Anime Lunch – Episode 1 – Astro Boy (1963)
Welcome to Anime Lunch, an exploration and celebration of 20th century Japanese animation - and in our inaugural show we’re going back to where it all began for the US - Astro Boy!
Based on the 1950s manga “Mighty Atom” by the legendary Osamu Tezuka, the animated show first premiered on Fuji TV on New Year’s Day, 1963 and is considered by many as the first popular series to embody the aesthetic that would soon become familiar worldwide as anime.
Astro Boy tells the story of an android boy built by a mourning father to replace his son after his tragic death, only to be sold to a robot circus before being freed by a kindly professor who joins him on numerous wonderful adventures.
But before Astro Boy could become one of the most successful anime franchises in the world, it had to be broadcast overseas. NBC Enterprises were looking for content to fill American airwaves, and secured North American distribution rights to the show they’d rename “Astro Boy” and they hired producer Fred Ladd to update it for English language audiences.
Ladd got his start in radio, but eventually made his way to film production, always with the focus on making new content from old material. Ladd had early success editing together nature documentaries into feature length films, which were traded in Europe for local film productions, such as cartoons that required dubbing for American markets.
This made Fred Ladd an early pioneer in the Westernization of overseas animated programming, an essential first step in bringing anime to American audiences.
On Anime Lunch this week, we’re proud to present 1963’s Astro Boy.
Airing live, Friday (1/28/2022) at 10PM Eastern Standard Time, noon Japanese Standard Time