The March/April 85th anniversary issue of Weird Tales features our big list of “The 85 Weirdest Storytellers of the Past 85 Years.” We’re breaking it down online, too: one honoree per day, in no particular order, for 85 days!

Walt Disney, Hanna & Barbera, and Alex Toth aren’t on this list — but if they had all merged into one, single, ultra-historic, gestalt super-cartoonist? Now that would be weird. And that’s OSAMU TEZUKA (1928-1989). The father of Japanese anime, Tezuka effortlessly danced back and forth over the boundaries between storytelling styles and genres, remixing them as he went, from the all-ages android allegory of Astro Boy to the more mature mythic immortality quest of Phoenix to the demonic imagery of Dororo.

What’s new: In 2008, Dororo will become the latest of Tezuka’s manga to be published in English.