JAPANESE CULTURE, EXPLAINED
AKIRA
Katsuhiro Otomo’s science-fiction manga AKIRA began in 1982. Its Neo-Tokyo setting links teenage characters with dangerous psychic experiments. The 1988 animated film is another version, also directed by Otomo.
Early volumes follow Kaneda’s friend Tetsuo as his powers awaken and he releases the frozen child Akira. After Akira destroys the city again, the Great Tokyo Empire rises: Akira is king and Tetsuo prime minister, while Miyako seeks a solution. External forces converge; Tetsuo loses control and mutates. Teenage conflict thus expands into catastrophe and a struggle over the city’s new order.
In a 2016 interview, Otomo linked his preparation for AKIRA to frustration with Fireball’s hurried ending. He had initially planned one volume over six months; new ideas then expanded the story and its setting.
The manga ran from 1982 to 1990 and was collected in six volumes. The film opened on 16 July 1988, before serialisation ended. It therefore did not adapt an already completed six-volume narrative page for page.
Ōtomo described controlling speed and flow through sparse words and carefully placed pauses. Architecture and destruction interested him, while fine crosshatching could give an explosion its texture. Reading the drawings means following both the movement between images and the relationship between figures and the city surrounding them.
The photographed pages 240–241 of volume one provide a concrete example. Page 240 moves between a large motorcycle close-up and a roadside figure within a receding street. Page 241 includes a rear view, smaller figures and a larger panel of buildings. Changes in viewpoint, figure size and panel scale vary the rhythm. These pages demonstrate movement through urban space; they do not illustrate the explosions or mutations discussed elsewhere.
In the same interview, Otomo recalled an assistant drawing buildings with rulers and Rotring pens while he added characters and environmental detail. The dense city involved a division of work as well as drawing technique. A useful reading exercise is to examine the action and architectural perspective separately, then see how they establish speed, distance and space together.
Kodansha describes the early English release as flipped for left-to-right reading and fully coloured. Its 2017 anniversary set instead preserves the Japanese artwork’s right-to-left direction and Otomo’s hand-drawn sound effects. “English edition” therefore does not identify a single visual treatment. Compare reading direction, colour and lettering as well as the cover.
The story develops into a struggle over power after the city’s destruction, with consequences far beyond the opening action.
Close and distant views alternate, while roads and buildings establish depth. Panel scale and viewpoint vary the rhythm.
Reading direction, flipped artwork, colour and the treatment of hand-drawn sound effects.