In 1952, Osamu Tezuka ended his one-year internship at Osaka University Hospital and settled in Tokyo with the support of family and friends, officially becoming a professional manga artist. At that time, the 24-year-old Tezuka had become a hot newcomer to the manga industry with a series of works such as "New Treasure Island", "Metropolis", and "The Forest Emperor". In April of that year, Shonen magazine began serializing Astro Boy, and two months earlier, the first episode of "My Son Goku" had been featured in Akita Shoten's Manga O.
In a comedy manga with a very fast narrative rhythm, "My Monkey King", Osamu Tezuka actually spent 108 pages to reinterpret the story of "Flame Mountain", such a high-standard treatment is extremely rare in the entire work. Sections such as the stegosaurus-shaped water-dodging golden-eyed beast (bull demon king mount), the personified fire demon, etc. are obviously homages and parodies of "Iron Fan Princess".
▲ "The Iron Fan Princess" (left) with
"My Monkey King" (right) picture comparison
Osamu Tezuka describes this complex as follows in the afterword to the one-line book "My Monkey King": "My Son Goku is strongly influenced by The Iron Fan Princess. Especially when writing about the end of "Flame Mountain and the Bull Demon King", the cartoon image jumped in my thinking and lingered. Forced me to almost imitate... I feel embarrassed to talk about this paragraph now. ”（7）
However, anyone who actually read the manga knows that Osamu Tezuka has used his imagination to reconstruct the journey to the west, and the ubiquitous banter and humor, as well as the creative concept of "postmodern" consciousness, are the background of this work. His Wukong is neither the great sage in the original "Journey to the West", nor the gimmicking walker in "The Iron Fan Princess", but a reckless teenager who continues to grow and constantly improve his personality on the way to learn the scriptures. In order to show the difference from the former, he named the work "My Monkey King".
▲ "My Sun Wukong" single book volume 3 cover art,
Akita Shoten 1957 edition
In fact, Sun Wukong in "The Princess of the Iron Fan" is not the lone hero that people think of, or even the real first protagonist, because the theme of this work is "all as one, strive for the final victory". This also made Wan Liming, who favored Sun Wukong, regret that he did not regret until the production of "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" in the 1960s, which only originalized his decades of "Monkey King Dream". Before his death, Tezuka also created an animation work with an autobiographical nature, "Osamu Tezuka Story: I Am Monkey King". The film dramatically recreates the past of Tezuka's association with "Iron Fan Princess", substitutes Tezuka into the role of Monkey King, and consciously adds a lot of extra points to The Sun Wukong brain in "Iron Fan Princess".
Comparing the real Japanese version of the "Iron Fan Princess" poster and the poster in the animation film in history, it can be found that Sun Wukong, who was originally placed in a corner, has become the main image, and the film's adaptation of some plots of "Iron Fan Princess" has also increased the performance of Sun Wukong's vast magical powers. It can be said that this is also the embodiment of Osamu Tezuka's personal "Goku complex".
▲ Left: The original Japanese version of "Iron Fan Princess" poster
Right: Poster of "Iron Fan Princess" from "Osamu Tezuka: I Am Son Goku"
As we all know, "Monkey King" also directly helped Osamu Tezuka complete the transition from a manga artist to an animator. In 1958, the animation department of Toei Pictures had just released Japan's first color animated feature film, "The Legend of the White Snake", and they were worried about the next film. It just so happens that the "My Monkey King" series is nearing the end, and Toei is very interested in the adaptation of Chinese mythology, if you adapt "Journey to the West" according to the manga of Osamu Tezuka, it has both the appeal of the famous book and the blessing of the popular manga, which is double insurance for them.
Osamu Tezuka gladly agreed to Toei's request for cooperation. But after all, "interlaced like a mountain", at the beginning, Tezuka's partial to the manga-style storyboard draft did not meet the needs of animation production, and the difference in the concept of the play made the cooperation less enjoyable. Fortunately, Tezuka became familiar with the animation production process and the way the team worked, and he decided to set up his own animation company in the future.
In 1960, Toei's third animated feature film, Journey to the West, was released. Coincidentally, this year, Wan Liming's "Big Trouble in the Heavenly Palace" is also in full swing.
▲ Toei version of the "Journey to the West" poster (1960)
▲ In 1967, Bug Productions launched an episodic version of "The Adventures of Wukong"
It can be seen that this "Journey to the West" more continues the aesthetic tendency of Toei's early "classical", in addition to some character settings and humorous bridges, Tezuka's personal imprint is not so strong. However, Tezuka's "Iron Fan Princess" complex is continued - the Flame Mountain becomes the main battlefield of the climax of the story, and the Bull Demon King is shown in the setting of the boss.
Tezuka's preference for the "Flaming Mountain" story also consciously or unconsciously influenced many later Japanese manga and anime. For example, in Akira Toriyama's "Dragon Ball", Goku has just started his adventure to encounter the Flame Mountain, looking for a banana fan, and also booked a "doll kiss" with Kiki, the daughter of the Bull Demon King, and married and had children when he became an adult;
▲ Manga "Dragon Ball", original work: Akira Toriyama, "Flaming Mountain" related chapters published in "Weekly Shonen JUMP" in 1985
▲ In the original plot of the animated version of Dragon Ball, Goku and Kiki once again look for a banana fan in order to calm the fire caused by the volcanic eruption
In the doraemon series of theatrical versions of "Nobita's Parallel Journey to the West" and "Crayon Shin-chan", the worldview and plot line involved in the Journey to the West are basically the inheritance of Tsuka manga and Toei's version of "Journey to the West"... When it comes to japanese audiences' familiarity with the story of Journey to the West, "Flame Mountain" definitely ranks among the best.
▲ Doraemon: Nobita's Parallel Journey to the West (1988)
▲ "Crayon Novel" episode "I Am Monkey King" (1990s)
(If you want to see more, please pay attention to the Xingman Cup brothers account "Empty Collection Library")