Before legendary manga artist Akira Toriyama blew up with fame with Dragon Ball, he created a manga series called Dr. Slump. The manga, which he wrote and illustrated, was serialized in Shueisha's shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump from February 1980 to September 1984. The series followed the humorous adventures of Arale Norimaki, a little girl robot, and her creator, Senbei Norimaki.
While Dragon Ball is probably the manga that the late Toriyama is best known for, Dr. Slump launched his career. Themangasold over 35 million copies in Japan, while earning him the Shogakukan Manga Award for shōnen and shōjo manga in 1981.
Haruka Takachiho, a co-founder of Studio Nue and the creator of Dirty Pair, often shares early drafts for popular manga and recently he took to social media to showcase some early rejected drafts of Dr. Slump.
"This is another version of Toriyama's rejected draft that was first released," he wrote. "It includes the number "1" to indicate that it is the same page. This was rejected, and that was rejected, showing Torishima's dedication. On the back, there is another cut by Polly Buckets. This may be a good reference for understanding the composition process.
Both pages feature sketches of Polly Buckets, the trigger-happy officer in the Penguin Village police force. The first page appears to be a loosely sketched page layout, while the second is a more refined drawing of Polly riding a motorcycle.
This isn't the first time Takachiho shared some Toriyama mementos. Earlier this year, showed a draft he received from Toriyama. It was also a pencil drawing that was rejected by the editor.
The Dr. Slump was adapted into an anime television series by Toei Animation. The series aired on Fuji TV from 1981 to 1986 for 243 episodes. There was also a remake of the series created 13 years after the manga ended that consisted for 74 episodes and was broadcast from 1997 to 1999.
Manga fans can enjoy the English language version of Dr. Slump in North America courtesy of Viz Media. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any way to the anime series of Dr. Slump as it's not currently available on any streaming service. While Tubi did acquire the 1997 TV anime rights in 2021, it doesn't appear to be available to stream any longer.
Akira Toriyama passed away earlier this year at the age of 68 due to an acute subdural hematoma. Fans can experience one of its final major pieces of work with the upcoming Dragon Ball Daima anime series, for which he created the story and character designs. Dragon Ball Daima will premiere on October 11th.