005 – Sea-Serpent Island [Astro Boy] (Manga)

Astro Boy (1952-68), Chapter 005 ‘Sea-Serpent Island’ (海蛇島) – originally titled ‘Astro Boy Goes Along the Equator’ – was originally published as a a summer vacation supplement in Shonen in August 1953.

What it’s about?

Astro Boy discovers heaps of bottles while diving in the sea, they all contain a letter from a girl on an island called Pochom-Pochom. In every letter she begs for help saying that she and her father are prisoners, and he is being worked to death. Astro and his friends, Kennedy and Alejo figure the bottles were all carried by the Japan current so Pochom-Pochom must be somewhere close by. But they can’t find it on the map and when Astro asks his dad he laughs it off saying it must be a joke.

Astro secretly goes out exploring the ocean and finds another bottle with a letter dated that day. Then he’s attacked by something in the water, and he flies away landing on an island beach. He meets a native woman and asks her about Pochom-Pochom Island. She tells him that Pochom-Pochom refers to a giant sea monster with fiery eyes that swallows whoever goes out to sea alive. When she hears that the monster attacked Astro just now, she runs away screaming in terror. Astro decides that the monster must come from the mysterious island. But he cannot investigate further now. He has only about half his energy to get home with.

He only just makes it back to Japan. However, his head has been dented from the impact of hitting the beach when getting away from that monster and Higeoyaji notices how sleepy Astro is in class the following day. His mother and father are suspicious as they replace his damaged head and refill his energy, but Astro tells them nothing. He slips out again that night and this time sees a ship attacked by the serpent. Before he can do anything, the ship is completely destroyed. Then while he stands on a floating barrel pondering what to do next the monster attacks him again and this time he is swallowed up.

To his amazement, he discovers that the serpent is an artificial monster, and he has been deposited into an underwater mining camp along with the crew and passengers of the ship. They are informed by a gang of scoundrels that they have been shanghaied to slave in their uranium mine. Astro meets an old man who tells him that he’s been a slave for ten years. His daughter works in the hospital clinic and every now and then he bumps himself on the head so he can go and see her. He injures himself and sneaks Astro in with him to introduce him to her. She is called Rumiko and it is she who has been sending the letters every time she dumps all the empty bottles through the garbage hatch. Astro has a plan to help Rumiko and her father escape. He disguises himself as Rumiko and hides the two of them inside a really huge jar each. His cover is blown by the bad lady in charge of the clinic who is suspicious of his boots. He runs as quickly as he can to the disposal hatch and dumps his friends jumping in after them.

The villains realize he’s a robot and try to capture him with the sea serpent. Astro is ready for it though and tears it to pieces so they can no longer shanghai innocent people. Then he drags the jars to the surface and deposits them on the island he visited the other night. He goes to see the native woman with one of the severed sea serpent heads as proof that Pochom-Pochom is no more. She is apparently the chief mistress of the island community, and she proclaims Astro their hero and champion. She promises to do anything to serve him. Astro asks that Rumiko and her father be given a home and looked after for a while. Then he returns to Japan almost running out of energy again.

Higeoyaji can’t understand what’s going on, and neither can his parents. His dad vows to watch over him the next night but finds out that Astro has tricked him by setting up his old, damaged head in bed as a decoy while he flies off back to his friends on the island. When he makes it clear that he is going to leave once again the island’s head lady begs him to stay. But Astro insists that he must take his friends home and he must go home himself. He tries to ask for a canoe to transport them all, but the lady goes crazy with grief and despair ordering her subjects to attack Rumiko and her father with swords. Astro protects them and they all make it to shoreline. But there are no boats to take.

Suddenly, the lady appears by herself seeming to admit defeat offering them a boat to depart in. Astro’s friends settle inside, and Astro prepares to cast off. But before he can get in the native woman suddenly slices off his head and runs away laughing with glee. Rumiko screams and faints. Her father knew that Astro was a robot, but she thought he was a human boy. Astro’s body gets up and flies away begging him not to let Rumiko know he’s a robot. When Rumiko regains consciousness, her dad tells her that Astro was killed, and she weeps bitterly.

When they get back to civilization, they tell the police about the underwater slave camp and presumably the villains are all arrested, and the slaves rescued. Later they track down Astro’s school, but they don’t see Astro. Rumiko’s dad speaks in private to Higeoyaji and they agree that it would be best not to meet with Astro. Besides the fact that Astro didn’t want Rumiko to know he’s a robot and she firmly believes that he’s dead there is another serious point. Technically Astro broke the law because any robot who dares to leave the country without special permission faces the penalty of having their energy terminated and being sent to the scrapyard. Therefore, they both quietly leave the school grounds Rumiko’s dad telling her that this is the very school Astro attended while he was alive. Unbeknown to them both, Astro silently watches them depart through an upper story classroom window.

What you should know

In the Astro Boy chapter “Sea Serpent Island” (1953), Kerrigan appears as a slave held in a base at the bottom of the ocean. However, when this chapter was first printed in “Shōnen” magazine, this slave role was played by Kerrigan’s younger brother, who looked exactly like Higeoyaji. Later, when this chapter was published in a tankōbon (standalone book), this role was played by Kerrigan instead, and the casting of Higeoyaji as Kerrigan’s younger brother was removed from the story.