One of the Holy Grails of a Superman nerd, especially one who likes Anime, is a proper translation of this book filled with beloved explaining their love for Superman. All of them men who fundamentally changed Anime and Manga for ever.
Osamu Tezuka, The “God of Manga”, creator of Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, Black Jack, Pheonix, and many others. He was an honorary Chairman of Japan’s Superman fanclub. He also translated Superman’s Last Son of Krypton by Elliot S! Maggin (your favorite Superman writer’s favorite Superman writer, a legend for Superman fans) and explained his thoughts of the character in detail here.
Go Nagai, the creator of Getter Robo, Devilman, Cutie Honey, Violence Jack, Mazinger Z, and many others. Someone you wouldn’t expect to be inspired by Superman—considering how dark and grim some of his work can be at times. And yet, he explains his thoughts and inspirations just as deeply as Tezuka here.
Shotaro Ishinomori, known as the “King of Manga”, creator of classics like the Super Sentai series, Kamen Rider, and Cyborg 009. Many of these have clear superhero inspirations like his mentor Tezuka. Even so, most of the time it’s Spider-Man who’s brought up by other people as the inspiration for someone like Kamen Rider, with Superman not even a line of dialogue is given. And yet, he’s here all the same talking about Superman as an inspiration too.
Its all very awesome. But unfortunately, I’m quite lacking in my Japanese. These interviews are quite great. But I can only find snippets of said pages. There are many more Mangaka whom are interviewed, but its hard to find and even Google AI doesn’t really seem to even acknowledge that this exists.
If any Superman fan out there that knows Japanese has these interviews and can translate? Please share.
