Akira

Akira (Japanese: アキラ) is a 1988 anime film by Katsuhiro Otomo. It was based on Otomo's manga of the same name. more...

The movie led the way for the growing popularity of anime in the West, where Akira has been considered the beginning of the second wave of anime fandom that began in the early 1990s.

Thematic influences

Although most of the character designs and basic settings were adapted from the manga, the movie still manages to include several original thematic influences, most notably in the plot which was somewhat different (partly due to time and budget) from the manga. Obvious thematic influences include World War II and the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as Japanese teen culture.

Plot summary

The setting is that of Neo-Tokyo, a Tokyo rebuilt (over what is today Tokyo Bay) after World War III destroyed it. As it turns out, World War III was (arguably) started by the uncontrolled growth of the superhuman powers of a child named Akira, who was enrolled in a secret government research program. In the story's current time, 30 years after WWIII, a gang of young bikers led by the cocky Shotaro Kaneda is involved in a fight with a rival gang when Kaneda's gang's youngest member, Tetsuo Shima, collides with a mysterious child on the highway. This child has escaped from the government psychic research program. Tetsuo is then taken to the government psychic research base with the child and subjected to various experiments. The incident with the mysterious child as well as the tests awaken Tetsuo's own latent powers, with disastrous consequences both on the personal level, as old interpersonal conflicts with his friends resurface, and on the larger level, as Neo-Tokyo is threatened by another Akira incident.

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