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Osamu Tezuka TV Specials Anthology Gets Retail Release

French company Tanuko is taking pre-orders for a retail release of "Love Saves the Earth," a Blu-ray Disc box set anthology of Osamu Tezuka's television specials. The company had launched a crowdfunding campaign for the set in July, though it did not reach its goal.

The box set will include the following anime:

• One-Million Year Trip: Bander Book
• Undersea Super Train: Marine Express
• Fumoon
• Bremen 4: Angels in Hell
• Prime Rose
• Baggy
• Galaxy Investigation 2100: Border Planet
• Boku no Son Goku

The Blu-ray Discs will feature English, French, and Spanish subtitles. The collectors' box set will have an outer packaging with the appearance of a 1980s television set and have individual packaging for each Blu-ray Disc resembling a VHS tape. It will also include a book featuring the complete storyboard of the Undersea Super Train: Marine Express anime, Philippe Bunel's TEZUKANIMATION book, eight postcards featuring key art from each anime, and two lenticular cards for displaying in the collectors box.

Tanuko launched a crowdfunding campaign on Kiss Kiss Bank Bank for the set in July. The campaign had a goal of 300 pre-orders and reached 137 pre-orders before ending on August 9. The projected shipping date for rewards was September 2024. Stretch goals for the campaign included a hardcover edition for the TEZUKANIMATION book, a VCR-shaped design for the Undersea Super Train: Marine Express storyboard book, and varnish options as well as additional embossing for the collectors' box.

Tezuka was a prolific manga artist who drew numerous influential works, including Astro Boy, Jungle Emperor Leo, Black Jack, Princess Knight, Dororo, and Phoenix among many others. These works would go on to inspire following generations in manga storytelling and art, which would earn him the moniker "The God of Manga." Equally significant is his founding of the Mushi Production studio, where he would helm the production of anime adaptations of much of his manga, and other original productions. Perhaps most significant of these was Astro Boy, based on Tezuka's manga, which became Japan's first half-hour animated series. The show pioneered animation techniques and production methods that gave rise to the earliest aesthetics and styles of television anime.

Source: Tanuko