The series began publication in the 70's. Most endings are climactic, often with some unexpected twist, whether a tragic turn, happy ending maybe bittersweet, or something to make you ponder. At the end of each chapter, I had to pause, and decompress. The Doc would adopt someone!?! Yes, he must be a good person after all.Įach chapter is a self-contained story. A hopeless case that the Doc adopted to be his own daughter. In the body of a little girl, and treated like one, Pinoko insists that she is 18 years old, and is Black Jack's wife. Most of the light comedy in the series is carried by a girl (woman?) he essentially saves from the trash heap. After all, how do you emotionally deal with that kind of responsibility? You wonder if his cold outside is to protect himself from those kinds of outcomes. Like one where he saves a patient, and thereby causes the death not only her, but her entire family. After all, that's what that scar on his face, and many more all over his body, are from. Maybe it seems like he can't understand what it means to be chopped up and sewn together, and go through painful years of rehab. And occasionally, he helps people for no apparent reason.

The patient may hate what he asks of them, but things turn out for the best in the end. Sometimes he has to give 'tough love' style treatment. Will he be cold and impassive, mercilessly demanding 30 million yen? Will he take on the case for free, or will he do it for some bizarre exchange?Īs you might guess, Black Jack isn't as cold-hearted as tries to seem. In each new encounter between the Doc and his patients and their families/friends/associates, we wonder which side of his face he is going to turn. And we cover every type of emotion possible, from comedy to tragedy and in-between. Despite his crusty, ugly outside, might he possibly be a good person? Whether hopeless cases that need his incredible skill, or criminals who can't go to a normal hospital. Yet still people come to him at his weatherbeaten shack on the hill. By the way, he doesn't have a medical license, and charges an arm and a leg (sometimes literally) for his services.

An old surgical scar runs down his face part of his hair has turned white, and he goes about wearing a big black coat thrown over his shoulders. Black Jack looks and acts like a gruff ol' doc from some cowboy town.

Black jack chapters wiki