AstroBoy Online Forums

Viki seems to have all sorts of Tezuka stuff. They now have ALL (or most anyway) of the Three Eyed One subed, plus a lot of the TV specials, 13 experimental films, etc.

They also have many old cartoons like Felix The Cat from the 30's! and Popeye / Betty Boop.

BTW when my daughters were in the HS marching band, one of their classmates had a grandfather who was one of the artists that did cels for Popeye and Betty Boop. (Myron Waldman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myron_Waldman)

One more thing. They have had the Japanese version of the 1980 Astroboy series subed for some time now. I noticed that in the Japanese soundtrack they used "also sprach zarathustra" for the music when Astro came to life. This piece is, of course, from the move "2001 A Space Odyssey" which Tezuka was asked to work on by Stanley Kubrick. He didn't take the job, but played the soundtrack often while he drew Manga in his studio (wore out the record even).

Heheh, an interesting little nod right there. However, I have seen a clip of this scene on Youtube that features a different music track- one that I find ultimately more pleasing, but not syncing up quite as well. I'll find it; give me a second...

Edit: Here you go!

Yes the English dub used "les preludes" by Franz Liszt.

... Funny, I think I remember it being Also Sprach Zarathustra, just like the Japanese dub. I don't remember, though; it's been a while since I saw any of the English dub. By the time I regained any interest in continuing the series, it had gone. The Japanese dub is now in it's place and I must say, I rather like it much better. It was the poor dubbing that induced my reluctance to overcome my procrastination.

However, I may just find a video on Youtube that has that particular part of the English dub, so that I can compare. It wouldn't make a whole lot of sense, seeing as this person mostly has Japanese clips of old Tezuka animes on their channel, but we shall see.

I may also look up the song itself. So uplifting. It would certainly be worth a listen.

"Little Brown Fox" wrote:I may also look up the song itself. So uplifting. It would certainly be worth a listen.

Liszt's Les Preludes is a very interesting bit of music. It's a 'Tone poem' (which is also what 'Also Sprach Zarathustra' is) that tries to describe musically a theme. The part used in the anime is from the beginning of the piece, from which the music goes through various themes and at the very end it rewinds though the various themes to arrive at the beginning theme using it in a dramatic ending. IIRC Jean Shepherd (on WOR-AM NYC) used the very same bit in his radio show as background while he was telling one of his many stories.