Theres this common belief that Princess Knight is the first shoujo manga ever. While this is not necessarily true what is true is that Princess Knight is the first shoujo manga serialization. The first longstory of the genre. Its the Astro Boy of Shoujo and that makes sense because its mangaka is very much Astro Boys own Osamu Tezuka. Written in 1953 Princess Knight is nonetheless a very important landmark in the history of manga as a whole. But Im not here to review the 1953s version of Princess Knight. Mostly because I didnt read it as a matter of fact I doubt most people who have it in their lists did either. Its more likely that they read the 1963s remake. Completely rewritten and redrawn by Tezuka himself this is the version thats widely available for us and has been translated in multiple languages. Since I never read the original I cant really tell you a comprehensive list of differences but improved art and panelling are the most obvious an extension from 3 to 5 volumes while keeping the chapter count at 27 and a change of villains from Mephisto to Madame Hell and perhaps the biggest being the introduction of Captain Blood. Its hard to say if these changes are for better or for worse so Ill be talking about the manga as is from here on out. 500https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblrm19273wgMK1qamhyd.jpg The story of Princess Knight is about a princess I bet you didnt see that one coming who due to a mistake is born with both male and female hearts. At first I thought this would make Sapphire our main character a hermaphrodite but not really specially because genitals seem to be inexistent in this word. Instead this means that fate forced her to hold two personas. Being born as a girl for half a day she gets to wear dresses learn feminine etiquette enjoy fashion dancing etc.. etc.. But to make sure the evil Duke Duralumon doesnt take the throne she has to pretend to be a prince which she does in the other half of her day. Learning how to swordfight and other manly manly things. Due to this plot its natural that a big portion of this manga revolves around gender roles. How it handles it is something that I think might be subjective Its clear that to a certain degree the forced gender roles are taken as a bad thing or as a joke. They put a baseball bat and a cap on the bed to make it look like the baby is male which is still my favourite joke in the entire manga. Theres multiple characters that think that the Princess should be able to rule as a woman and not have to hide her gender. And the women in general have a strong presence in the later part of the manga in a very fun battle of sexes. 400http://tezukainenglish.com/wp/wpcontent/uploads/2014/06/pknakamanga01.jpg But Princess Sapphire has two clear sides to her coin. Without her female heart shes brash rude strong. Without her male heart shes cute weak and frail. Which is fine but it also goes against other portraits of female characters within the same story. Makes it a bit inconsistent. With that said the major villain of this manga Madame Hell is trying to steal Sapphires female heart so she can give her to her daughter who she believes is not girly at all. So maybe those girls also have a male heart? Who knows. The story itself is pretty fun to read we follow Sapphire as she goes from adventure to adventure to stop people from finding her real self or to protect her heart from Madame Hell which by the way is married to SATAN himself. Everything is adorned with a clear early Disney influence that is sure to captivate the fans of those movies. Evil witches princesses and castles dancing animals and of course a Prince Charming literally named Franz Charming here to save the day. With that said Sapphire is much more proactive than the early heroines of Disney movies. Fighting the bad guys with her talent in sword fight and even taking care of the good guys when in need. The Disney influence gives this a whimsical and fun atmosphere which helps making its somewhat straightforward and simple narrative more enjoyable. We should note that this is very much a story made for kids and I think kids can easily enjoy it even now 60 years after the manga was released or rereleased I suppose. I think that despite talking about gender roles as a main topic its still very much a timeless tale. 600https://tezukaosamu.net/en/manga//m0559/m0559main.jpg But even with the straightforward storyline I still feel like theres a couple of things that come out weird and lead to an anticlimatic ending. First being Venus a villain that is introduced at the end without any real kind of buildup which isnt even consistent with the rest of the mythology which is clearly rooted in Christianity. Theres Madame Hell Satan and a major helper of Sapphire is Tink which looks like Link but he came first so I guess Shigeru Myamoto was a Tezuka fan. Tink is an angel whos in service of God and even uses a crucifix So why do we have a Roman god out of nowhere? Well thats a nitpick honestly but I found it weird. Something thats less of a nitpick is Captain Blood. I found out that hes an addition of this manga while doing some research for this review. Its hard to believe that he wasnt in the original since he has such a large screen time and hes even given a major plot twist and relation to another major character in the story Thats never concluded. Its incredibly weird that youd plant the seeds for his character arc and never bother to conclude them but alas https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/osamutezuka/images/3/38/PrincessKnight16.jpg/revision/latest/scaletowidthdown/340?cb=20141110063202 Princess Knight is far from being a masterpiece but it does its role perfectly enough. Its a kids story thats bound to entertain most kids while giving them some to think about what it means to be a boy or a girl plus I think any Disney fan will be able to take something from this story.