Astro Boy re-appears as the protagonist in the 2003 series; a robot with the ability to think and reason ('Kokoro', or Japanese for 'heart and soul'). Atom was created by Doctor Tenma as a ‘replacement’ for Tobio, his deceased son. Tenma, overcome with grief, decided to make an identical robot copy, which he will raise just like his own. Tenma, however, during the project lost the trust of his fellow scientists, who had thought that he has been overcome with grief and longing for his son and as a result went insane. Tenma, who was indeed displaying signs of insanity at that point, finished his project and named the robot after his son. Unfortunately, things got out of hand as soon as Astro was led into the basement full of broken robots (including Robita) and the robot Tobio (doing the same thing the original Tobio has done) asks for Tenma to fix it. After Tenma refuses, the robot Tobio rebels against him (the same thing the original Tobio has done) and as a result, Tenma shuts him down.