Pluto: Urasawa x Tezuka, Vol. 4 (Volume 4)

The guy on the cover of this volume is Atom/Astroboy's creator. He's introduced to the narrative to make some portentous but undoubtedly important pronouncements about the division between humans and robots as the excellent cyberpunk manga thriller continues and deviates further from its source material.Pluto continues to follow his course of vengeance on the forces involved in the destruction of the Persian States during the 39th Central Asian war. This leads him directly into conflict with Atom and Uran, with tragic consequences. The tension of the threat is palpable, and the resolution of the situation is a shock.Meanwhile Gesicht is assigned to protect the robot hater who plans to kill him. However, this leads to an uneasy alliance that raises new clues and questions about the mystery surrounding Pluto and his mission.As does the attempt to kill Gesicht's creator, which draws Epsilon and Heracles back into the story as they discuss Atom's creator.It's hard to fault Urasawa's narrative or art. Both are pretty much beyond reproach. There are a couple of pages in the copy I got where the reproduction is a bit dodgy but this is a printing issue. If I have one criticism, it's that we still haven't got back to the teddy bear shaped Dr Roosevelt. Hopefully in the next volume!