Released on the same day as AKIRA 2 ( read my review here ), ‘Apple Paradise’ is an omnibus collection of short manga stories by Katsuhiro Otomo, drawn over a 2 year period from 1980 to 1981, when the artist was 26-27 years old.
The volume kicks off with 12 stories from the ‘That’s Amazing World’ series, Otomo’s satirical/black humor re-telling of renowned fables and tales of mythology like Moby Dick, King Arthur, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Noah’s Ark and more, first published in serialized form by Kisoutengaisha.
Next up is ‘The Old Timer Of Sun Burgs Hill’ (サン・バーグズヒルの思い出 / see the post header image above ), a Western piece with hints of influence by the legendary comic artist Moebius’ Blueberry. The reproductions in dual tone color is just gorgeous.
And of course we have the namesake sci-fi manga piece ‘Apple Paradise’, released in full for the very first time ever in tankobon format.
Two other short stories featured include ‘Electric Bird Land’ and ‘I.N.R.I’; Otomo’s selective and visually strategic use of single tone, bold orange color really adds mighty aesthetic punch to the art work.
Otomo was already doing phenomenal manga work before AKIRA; check out this insanely detailed drawing from one of his short stories 'That's Amazing World – Blue Bird', now collected in the omnibus APPLE PARADISE (1980). My full review up soon; purchase links in comments below – pic.twitter.com/dl7LkG2ybH
— blauereiter (@blauereiter) July 5, 2025
(above) Some extras that came with the book, from right to left; a handy reading bookmark, a entry form to win special prizes ( Japan only ), a flyer for the AKIRA REMIX soundtrack. I bought the vinyl while I was in Tokyo recently and will write more about it in another post later on.
Just like the previous ‘Otomo The Complete Works’ omnibus releases such as ‘G…..’,‘Goodbye Japan’ and ‘Fireball’, publisher Kodansha is really doing Otomo fans ( and indeed, all manga fans ) a huge service by allowing easy availability to the artist’s earlier works that were previously scattered across rare out of print editions and/or were simply never published in their full form.
Otomo is of course revered and most known for his magnum opus AKIRA as well as Domu, but his genius in manga work started even before he embarked on these two and one should certainly not sleep on his earlier body of work. Very highly recommended.
“Apple Paradise ( Otomo Complete Works ) Manga 大友克洋全集 コミック” details :
Dimensions – 17.6 x 2.1 x 24.9 cm
Softcover with dust jacket, 288 pages
B&W with color on select pages, In Japanese language
Buy From Amazon.com | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | Amazon FR | Amazon IT | Amazon DE | Amazon ES
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July 8th, 2025 at 10:55 am
Incredible artwork. Every time I see one of these volumes I’m blown away by it. Still holding out hope that Kodansha will eventually release these in English.
July 10th, 2025 at 12:49 am
Ok, he’s the GOAT of manga as far as I’m concerned. I mean I thought that anyways, but this work, that I’ve never seen before, really drives it home. Too bad people generally only know Akira and Domu. On the other hand, all considered he’s not the most mainstream mangaka, less so than Toriyama, Shirow, Tezuka, or Miyazaki. And for good reason as most of his work you’ve posted over the years has never or rarely left Japan. I’d imagine things would be quite different if there had been regular, worldwide releases of his stuff after Akira.
July 11th, 2025 at 2:36 am
Chris – No news on the English edition as yet, but you never know !
Chris James – Much agreed, most of his pre-AKIRA days work are fairly hard to locate even in Japan itself, but this new Complete Works is making it much more accessible. Would be even better if there are English editions, though understandably it’s a lot of translation/editorial work involved.