Review of Dororo

Dororo discusses the principles of Utilitarianism (sacrificing one for the greater cause, the justification of making one miserable and damned for his entire life in service of the rest) and Deontology which focuses mainly on the moral of the action itself rather than the consequences. Both are embodied in the characters of Daigo and Hyakkimaru respectively. The story is set in the Sengoku Jidai era in Japan - a century long-period of wars, chaos and social upheaval (1467 - 1568 CE). The story is also filled with religious themes, it begins when a greedy samurai Daigo or ambitious as some might view him, enters atemple called "Hall of Hell" to make a bargain with the demons and abandoning the way of Buddha. He offers them to take anything from him and in return they grand him the power to rule over his realm and free the country from famine and wars. His prayers are answered and the price is paid when his child is born with a curse; missing 12 parts of his body including limbs, eyes, ears, and skin, yet he lives. Daigo doesn't seem affected and quickly disposes of the child by ordering the midwife to drown him in the river. however the midwife sympathizes with the baby and decides to let him float in a small boat and just like in the story of Moses the child is found and taken care of. the man who found him is a doctor by the name of Jukai. He equips the boy with a prosthestic body and gives him the name Hyakkimaru which means "Little monster" in japanese. Judai later discovers that the boy is blessed with the ability to see the soul of the living things. The doctor who's burdened by his sinful past decides then to train Hyakkimaru to fight and protect himself as a form of redemption, the boy sets off to hunt down demons in possession of his body parts. along the way he meets Dororo (his name means young thief) and they become inseparable since then. Back to our first point, Daigo fights to kill Hyakkimaru and we are introduced to new characters on the way like Tahoumaru (Hyakkimaru’s younger brother). At first he resented what his father did but later he decides that the wellfare of his entire people is more important than the well being of just one person. The good actions is measured by the good consequences. And even Tahoumaru takes that belief to a more extreme level when he despises Hyakkimaru for defeating him the first time and decides to hunt him down.

[Spoiler] but not really a spoiler so...
as Hyakkimaru retrieves his body parts by killing the demons who agreed on Daigo's deal, the country is threatened once again by the rise of famine and wars. but that doesn't stop Hyakkimaru from fighting as he doesn't care about the people falling victims to the consequences of his actions, as he is a victim himself and he fights tooth and nail for what he sees is justice and his right. on the other hand, Daigo finds out about this and tries to kill his son in order to maintain peace and prosperity in his country.

Dororo is based on the manga of the same name by Osamu Tezuka, who's also known in Japan as "The Father of The Manga" for his important role in the success of anime and manga world wide, he's also a doctor and got his PhD in 1961, although he chose to work as a mangaka but you can see how his role as a physician had a huge impact on his works, like in his famous manga Black Jack, you can see how detailed the anatomy he draws is, in addition to the complicated description and how they treated wounds. Dororo is no exception, as you can still see that there's a medical background, especially when Jukai treats Hyakkimaru's wounds the second time he sees him.