If you told a younger version of myself that Anime would a research topic for my University degree I would have felt quite excited for the future.

As a franchise Akira is one that I hold close to my heart, not because I thoroughly enjoyed the film when I first saw it many years ago but because for me it represents a lot of what Anime/Manga is. Having themes with such a strong representation of Japanese culture I identify myself with the series quite a lot. Japanese culture is nothing foreign to me and after visiting the country multiple times and basing previous DA’s on the study of aspects of Japanese culture I was quite glad to be immersed in a class room where that was the studied topic.

The…