Review of Alabaster by Ian Wolf
Alabaster Vol. 1 by Osamu Tezuka © 2015 by Tezuka Productions. Alabaster Vol. 2 by Osamu Tezuka © 2015 by Tezuka Productions.
"Ugliness is in a way superior to beauty because it lasts." - Serge Gainsbourg
Another of Digital Manga Publishing's crowdfunded Osamu Tezuka titles, Alabaster is one of the Godfather of Manga's darker works, primarily dealing with racism, but also featuring grotesque images and other disturbing subjects like rape. In fact, reading the afterword it becomes clear that Tezuka disliked this series, saying: "I hate every character that appears in it without exception".
Alabaster tells the story of James Block, an African-American athlete who won six gold medals in the 1972 Munich Olympics. Block later falls in love with a beautiful TV star named Sarah Ross and the two date, but when Block asks Sarah to marry her she refuses, partly because James is black. This drives James into a rage, and also to stealing a car and driving it into a crowd of people. He thus ends up going to jail for five years for assault, driving without a licence and involuntary manslaughter.
While in prison he meets a mad scientist named Dr. F who created a special ray gun which makes whatever it fires at invisible. He is in prison because he used the gun on his pregnant daughter, killing her, but her child survived. James, who has come to hate the fact that he is black, asks Dr. F if he could use the gun on himself and the doctor agrees. When James serves his sentence he finds the gun and turns it on himself, but comes to realise that anything it is exposed too long to the gun will eventually die from the rays. Thus James is only partly exposed to the ray, meaning that only his skin is invisible and the inside of his body visible to all. Following this James adopts the name "Alabaster" and begins seeking revenge against those who have wronged him, starting by killing Sarah.
Later, Alabaster travels to Japan where he plans to find Dr. F's granddaughter, Ami, who was adopted by the woman who prosecuted Dr. F. As Ami did not get a direct blast from the ray gun, she had a different affliction: she slowly began to turn completely invisible, to the point where only her eyes could be seen. As a result, she has to go outside completely covered in makeup, and cannot wash in publish. Alabaster wishes to adopt Ami as his own daughter, but her adoptive mother refuses to give her away.
As the years go by Ami gets involved with a poor delinquent named Genya Yamagata, who learns about Ami's invisibility and uses her to help steal test papers and later to steal jewellery. However, Genya is caught and Ami's mother prosecutes him. The invisible Ami enters the court to confess to the crime, but in the end Genya is sent to prison. Ami ends up running away from home and joining Alabaster. Together they free Genya and some of his friends from prison, and then the entire gang begin a massive crime wave, targeting the hypocritical and most importantly, the beautiful. Alabaster's ultimate goal is to remove all beauty from the world and to use the ray gun to make the entire world ugly with Ami as the world’s queen. Meanwhile trying to stop them is Rock Holmes, a narcissistic FBI agent in love with his own face, who will resort to any means to capture Alabaster and Ami, no matter how vile.
The central draw to Alabaster as a title is Tezuka's artwork. The dark, twisted world that Alabaster desires makes for some truly disturbing imagery. The power of the ray gun results in disgusting depictions of mutated animals, some with invisible skin like Alabaster himself, others with partly or fully skeletal bodies, and others with body parts that just seem to float in mid-air. It is not just limited to animals; people too end up being shockingly "mutilated" by the ray gun. Then there is Alabaster's dream of creating his own ugly utopia, with twisted misshapen buildings and a palace for Ami modelled on the head of a dung fly.
Another interesting aspect of the artwork is the depiction of Alabaster himself, not just in his transformed state, but before that. One problem when talking about Tezuka's work is having to explain that he was not racist, despite the fact he often drew people of ethnic minorities in a way that we today would consider racist. In his old James Block state, he looks like a perfectly normal character, and we have what is a non-stereotypical portrayal of a black person in a Tezuka manga. Annoyingly however, in the second volume there is an old-fashioned depiction of a different black character.
Because of the themes in the manga there are some elements that people might find objectionable. For example, there is use of racist language and there is a rape scene near the end of the first volume, although it should be pointed out that this scene leads to a key development in the plot.
Alabaster makes for uncomfortable reading for many reasons, and you can understand why Tezuka ended up disliking this title, written during a time when Tezuka himself was having problems. However, it is a compelling series. It is one that when you start reading it you do not want to stop.
Final score: 8 out of 10
Alabaster Vol. 1 by Osamu Tezuka © 2015 by Tezuka Productions. Alabaster Vol. 2 by Osamu Tezuka © 2015 by Tezuka Productions.
"Ugliness is in a way superior to beauty because it lasts." - Serge Gainsbourg
Another of Digital Manga Publishing's crowdfunded Osamu Tezuka titles, Alabaster is one of the Godfather of Manga's darker works, primarily dealing with racism, but also featuring grotesque images and other disturbing subjects like rape. In fact, reading the afterword it becomes clear that Tezuka disliked this series, saying: "I hate every character that appears in it without exception".
Alabaster tells the story of James Block, an African-American athlete who won six gold medals in the 1972 Munich Olympics. Block later falls in love with a beautiful TV star named Sarah Ross and the two date, but when Block asks Sarah to marry her she refuses, partly because James is black. This drives James into a rage, and also to stealing a car and driving it into a crowd of people. He thus ends up going to jail for five years for assault, driving without a licence and involuntary manslaughter.
While in prison he meets a mad scientist named Dr. F who created a special ray gun which makes whatever it fires at invisible. He is in prison because he used the gun on his pregnant daughter, killing her, but her child survived. James, who has come to hate the fact that he is black, asks Dr. F if he could use the gun on himself and the doctor agrees. When James serves his sentence he finds the gun and turns it on himself, but comes to realise that anything it is exposed too long to the gun will eventually die from the rays. Thus James is only partly exposed to the ray, meaning that only his skin is invisible and the inside of his body visible to all. Following this James adopts the name "Alabaster" and begins seeking revenge against those who have wronged him, starting by killing Sarah.
Later, Alabaster travels to Japan where he plans to find Dr. F's granddaughter, Ami, who was adopted by the woman who prosecuted Dr. F. As Ami did not get a direct blast from the ray gun, she had a different affliction: she slowly began to turn completely invisible, to the point where only her eyes could be seen. As a result, she has to go outside completely covered in makeup, and cannot wash in publish. Alabaster wishes to adopt Ami as his own daughter, but her adoptive mother refuses to give her away.
As the years go by Ami gets involved with a poor delinquent named Genya Yamagata, who learns about Ami's invisibility and uses her to help steal test papers and later to steal jewellery. However, Genya is caught and Ami's mother prosecutes him. The invisible Ami enters the court to confess to the crime, but in the end Genya is sent to prison. Ami ends up running away from home and joining Alabaster. Together they free Genya and some of his friends from prison, and then the entire gang begin a massive crime wave, targeting the hypocritical and most importantly, the beautiful. Alabaster's ultimate goal is to remove all beauty from the world and to use the ray gun to make the entire world ugly with Ami as the world’s queen. Meanwhile trying to stop them is Rock Holmes, a narcissistic FBI agent in love with his own face, who will resort to any means to capture Alabaster and Ami, no matter how vile.
The central draw to Alabaster as a title is Tezuka's artwork. The dark, twisted world that Alabaster desires makes for some truly disturbing imagery. The power of the ray gun results in disgusting depictions of mutated animals, some with invisible skin like Alabaster himself, others with partly or fully skeletal bodies, and others with body parts that just seem to float in mid-air. It is not just limited to animals; people too end up being shockingly "mutilated" by the ray gun. Then there is Alabaster's dream of creating his own ugly utopia, with twisted misshapen buildings and a palace for Ami modelled on the head of a dung fly.
Another interesting aspect of the artwork is the depiction of Alabaster himself, not just in his transformed state, but before that. One problem when talking about Tezuka's work is having to explain that he was not racist, despite the fact he often drew people of ethnic minorities in a way that we today would consider racist. In his old James Block state, he looks like a perfectly normal character, and we have what is a non-stereotypical portrayal of a black person in a Tezuka manga. Annoyingly however, in the second volume there is an old-fashioned depiction of a different black character.
Because of the themes in the manga there are some elements that people might find objectionable. For example, there is use of racist language and there is a rape scene near the end of the first volume, although it should be pointed out that this scene leads to a key development in the plot.
Alabaster makes for uncomfortable reading for many reasons, and you can understand why Tezuka ended up disliking this title, written during a time when Tezuka himself was having problems. However, it is a compelling series. It is one that when you start reading it you do not want to stop.
Final score: 8 out of 10