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Twenty-six half-hour episodes of "Astro Boy Reboot" are planned.

As per usual, the Entertainment side of things often seems to a be little slow post-New Comic Book Day, but a couple of headlines have hit the wire that are worth noting:

– It was probably an inevitability, but Sony co-chairman Amy Pascal announced that she will be stepping down from her post and taking on a production role within the studio. While this is surely in response to the devastating Sony hack (which unveiled some very candid emails between Pascal, producers, and top talent), Sony has been in need of a correction course given their struggles of late to launch big picture franchises and the mishandling of the Spider-Man films. Regardless, Pascal leaves a heck of a resume behind her, and I’m sad to see one of the top female creative forces in Hollywood vanish under these circumstances.

– Does the idea of a Robotech movie excite you? After about 8 years of development purgatory, the property may finally see the light of day again. Warner Bros has enlisted 300 screenwriter Michael Gordon to tackle the project and according to Deadline, they have their eyes set on Mama director Andy Muschietti.

– Or how about a live-action Astro Boy? Despite the fact that we had an animated feature in 2009 that barely made a dent in the box office, Animal Logic Entertainment is teaming up with Tezuka Productions to bring Osamu Tezuka‘s creation to life yet again. Here’s what producer Zareh Nalbandian said the studio is aiming for:

We’ve seen him as a manga, an anime and an animated movie but we’ve never seen him as a live-action movie or him as a superhero. We actually see him in the same league as an Iron Man.

– Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive) had long wanted to cast Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) as Wonder Woman in a proposed adaptation of the DC Comics property. Obviously, Warner Bros went another direction entirely, but that hasn’t stopped Refn from working with the actress as he’s cast her in another of his films. This time they’ll be teaming up for The Neon Demon, his first outright horror film, and she’ll be joined by Keanu Reeves, Jena Malone, and Elle Fanning among others. Hopefully it’ll be more appealing to audiences than Only God Forgives, a film that I’m one of the lone defenders of.

– Last night, the Visual Effects Society held their big awards ceremony and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes took home the award for Outstanding Visual Effects while Birdman took home the award for Best Supporting Visual Effects. Big Hero 6 was the talk of the night though, taking 5 awards in total including the award for Outstanding Animation.

Today we look at the work of John Nevarez, Cartoon Brew's Artist of the Day!

heyoscarwilde:

Greeting card sent to famed Donald Duck illustrator Carl Barks by Astro Boy creator Osamu Tezuka ::  year unknown :: via comicartfans.com

This past week, my teenage son and I had the chance to visit the Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum located in Takarazuka city.  Osamu Tezuka is often referred to as the ‘father of manga’ and is highly revered by manga artists in Japan.  His most famous works include Astro Boy, Black Jack and Jungle Emperor Leo.

The museum was opened in 1994 and contains items from Tezuka’s life like his numerous sketchbooks and writings, as well as an animation studio in the basement, and a screening room for films.  There is also a library, shop and cafe on the upper floor.  On our visit, the exhibition hall was filled with panels from Tezuka’s manga series Buddha, which is about to debut as a full-length animated film this May.

My son and I enjoyed touring the museum.  In the animation studio, we drew our own little two panel animations where we could see our drawings in action on backdrops of our own design.  I think my son’s favorite part of the museum was the library where there were multilingual editions of Tezuka’s most famous manga.

While he read, I watched an interactive media program about Tezuka’s life.  Born in 1928, the oldest of three sons, he took to drawing at an early age.  As a youngster, he was often bullied and took much solace in his imagination.  In particular, he was inspired by the world of nature, especially insect life.  In fact, Tezuka took his pen-name from an insect called the osamushi.  He continued with his obsession of drawing cartoons, even during the war years, when such activity was considered frivolous and unpatriotic.  While young, Tezuka had a serious swelling in his arm which was cured by a doctor; Tezuka then wanted to become a doctor himself and pursued medical studies in university.  However, he continued with his drawing of manga, and eventually, on the advice of his mother, pursued his one true passion as his sole profession even though, at the time, such a career was considered precariously unstable.  And the rest, they say, is history!

700 manga later, with Tezuka immortalized by the Japanese as the god of manga, it is unfortunate that so few of Tezuka’s work are available in English.   Hopefully that will change in the years to come.