"No matter how the species on earth evolve, they cannot escape the fate of evolution, depravity, and destruction."
—Pierre Buller, Planet of the Apes
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > "BirdMan Series" and Osamu Tezuka in the early 70s</h1>
The Bird Series began to be serialized in the Japanese magazine S-F マガジン in 1971 and continued until its end in 1975, all in the form of short stories, and finally summarized in a single book into all 19 chapters of the story.
On the one hand, in 1971, Osamu Tezuka's animation company went bankrupt, and he was saddled with a huge debt of conservatively estimated 150 million yen, and had to return to the manga industry as a personal person to draw manga to pay off the debt, but at this time, the manga industry was already a rookie, and the style and genre of manga were constantly evolving.
Even Osamu Tezuka, the most prominent manga artist of the Tokiwaso period in the 1950s, was turned away by many manga editors, and Osamu Tezuka had to say goodbye to children's manga and start experimenting with new manga genres, not only that, but also to cater to the market.
This period can be called the lowest point of Osamu Tezuka's life, and his mood is also transmitted to his works, reflecting the works of this period, the biggest embodiment of which is the gray and dark tone and dissatisfaction and criticism of reality.
The Bird Series, published in the science fiction magazine S-F マガジン, has several purposes, first of all, as Japan's first science fiction magazine, S-F マガジン has a huge readership and circulation, and Osamu Tezuka can get real reader feedback on his work in this magazine.
Secondly, because the competition for serialization in comic magazines is very fierce, through their own fame, they can easily be serialized in popular science fiction magazines, and their income can also be guaranteed, just like the current singer to appear in variety shows is a reason.
Osamu Tezuka is very good at the subject of science fiction, if you add a label to his manga, SF is one of the most important labels, in the form of manga, it can be said that he is familiar with it, that is his best field.
< h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > SF 杂shi "S-F Magazine" Yote 冢ji insect "鸟 human daisy"</h1>
Although the serial of "Bird People" lasted for 5 years, the workload was not large, and S-F マガジン was different from a manga magazine that was released weekly or half a month, and S-F マガジン was a monthly magazine that only needed to hand over 7 pages of manuscripts per month.
"S-F マガジン" is the first SF magazine in Japan, and during its inception from 1959 to 1962, it was cared for and influenced by the famous American science fiction magazine "The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction".
Another important reason why Osamu Tezuka's SF manga works can be serialized is that fukuto of the second generation of editors, Hiroshi Nanzan, was entrusted with the second generation of editors, and in 1969, the "Overhaul Symposium Incident" broke out within S-F マガジン to discuss the direction of Japan's SF, and Masashi Fukushima resigned, and the second generation of editors NaganamiYama Hiroshi took office.
Hiroshi Nanzan is known as the first person to study Japan's extraordinary phenomena, and from the beginning of Hiroshi Namami's tenure, "S-F マガジン" put aside the shackles and limitations of the previous hard-core SF and expanded into the diversity of supernatural, fantasy novels and manga, in other words, began to formally break away from the traditional SF route of American SF and began to embark on a Japanese SF that suited its own characteristics.
Paranormal phenomena have a long history in Japan, as early as 1923, Asano and Saburo founded the Psychic Research Society in Tokyo, specializing in telepathic supernatural phenomena.
Because of the influence of Nanzan Hiroshi, the "Bird Generation" also added a lot of research results about Nanshan himself, bizarre paranormal phenomena, such as The Koberon in Chapter 5 "Kobelon the Vulture and Me" in the kilted brain to create powerful brain waves, making the doctor hallucinate, and even directly control the doctor himself.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > the prototype of Osamu Tezuka's Torihito Series</h1>
In 1971, although Osamu Tezuka began to serialize the "Bird Man Series" in science fiction magazines, he actually created other manga works at the same time, such as the novella "Akiko", the long manga "Strange Doctor Black Jack", etc. As a creative manga artist, he did not invest much energy in this "Bird Man Series", so he referred to a popular movie that was being released at the time - "Planet of the Apes" released in 1968, and we can see many elements similar to "Planet of the Apes" from the "Bird People Series".
In 1963, the French science fiction writer Pierre Buller created "Planet of the Apes", 5 years later was adapted into a film of the same name, the Cold War, religion, race is the most appeared in the "Planet of the Apes", human astronauts forced to land on a planet, found that the ruler here is apes rather than humans, apes are high and even raise humans as pets, the film revealed that this is actually the earth thousands of years later.
The worldview in Birdman's Great Series is that birds evolve to heights that surpass humans, and humans become inferior animals ruled by birds, which is no different from Pierre Buller's Planet of the Apes, except that apes are replaced by birds.
Cold War, religious, and ethnic elements also appear in Osamu Tezuka's "Bird Man Series", and even appear repeatedly through different stories, such as the cold war topic in the third chapter "Crows", Japan is helpless to a large group of highly intelligent crows, want to attack them, and fear of causing a fierce reaction from powerful Cold War countries, which is the real manifestation of the Cold War period at that time.
Chapter Seven, "The Story of Rhodesia," is dominated by ethnic conflict, with people of color rebelling because they are usually oppressed, but in turn bullying white women in the riot.
Because "Planet of the Apes" is used as a reference, and only needs to create 7 pages of short stories per month, Osamu Tezuka's "Bird Man Series" contains both Tezuka's perception of reality and some attempts at different manga genres.
Chapter 2, "Man-Eating Seagulls", tells the story of three humans who have fled the sea and arrived at a small island with the help of seagulls, but two of them actually wanted to kill the seagulls to eat them, and did something to take revenge.
This is reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock's famous 1944 film "A Lonely Boat in the Angry Sea", in which a group of ordinary people are hit and sunk by a German submarine, everyone takes a small boat, and then rescues the German captain on the submarine, but he takes revenge and takes everyone to the opposite destination and tries his best to eliminate the savior one by one on the way.
"Blackbird" tells the story of a high-level bird tribe that was supposed to destroy humans, but became friends with the human old man, and finally after receiving the order to kill the old man, he sang a final lament for the old man with the birds.
The best of the Birds series is Osamu Tezuka's temptation to "reverse the ending", the most exciting of which is "Quail Hill", where Taka and Kino are two different bird races, and the two sides hold a game, each sending a group of humans to fight and betting.
However, they are pregnant with each other, and Nagao hopes to use the human superiority of his side to get Kino's sister, and Kino wants to destroy Nagao by human hands.
The human who represents Keno's side is called Kiel, and the human who represents the high side there is called Sack, and the two sides have launched a contest between you and me, but in fact, Kiel and Sak collude, and the two humans merge together to prepare to destroy the two bird clans, and when they have eliminated Nagao, they are rushing to Kino but are defeated by the other side first, and Kiel's girlfriend betrays him at the most critical time, betrays the human people, and reports to the bird clan Kino.
This series of short stories has a lot of points to the point, each person can deduce some resonance from reality according to their own judgments and growth experiences, worldview, which provides valuable experience for Osamu Tezuka, and many successful experiences are also used in his other outstanding work of the 70s, which is also a main line, short story composition of "Strange Doctor Black Jack".
The most interesting taste of "Bird Man Series" needs to be tasted by the reader himself.