Luca Esposito

is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Kenta Shinohara. It was serialized online from May 2016 to December 2017 via Shueisha's ''Shōnen Jump+'' website/app. It was collected in five volumes. Viz Media published the series in English. An anime television series adaptation produced by Lerche aired from July to September 2019.

Plot

In 2063, space travel has become possible and commercially viable; a group of students from Caird High School departs to the nearby planet of McPa for their Planetary Camp. Soon after the group arrives on the planet, the nine children encounter a mysterious and unforeseen intelligent sphere of light; it attacks them, transporting them into the distant depths of space. Floating in orbit around an unknown planet, they discover an old abandoned spacecraft nearby. Finding it in working order, they resolve to use the ship to return home. To do so, they must cross the 5,012-light-year gulf of space separating them from home by visiting alien planets, the names of which are all anagrams, harboring life to replenish and manage their limited resources.

The long and dangerous journey home aboard their vessel, which they name ''Astra'', brings with it new character revelations, strengthening the bonds they share, and the eventual realization that the stakes of their journey are far higher than any of them could ever have realized.

Characters

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:An optimistic guy with good athletic ability and captain in the ''Astra''. While he has interest about space thanks to his now-deceased teacher, his father forced him to take a part in athletic activity. His lifelong dream is to be able to explore outer space while captaining his own ship.
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:Aries sometimes acts like an airhead and sometimes has flashes of inspiration. She also has an eidetic memory. While her eyes are both green, her left eye color is slightly pale compared to the right one. She transferred to the school only a month before the trip.
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:A naturally curious boy and a talented engineer capable of repairing any damage to the Astra. His father Marco is a controversial senator. It is later revealed that Luca is intersex, having an androgynous body with sexual characteristics of both sexes. Although he identifies himself as a boy, Luca notes that he does not really consider himself a man or a woman, and his identity can change.
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:A handsome, intelligent student botanist who uses his cooking and botany skills to ensure the crew is properly fed. Acts as Kanata's first mate. In reality, Charce is actually a member of the royal family of Vixia, sent to assassinate everyone utilizing a wormhole. However, upon meeting Aries and noticing her unique traits, he became convinced that she was a clone of his childhood friend, Seira, and so he changed his plan to bring her back alive.
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:A rich heiress who is the daughter of a famous doctor. She finds it difficult to trust other people besides Zack, who is her childhood friend. She received very little attention from her mother. As a teenager during the 113 days in space, she was the ''Astra''s ship "doctor".
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:A cool and intelligent student who seeks to become a space explorer and has a space pilot license, making him the Astra's main pilot. His father works in the bio-technology industry who is currently working on a project with Quitterie's mother, thus making Quitterie and him childhood friends. His dream is to pilot his own ship with Kanata captaining.
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:Nicknamed "Funi", she is Quitterie's adopted sister, who was adopted into the family after the death of her parents. She is a cheerful, positive girl who wants to get along with Quitterie. She carries around a puppet named Beego with her.
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:A quiet, antisocial, but highly intelligent boy who does not get along well with the rest of the crew. His father is the vice-principal of Caird High. He is good at handling a gun, most of which were banned over a century ago. His late older brother was a freelance journalist who stumbled upon a secret he should not have which resulted in his death, leading Ulgar to despise and hold revenge against Marco Esposito.
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:A shy, quiet girl who constantly apologizes for everything she does as a result of being emotionally suppressed by her mother, Lucy Lum, a world famous singer. Yun-Hua has a great singing voice, but her mother constantly berated her and told her she should not bring attention to herself, so she distances herself as much as possible.
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:A woman whom the crew of the ''Astra'' discovers has been in cryosleep for twelve years on a ship of a similar but older model than the ''Astra''. Her allies were killed, leaving her the only survivor of her crew. They were members of a planetary exploration team looking for other habitable planets.

Media

Manga

''Astra Lost in Space'', written and illustrated by Kenta Shinohara, was serialized on Shueisha's digital magazine app and website ''Shōnen Jump+'' from May 9, 2016, to December 30, 2017. Shueisha collected its chapters in five volumes, released from July 4, 2016, to February 2, 2018.

In North America, the manga was licensed for English release by Viz Media.

Volumes

Anime

An anime television series adaptation was announced on February 5, 2019. The series was animated by Lerche and directed by Masaomi Andō, with Norimitsu Kaihō handling series composition, and Keiko Kurosawa designing the characters. Masaru Yokoyama and Nobuaki Nobusawa composed the music. It aired from July 3 to September 18, 2019, on AT-X, Tokyo MX, TVA, KBS, SUN, and BS11. The first and last episodes aired as one-hour specials. Nonoc performed the series' opening theme song "star*frost", while the ending theme, "Glow at the Velocity of Light", was performed by Riko Azuna. Funimation licensed the series in North America and the British Isles, and streamed it in both subtitled and dubbed formats.

Episodes

Reception

The manga was ranked fifth at the third Next Manga Awards in 2017 in the web category, it was also ranked third in the 2019 edition of Takarajimasha's ''Kono Manga ga Sugoi!'' guidebook, and won the twelfth Manga Taishō Awards. It was also nominated for the 23rd Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize. The anime adaptation won "Best Media" at the 51st Seiun Award during the 59th Nihon SF Taikai.

Michele Liu, writing for Anime News Network, said that the series is "unique" because Luca is a main character who is born intersex rather than "altered by sci-fi space diseases or external influence," with Liu also describing Luca as bisexual.

Notes

References

External links

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{{Seiun Award - Best Media

Anime series based on manga
AT-X (TV network) original programming
Comics about cloning
Comics set in outer space
Crunchyroll anime
Fiction set in 2063
Funimation
Japanese webcomics
Lerche (studio)
Manga Taishō
Medialink
Shōnen manga
Shueisha manga
Space adventure television series
Space opera anime and manga
Television series about cloning
Television series set in the 2060s
Transgender-related anime and manga
Viz Media manga
Webcomics in print