Akira
Summary
Tokyo, as we know it, was
destroyed by a kind of a new super-bomb of unknown origin. 9 hours after,
World War III broke out and most of the major cities in the world were
completely destroyed. 31 years after, Neo-Tokyo now stands, were the old
Tokyo has been. One night, Kaneda and his motorcycle gang have an accident
with a little boy with a wrinkled face, as one of an old man. Tetsuo,
one of the gang's members crashes into the boy, who mysteriously remains
unhurt and then simply vanishes from the eye. Tetsuo is brought to Hospital,
and everything seems to have normalized. But that is not at all the case:
The strange boy from the last night was a part of a secret military project
dealing with supernatural powers. The project is lead by the "Colonel",
who wants to develop human weapons with aid of these powers. On his trail
are Ryu and Kei (not Kay), members of a semi-terroristic group, who want
to discover and destroy his plans. And now Tetsuo is going to be a new
member of the project. But his powers rise much faster than the Colonel
has expected. Tetsuo manages to find out the location of an underground
freeze chamber, where the mysterium AKIRA is kept. Akira, too was a member
of the project. But why did they put him in the freeze chamber at 0,0005
Kelvin ? They were afraid of something. Something they couldn't control
anymore. Something Tetsuo is going to set free really soon. . .
And in midst of all the trouble: Kaneda and Kei
Character Guide
Tetsuo
Tetsuo is one of the more interesting characters of Akira. After he receives
his new powers, he begins to lash out at his best friend, Kaneda. Deep
within Tetsuo he harbors jealousy and resentment to the fact that throughout
his life he has always been weak and needed Kaneda's help to defend him.
In a twisted way, this is Tetsuo's revenge for all the times Kaneda has
helped Tetsuo.
Kaneda
Kaneda is your normal teenager. His hobby is riding on his motorcycle
with his friends, as well. Kaneda becomes frustrated, however, when he
realizes Tetsuo has become stronger than him. Not only that, but Tetsuo
has killed on of their fellow friends. After this, Kaneda vows revenge
against Tetsuo, and throughout the movie attempts to put an end to Tetsuo's
madness, but proves to be no match to Tetsuo's newly harnessed psychic
and physical strengths.
Kei
Kei is a member of one of the Antigovernment organizations. Kaneda meets
her while at a riot and becomes somewhat infatuated with her. He follows
her around continuously and eventually becomes caught up in the Antigovernment
movement.
Kei is eventually used by one of the experimental treatment to guide
Kaneda to Tetsuo so that they can stop him from reaching Akira's level
of power, however, this fails.
Colonel
The Colonel is another interesting character. We can see from the beginning
that his career is pretty bumpy and his methods for dealing with problems
are being put into question by the Supreme Executives of Tokyo; the only
ones who threaten his power. He may seem like the bad guy at first, but
he is simply overwhelmed at all that he must do.
Eventually the Colonel rebels, in a way, against the Supreme Executives,
arresting them all for treason. He is also responsible for Akira and Tetsuo,
since he did not pressure the scientist's enough.
Akira
Although the title of the movie is named after Akira, he only appears
once in the entire movie in the form of a transparent human and skeleton.
Akira's power is eventually reached by Tetsuo, and when this happens Akira's
"samples" are broken, which unleash him. He meets the experimental
children as well as Tetsuo in the end of the movie, and when Tetsuo becomes
a sort of "negative energy" he goes with Akira.
Another important thing to note is that in one of the flashbacks we see
that both Akira and Tetsuo went to the same Kindergarten.
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