hyakkmaru was abandoned as a child, with what remained of his body wrapped in cloth and set adrift in a boat. The image is right out of the bible with Hyakkmaru as Moses.

There are rumors that there might be a season two, but if that happens the story line will be totally new since it will go beyond any material that Tezuka left behind. The final few scenes of the last episode showed Hyakkimaru and Dororo parting ways, and in a flash forward Dororo was now a young woman.