Phoenix: The Complete Collection

The Pain of Eternity
It's hard to rate this series because it's a collection of five short stories. The only links the stories have is the Phoenix, and the immortal bird of legend tends not to play a huge role in any of the stories, often just being in the background watching the events unfold.

Some of the stories last for four episodes, others one. Some of the stories take place in the past, others in the future. Some of the stories involve battles between Gods, others focus on battles against nature. There's almost too much variation.

The first, four episode story is probably the best of the lot - it flowed well from episode to episode, despite there being a lot of twists. It started with a man washing ashore somewhere, getting captured by a tribe and needing to save the life of a woman to save himself from being executed. The focus then switched to an Apocalypto style raid on the tribe by another country. It then switched yet again, this time to a father and son type of story...

Not bad for an adaptation
So, I originally started off by reading this series in the library. I was pulled in immediately because this work was different and I began to understand how Tezuka earned the title of "God(father) of Manga". In comparing the anime series to the manga, I was still impressed but a little disappointed to see that the Phoenix didn't interact with the characters more. There are moments in the book when the Phoenix directly addresses the characters and tries to impress the Buddhist sentiment of the natural life cycle, which the Phoenix is in juxtaposition to although the Phoenix too dies and rises (rebirth, karma). I also was a little saddened that not all the stories could have been adapted.

The one thing for me that really made this series stand out was the incorporation of history and mythology that while it isn't absent from modern manga, this series was particularly informative of (there's a reason for Saruta's big nose, it comes from mythology and Tezuka gives a brief...

excellent stories for all mankind in anime form
original was a manga book series
in the 1970s..by our own
walt disney of japan...

now you get to see it..more or less
accurate to the book form...in dvd movie form...

GET it
if you wish to know about life,
spiritual values and deep facts of thousands of years
and more...

serious people, and even young OPEN minded clean kids
will carry these lessons
for all their lives.

see how it changes your life.
english subtitles...are ok...they get to the point eventually.
msg gets across.

Click to Editorial Reviews