Pluto – Robots and Revenge

Naoki Urasawa never disappoints with his stories, the mystery, the themes, and the characters most of all, it gives you an experience that is special to only his works. I was going to read PLUTO however Netflix made it easier and who doesn’t prefer an anime adaptation. Netflix didn’t mess up this time either. MILD SPOILERS AHEAD.

A legendary robot, Montblanc who served in the 39th Central Asian War, is violently murdered. A funeral is held in which humans and robots worldwide take part in mourning. Europol detective Gesicht is assigned to the case of the robot’s murder. At the same time, Gesicht also works on the case of the murder of a Robot Rights activist and finds similarities in the cases. The case leads him to uncover a plot to assassinate the greatest robots on earth and the reasons teach him of the fragile coexistence between robots and humans, a case that gets as personal as it matters to the world.

Urasawa’s stories rely on his characters, their stories when interconnected are what form his plots and it is his genius to take us through the journey of these characters simultaneously and slowly unveil the greater plot to us. The Europol agent Gesicht who we first right off as emotionless due to being a robot, shows emotion in lots of different things and towards the end of the show is the driving factor of the finale. The other characters like Atom, Hercules, and Brando, all robots show both the advanced world of the story, and their emotions also blurs the line between humans and robot which makes an epic reveal at the finale all the more hard-hitting. These amazing characters are what make the story special and no character in the end is left unexplored or unfinished in their character arcs.

Let’s clear out the part where Netflix did great, the visuals and the voice acting. I watched most of the series in dub and one episode in Japanese and I liked them both, either can be a great way to experience the show. The series works well to show how futuristic the world of Pluto is, the environment, the cars, the basic day-to-day life of people, everything is not thrown in the face of the audience however it is very noticeable that the story takes place in the future which drives the theme of this being a story that could take place in the real world in the future. There’s clear hostility of some humans towards robots, clear exploitation, and that affects the story but is also shown in many subtle ways. The way the story unveils, through the introduction of new characters, their stories, their emotions, and thoughts that drive present or past actions all follow the typical Urasawa style, it is a bit confusing at first but once it has its grasp on you, you begin to notice the pleasant subtleties the story has that hints towards the revelations that occur in the final episode. In his usual Naoki Urasawa fashion, even when the real identity of the final villain is revealed many plot twists occur and the finale as usual leaves every watcher in awe.

The cycle of hatred, which is represented through events in the series that one can see mirrors real-world events quite evidently to get the message across to the viewer is the real and most showed theme of the story. The way simple characters whose lives are altered by powers that are beyond them turn into killers filled with hatred for the greater powers and take actions that again threaten simple people like them to start the cycle all over again is a journey beautifully explained by Urasawa in the show and in the end, the viewer clearly gets the message of what revenge leads to. the way this complex detective story gets the message across so clearly is what people call Urasawa’s genius.

8 episodes of an hour each which cover one volume of the 8 volumes manga, makes Pluto a relatively short watch for a weekend however the themes that it drives home are something that one may think about beyond the weekend. I had one little thing I didn’t like about the finale and I found out that it was answered cleanly in the manga (I do think that when you encounter that point, you will also feel that it is quite ironic) so I will give the perfect rating to Urasawa’s work, Pluto a solid 10/10.

So that is it for this post guys hope you got some value from this.  Thank you guys for reading to the end hit me up on Instagram and Twitter with your thoughts and if you have any ideas on what I should write about. Stay safe. Thank you again and I’ll see you all next week.