Doraemon Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

Doraemon: Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

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Japan has provided Americans with many popular manga titles – but most Americans still don’t know about its best manga character.

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Doraemon Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

From Sailor Moon to Dragon Ball, many Americans love reading Japanese Manga – especially now that so many English translations of their comic books are available in the United States. However, Japan has a wealth of manga characters that have achieved fame in many countries around the world. Curiously, however, one of their best manga characters has yet to take the United States by storm yet.

Considered Japan’s first “animation ambassador” by foreign minister Masahiko Komura himself, Doraemon, a robot cat who’s been appearing in Japanese manga comics since 1970. Despite a fifty-year career that’s included appearances in manga, feature-length films, and an anime television series that’s lasted longer than The Simpsons, many Americans still don’t know much about Doraemon. To give you an idea of what you’ve been missing, let’s take a fond look back at Doraemon’s history.

Who Is Doraemon?

Doraemon Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

Created by Japanese cartoonists Hiroshi Fujimoto and Motoo Abiko (who wrote under the pen name Fujiko Fujio), Doraemon is a manga about Nobita, a kind-hearted ten-year-old boy who, unfortunately, is terrible in school, clumsy at sports, and regularly bullied by his classmates. Nobita was such a loser in life that his descendants in the 22nd century are still paying off all of the debts he accumulated in his life.

Ashamed to have such a loser ancestor, Nobita’s great-great-grandson Sewashi Nobi comes up with the idea to send his robot cat Doraemon back in time to look after Nobita when he was a boy. Sewashi hopes that if Doraemon encourages Nobita to stand up for himself and do better in school, history will change and his future descendants’ lives will improve.

Unfortunately, since Sewashi’s family is so poor, Doraemon is not a top-of-the-line model robot cat. Later stories reveal he was damaged in a manufacturing plant accident, resulting in him graduating at the bottom of his class while being trained to take care of children. Worse, while looking after Sewashi, Doraemon’s cat ears were nibbled off by a mouse, causing the originally yellow Doraemon to turn blue in horror and develop a crippling phobia of mice.

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Nevertheless, Doraemon is also kind-hearted and devoted to helping Nobita, who develops a brother-like relationship with his robot cat. Moreover, Doraemon possesses a bottomless “fourth dimensional pocket” on his stomach that contains a seemingly endless supply of gadgets from the future. The gadgets tend to be second-hand (since Doraemon is so poor) but can still accomplish magic-like miracles that help Nobita. Unfortunately, Nobita tends to be lazy and often abuses the power of these gadgets – resulting in comedic disasters.

The Doraemon Manga Adventures

Doraemon Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

From this basic concept, Fujiko Fujio developed a line of stories that turned Doraemon from one of Japan’s best manga comics into a cultural phenomenon. Most of the manga stories followed a simple pattern. Nobita would come home crying, usually, after the local bully Gian beat him up, rich kid Suneo showed off a new toy, or Nobita’s crush Shizuka began hanging out with other boys. Doraemon would offer sympathy and encouragement, but Nobita would insist on a quick fix for his problem – resulting in Doraemon producing a gadget from his pocket.

The gadgets were a huge part of the manga’s appeal as they could basically fulfill any wish. Some like the “Anywhere Door” which could transport the user anywhere in the universe, made multiple appearances. Others, like a set of pills that could grant a person insect-like superpowers were designed specifically for one story. Regardless, the gadgets usually gave Nobita the fast solution he wanted – but when it came time to return the gadget, Nobita would usually keep it and get into more trouble.

One story had Doraemon give Nobita a “balance shot” after Nobita had a day filled with nothing but bad luck. The shot gives Nobita uncanny good luck to balance out all the bad things that happened to him – but when Nobita starts overindulging, Doraemon warned him that a wave of bad luck will soon balance out the good fortune. Terrified, Nobita begins refusing all the prizes and free food that keep coming his way, knowing he’s just inviting trouble.

Doraemon Japan’s Best Manga Most Americans Don’t Know About

Despite these mishaps, Nobita does become a better and stronger person thanks to his friendship with Doraemon. Although Nobita is generally cowardly, he displays remarkable courage when looking out for his friends. In one touching story, Doraemon is forced to return to the future, and Nobita, not wanting his friend to worry about him, refuses to back down from a bully’s constant beatings until the bully gives up just so he can show Doraemon he can survive without him.

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Fujiko Fujio also used Doraemon and Nobita’s adventures to teach lessons about science, history, and environmentalism, similar to Hayao Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli films. Many stories saw Doraemon take Nobita to different historical periods in “Doctor Who” style adventures where they (and the reader) learn about dinosaurs, world history, and scientific principles. Virtually all of these stories were adapted into the Doraemon television anime series which produced almost 2000 episodes from 1979 to 2005. The anime was later rebooted the same year into a new Doraemon animated series.

Doraemon quickly gained widespread appeal outside of Japan, and both his manga and anime were translated and redubbed for several different countries, including India, France, Vietnam, China, Brazil, and the Philippines. Although English-translated versions of Doraemon’s manga exist, the U.S. didn’t get the dubbed Doraemon anime series until episodes of the 2005 series were adapted into an American-style Disney XD television series. Surprisingly, former Power Ranger Johnny Yong Bosch voiced Nobita (renamed “Nobi”) and Mona Marshall from South Park voiced Doraemon.

The Doraemon Novels

Doraemon’s popularity led to Fujiko Fujio creating full-length manga novels that offered longer, more action-packed adventures. Unlike the episodic manga, the stories had a darker tone and saw Doraemon, Nobita, and their friends travel to prehistoric times to take care of a dinosaur Nobita raised or repel an invading robot army from a different planet. The new stories proved popular and were adapted into successful feature-length animated films.

While many Americans still don’t know about Doraemon, his popularity around the world guarantees he’ll be around when the U.S. is ready to fully embrace his manga, anime, and films. In the meantime, English translations of his manga exist on the Internet for those who want to read comics online, giving fans a way to discover the best manga most Americans don’t know about.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/doraemon-best-manga-series/

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