Pinocchio and Key the Metal Idol
Humanity in the inanimate

Robots and dolls are fascinating to children and sci-fi fans.  In the West, United States, Pinocchio was created and in the east, Japan, Key the Metal Idol.  Pinocchio was directed by Steve Barron while Key was created by Hiroaki Sato.  The Pinocchio version I saw was a live action while Key the Metal Idol was a Japanese cartoon or anime.  The anime, Key the Metal Idol, is similar to Pinocchio.  Both illustrate a story of how a doll or robot is trying to become human.  In Pinocchio it is gained through the heart while in Key it is through friendship.  Pinocchio and Key were created to become human and must struggle in order to achieve this aim.  First I will give an overview of both works.  Then I will compare the visuals and both fathers of Key and Pinocchio.  Then I will compare the outcomes of the stories and how both protagonists are similar and different.  Finally, I will briefly discuss how both works explain what humanity is.  Both works of art draw on the struggle of humanity and what it is to be a sentient conscious life.

Geppetto, a puppet maker, unknowingly found some enchanted wood and took it home to make a puppet out of it.  He named the puppet Pinocchio and was astonished and thought mad when Pinocchio came to life.  If only Pinocchio was a real boy, said Geppetto.  Pinocchio goes on a quest to find out how to become a real boy.  He meets Pepe the cricket who mentors Pinocchio and helps him make the right choices.  Loewnzini gets custody of Pinocchio by bailing out Geppetto from jail.  Loewnzini uses Pinocchio for money by making him a star.  Pinocchio runs away from Loewnzini after a fire breaks out during a concert.  Then he begins his search for how to become human with his friend Pepe.  After saving his father from a monstrous whale, Geppetto wakes up seeing Pinocchio changed into a real boy.  It was a miracle.  The story of Key is much more darker then its predecessor.

Key was born as a little girl and her grandfather, Pro. Mima, was a scientist.  Key’s bloodline has supernatural powers and absorbs geist or human energy through miracles.  In order to save her daughter, her grandfather pumps over 30,000 lives of geist into Key.  This transaction transformed Key’s body into a machinelike form and was done in order to hide the power from Ajo.  Ajo is a man who will do anything to create warfare in the form of robotic dolls controlled by geist.  After Ajo killed her grandfather, Key set out to Tokyo in order to find 30,000+ friends which led her to try to become an idol.  In a big stadium, Ajo sucked everyone’s geist and was hell bent on killing everyone.  Key saves everyone by releasing her built up geist onto everyone after singing her lullaby thus saving everyone.  The story ends with a human transformed Key in front of an audience of 50,000 people.

The visuals were different between Key and Pinocchio.  Key was an anime and everything was drawn while Pinocchio was all real actors and a 3D drawn Pinocchio.  Pinocchio was taken place in pre-industrial Europe while Key took place in modern Japan.  Both originated in a small village/town but the destinations of both adventures were different.  Pinocchio’s adventure was out in the woods while Key was in the city of Tokyo.  Another difference is that Pinocchio was wooden and looked fake while Key looked like another kid but was very pale.  Pinocchio could eat and when he lied his nose grew but Key didn’t eat, lived off of solar energy, and pills prepared by Pro. Mima.  Let’s look at how Geppetto and Pro. Mima measure up.

Geppetto is a puppet maker while Pro. Mima is a robot maker.  Geppetto creates Pinocchio by chance and luck while Pro. Mima’s experiments on his daughter were more deliberate.  Both tell Pinocchio and Key to become human and that sets them off on an adventure.  Geppetto creates a doll out of enchanted wood while Pro. Mima creates robotic Key by infusing the geist of 30,000 people into human Key.  Geppetto does not face any adversaries aside from Loewnzini wanting Pinocchio while Pro. Mima faces a murderous Ajo who wants all of Key’s hidden geist.  Geppetto lives and is reunited with Pinocchio after his quest while Pro. Mima dies before seeing Key become human.  Next we will look at the similarities and differences of the outcome of the stories.

Unlike the happy ending of Pinocchio were Pinocchio is reunited with his father Geppetto, Key loses all of her friends and loved ones to Ajo and reawakens as a human standing alone on top of a huge stadium in front of over 50,000 people who wanted Key to sing her song.  Key had a much more challenging life then Pinocchio. Pinocchio had his moments of danger but not to the extent of Key.  There are robots controlled by D, an agent of Ajo, who are searching out to kill or capture Mima Tokiko (Key) at any means necessary.  Key visits a religious sect and saves a child who is terminally ill and they are also killed by Ajo’s robots.  Ajo killed Key’s grandfather, and sucked out all of the geist of her closest friend Sakura thus killing her too.  Key’s mentor, Tsurugi, has many sessions with Key trying to get her human side to come out and also is killed by Ajo by falling down an elevator shaft.  Pinocchio is more like a fairy tale while Key is darker and appealing to a mature audience.  Key suffers more than Pinocchio. 

None of Pinocchio’s friends die but everyone Key knows and truly loves die.  Key becomes human but at a cost unlike Pinocchio.  Key’s dual persona also competes with each other.  Human experience and attention draws Key’s human side to appear.  The more people cheer for Key, the faster she becomes human but this is not so easy.  She only becomes human for a short period of time.  In order to save Sakura, Key becomes human and uses her powers to find and save her.  Unfortunately, Key saves her only to say goodbye because her energy or geist was extracted by Ajo.  But that final meeting between Key and Sakura really gave Key the needed boost in order to become truly human.  Let’s take a look at the different the character developments of Key and Pinocchio.

Pinocchio has an upbeat attitude and full of wonder throughout his early doll life while the robotic Key is monotome and downbeat.  Pinocchio has no superhuman powers while Key contains the power of geist that can cure a child and save people from dying.  Unlike Pinocchio who has one consciousness, Key has two competing consciousness, her human and robot side.  At first, she can only be a human for a short period of time and requires a lot of rest while her human side sings a lullaby during sleep.  Key is inspired by Miho, a singer, while Pinocchio is inspired by other boys thus making him want to be human more.  Key does not know Miho is a human operating a robot and their fate are intertwined, a robot wanting to become a human and a human becoming a robot.  Their fate of conflict was set.  Miho’s persona attracted Key initially and whenever Key encounters Miho or Ajo’s other robots, they malfunction.  They malfunction because Key absorbs geist from living and inanimate objects.  Key stops Ajo’s plans like Pinocchio does to Loewnzini.  Loewnzini was trying to turn all the boys into donkeys and Pinocchio thwarts his plans.

Pinocchio and Key have different interpretations of what a human being is.  In Pinocchio, the doll Pinocchio has a full human child personality.  For Pinocchio, being human is having flesh and bones.  Key’s interpretation of humanity is through emotions.  Whenever Key’s human side takes over, Key is flooded with human emotions and especially sadness.  Key’s human side is usually awakened through suffering and praise from supporters and enemies alike.  Being human is physical and external in Pinocchio while in Key humanity is emotions and internal dimensions.

Pinocchio and Key are two similar stories.  Pinocchio was geared toward a younger audience then Key.  At first glance, a live action Pinocchio and an anime Key the Metal Idol may not look similar.  However if one looks more closely at the substance there are more things alike than different.  The settings of Pinocchio and Key were pre-industrial Europe and rural Japan, respectively.  Both their fathers are very much alike but differ because Pro. Mima died while Geppetto reunited with a human Pinocchio.  The outcomes of the story are the same both become human but at different costs.  Key faces more suffering and pain and goes on alone as a human idol saving everyone.  Pinocchio saves his father from the huge whale and all the boys from becoming donkeys.  Their personalities are different.  Pinocchio was more of a child while robotic Key more like a serious bland adult.  Human Key could only experience real emotion through her human side unlike Pinocchio who could feel and cry even though he was a doll.  Both had mentors who knew they could become human and supported them in their aims.  Pepe the cricket supported Pinocchio while Tsurugi, Key’s mentor, helped her in the end by hugging her thus bringing out her human side.  Both Key and Pinocchio grapple with a journey for self-discovery and the chance to become truly human.