"Black Jack Missing Pieces" (Rittosha Publishing) is composed of the "phantom original version" of Tezuka Osamu's masterpiece manga "Black Jack". It was released in November 2023 and was a hit, selling over 10,000 copies despite its high price of 4,950 yen. Following the book, "Black Jack Historical Color Pieces" (same publisher), which collects episodes that were published in color pages when it was first published, will be released on November 15th. The new book is likely to be a hot topic as it will also feature many miraculously unearthed materials. "Black Jack" was serialized in "Weekly Shonen Champion" (Akita Publishing) from 1973 to 1983. Many related books have been published so far, and it seems unlikely that new discoveries will be made at this point, but in the Reiwa era, more than 40 years after the end of the serialization, a "phantom" "missing piece" was discovered. We spoke to Hajime Tanaka of the Materials Development Department of Tezuka Productions, who was involved in the production of the book, about the behind-the-scenes story of the excavation. ◇Scattered Fragments
Tezuka is known for making major edits to his works when they are serialized in magazines and made into comics. He also makes edits when the comics go through multiple editions or change format. In other words, there are many different versions, and in the case of "Black Jack," there are episodes with completely different endings. For the first time, "Black Jack Missing Pieces" has reprinted the "phantom original version" from when it was serialized.
Tezuka was a prolific artist, and it is said that he drew 150,000 pages in his lifetime, and currently, Tezuka Productions has approximately 100,000 manuscripts in its possession. They are stored by work, but the amount is so large that sometimes the materials get mixed up. Sometimes "missing pieces" are discovered by chance among materials for other works. They are also sometimes discovered and returned by the publisher.
It is hard to believe now, but Tezuka would sometimes attach manuscripts to his replies to fan letters. Since the color manuscripts published in magazines were never published in the comics released at the time of serialization, he would generously give them to his fans. It is said that Tezuka would sometimes give materials as gifts to fans who came to visit his workshop, which shows how much he valued his fans. If something was handwritten by Tezuka, it would have great cultural and historical value, but in times that were different, it probably wasn't given much importance.
In other words, some of the valuable materials have been scattered. "Black Jack Missing Pieces" and "Black Jack Historical Color Pieces" have unearthed and reconstructed the lost fragments, restoring the "phantom original version" to the Reiwa era.
◇What's different about the original version?
In "Black Jack Missing Pieces," you can compare the original version with the comic version to get a glimpse of the creativity and originality of Tezuka, who is also known as the "god of manga." So what has changed?
"Tezuka is a manga artist who makes a lot of revisions. Sometimes the structure changes significantly. Sometimes the ending changes because panels are rearranged or added. Sometimes the lines change. Sometimes he changes old material, such as TV material, and sometimes he changes the names of diseases and phrases to reflect the historical background. There's nothing wrong with making changes, but the original version gives us an insight into the atmosphere and customs of the time when it was serialized, so I think it has documentary value in itself."
The comic version is based on the original version, with frames cut and pasted and revised, so the original manuscript has been lost. When reprinting, the manuscript is rearranged like a puzzle while looking at the magazine in which it was published. If frames cannot be found, the magazine will be scanned.
"For the Ritsusha reprint series, Office ASK creates new manuscripts (blueprints) for reassembly, and uses them to restore the books. When scanning from magazines, ink bleeds and lines show through, so they are corrected and restored. The company's technology is excellent, so they are able to reprint the books, but it is actually very time-consuming. All previous issues of Black Jack use manuscripts for the book that Tezuka edited, so this is surprisingly the first original version." ◇Miraculously unearthed materials as well Black Jack Historical Color Pieces, which will be released on November 15th, will consist of 17 stories, mainly episodes that were first published as vivid four- or two-color color pages. The reprint uses existing manuscripts, and selected stories related to Black Jack's origins. The masterpiece "A Friend Is Where" will be published in its original, unedited form. Many valuable materials will be included, such as unused names and unpublished manuscripts that were miraculously discovered, storyboards for the anime, and handwritten synopsis manuscripts. The inclusion of unused names is also a major point.
"In fact, almost no names by Tezuka remain. He draws directly, so there are no names left. That's why they're not available anywhere. I thought they would never exist again, but they were miraculously discovered."
Mr. Tanaka also said about "Black Jack," "It's a work from when he was at the peak of his career, so you can see the skill of Tezuka."
You can feel the passion of Tezuka at the time from the color pages and the valuable materials that were discovered.
(c) Tezuka Productions
