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When Astro Boy was released in Brazil, I thought the series was the same as the original japanese version.
However, I had a huge shock while watching the original series.
I realized that Astro Boy is not quite the same as the original Tetsuwan Atom and it appears to be
denying it's own origins due the name change and re-scripts.
The name change was unevitable, however the title is not about a atom powered robot anymore.
Tezuka believed that atomic energy could be used for peaceful purposes and despite all of what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki there was stomething good to be found.
Considering that, he could not be quite pleased with the name change.
There are tales that critics of NBC tried to convince Tezuka to change his concept of story for being "inappropriate" for children, however he refused.
Specially, because it would be against his right as a creator. However, the dubbed series was still heavily edited to the point that most of his ideas were removed.
The original dub 1966 dubbed series still had incorrect order of episodes and only 104 episodes if compared to the original Tetsuwan Atom.
All character names got replaced with english puns like "Astor Boynton II and III" (Dr. Tenma and Tobio. A rather forced pun with the series title.), Dr. Elefun (Dr. Ochanomizu) and others. However, the wrost name was given for Uran who was called "Astro Girl"
As if she was just a female version of the protagonist which was not true. The writters of the dub don't wanted to consider that would be bad for a sister having the same name as her older brother. And that change was just to follow american super-hero comic books like "Batgirl" or "Super Girl".
Due the fact Astro Boy 1966 dub had 104 episodes, many people missed sagas like "Blue Knight" and also more appearances of the protagonist's creator who appeared more than twice in the original series.
The media often talks about Astro Boy as if it's the same thing as the original series, but in reality is a heavily edited dub which contradict most of the original series elements as tould before.
I've talked about that in a forum and a user tould me the reason which Astro Boy is not the same thing as the original series is due the fact the dub is affected a by a rule which states that "everything animated is a cartoon" and should be suitable for children".
Although Astro Boy dub has contributed a lot with Tezuka, we can't just pretend that the dub is perfect. Also, Tezuka could not make new scripts for the dubbed series and everything was made without his interference.
It's been tould that Astro Boy has been created in 1952 as a manga black&white, however the dubbed name only appeared in 1966 with the series importation and Tezuka never renamed the series permanently.