And here we are, following some six months of work (and nearly 50 years after it's initial serialisation) we at last come to the all too tragic ending of The Moon.
The Moon was a series that I stumbled upon in passing from a brief mention online, and it's one I'm glad I did. While at times a weird read (the second arc especially feels like it could've been one of the wackier stories in Azarak) I think it it an amusing one nonetheless (at least when it's not killing off all its cast), mixing the wild, zaniness of the 70s with a slightly more introspective giant robot story.
As discussed in the included essay, the series came at a funny time for George Akiyama, coming after his more controversial shounen works, but before he moved primarily towards writing for seinen magazines. It also came at something of a funny spot for mecha as a genre, beginning six or some months before Mazinger Z its setup is much closer to the very old-school likes of Tetsujin, with the titular robot not being directly piloted (indeed, it's curious to think how it might've been if it had come a year or so later, as Mazinger's influence began to be felt).
Despite this it does in some senses pre-empt later developments in the genre (e.g. by having an extensive team controlling the robot, not just the one individual), and, while it'd be impossible to prove, I can't help but feel that even at this early stage Akiyama was poking fun at what would become certain mecha tropes, like for instance the Baron's inexplicable ability to conjure up a giant robot, his decision to entrust said robot to a group of random children for no clear reason, or even the need for the robot to require such a bizarrely large number of people to control it.
As ever thanks for the project go to my illustrious editor Nady, and to das for helping out with the raws. If you enjoyed the series you can pick it up digitally, or physically through one of the numerous reprints that it's had.
Going forward I do intend to do one final revision (minor spelling fixes etc.) before uploading it to MangaDex. In a perfect world I'd at some point redo the entire thing with scans from Fukkan's complete edition (which included colour pages and so on), but I doubt that'll ever come to fruition. Akiyama's earlier work Derorinman has at least some tie ins with The Moon so at some point I might look to doing that, although I'll otherwise not likely be working on anything else of his.
