Tetsuro Hoshino

Tetsuro Hoshino is a poor Earth boy who witnessed his mother die at the hands of Count Mecha. With his mother's dying wish being for him to obtain a machine body, Tetsuro embarks on the Galaxy Express 999 with Maetel.

Appearance
Tetsuro's appearance changes depending on the medium, in the original manga and anime format he has the standard generic appearance of many characters by Leiji Matsumoto, a small body with an oval-shaped head that is disproportionate with the rest of his body, a broad face, a rounded nose, tiny round eyes, tiny round ears, and a wide mouth. He also has messy shoulder length brown hair.

In some media, Tetsuro has an appearance similar to more significant male characters of Matsumoto (including Captain Harlock) but younger as shown by a more round face. While Tetsuro retains his messy brown hair, at times it covers one of his eyes. Interestingly, Tetsuro's original appearance is stated to be 10-years old, while the latter is stated to be 15.

Tetsuro normally wears a ragged poncho for clothing in addition to a red short sleeved shirt, yellow pants, and black shoes. After stopping on Neptune he is given the hat of the late Tochiro Oyama. The later appearance of Tetsuro also gives him a green jacket and white gloves.

Personality
Tetsuro is a curious young boy who wants to get the best out of life. Having grown up without a father, Tetsuro was dependent on his mother Kanae. Due to being poor, Kanae wished for Tetsuro to have a machine body so that he could live on. After Kanae was killed right in front of Tetsuro, he wanted to fulfill his mother's wish of getting a Machine Body. When it comes to most mechanized people however, Tetsuro is very hostile towards them both due to how they treat non-machine people like his mother and many of these Machine People had gotten their Machine Bodies out of pure selfishness. Yet, Tetsuro acknowledges that there are good people with Machine Bodies including the ones who had to struggle to get them.

Tetsuro's curiosity allows him to explore and look in great depth of a subject and situation. Maetel and the Conductor state that this is Tetsuro's best and worst trait as it allows him powerful insight but can also get him into trouble. As such, he is rather impatient when it comes to subjects that catch his eye. Tetsuro has little patience for people that believe themselves to be so highly, but is willing to come to terms with them. He also has a strong sense of justice, unwilling to not help those in dire need; unfortunately he is often held back by several factors that prevent him from doing so. While depressed by this, he never stops trying when he can and even when he fails Tetsuro never hesitates to make sure the victims are never forgotten.

Tetsuro is somewhat ignorant in monetary sense having been poor for most of his life. He prefers not use the gold coins provided to him as a gift as he feels that he did not earn them. Whenever he does spend money, it's usually to purchase quality ramen. Due to how expensive Machine Bodies are, this is another reason that Tetsuro is traveling on the 999 as the endpoint Machine Bodies come for free. However, he does not wish to be in debt during the journey and helps Maetel whenever he can so that she does not go through hardships for him.

Tetsuro does not even want to take shortcuts to getting what he wants, as his journey until the end destination is more ambitious than desire based. Also during another stop when his body was attempted to be hijacked, Tetsuro was disillusioned by the idea of gaining a new body if it meant losing his personality, calling his naturally born body the 'best'. By the end of his journey, Tetsuro even chooses not to get a Machine Body at all as he wanted to live his life to the fullest with all the vulnerabilities that comes from his own body rather than end up like a majority of the Machine Empire did as people who became complacent and finding themselves becoming slaves without realizing.

On a side note, Tetsuro is not very hygienic. Due to his poor living conditions, he did not get proper training in that category. In fact, he outright hates bathing and brushing his teeth when he tried it the first time. At times, Maetel had to hold him down and force him to do the act in order to move to certain places. He does not like getting his hair cut either as he felt there was no point to it.

Tetsuro dislikes winter as he dislikes the cold and it brings him memories of when his mother was killed. He is not very educated and finds Maetel's tutoring to be boring, but is fond of books. Tetsuro's favorite food is ramen (especially the beef kind), preferring the real kind over the synthetic type. He also normally eats simple foods like rice and bread, with no basic likes or dislikes to tastes due to his lifestyle.

Relationships
Tetsuro's sense of justice, as well as his warm heart and strong will, had him earn the love and respect of many of those around him.

Parents
Tetsuro was raised by his mother Kanae, relying on her until her death. After Kanae was killed by Count Mecha, it began Tetsuro's journey to both grow and get a Machine Body. Tetsuro's desire to gain a machine body was not even for his own survival but because it was his mother's wish for him to live on. Kanae's death had still haunted Tetsuro as he felt powerless to prevent her demise, his failures to help others seemed to have even increased his desire for a machine body as Tetsuro is reminded of his own mother's death from these events. Tetsuro also keeps a memento of his mother that is different depending on the medium (e.g. a rocket, a pendant). Tetsuro even finds his mother's presence with Maetel due to her appearance and mannerisms being very similar.

Tetsuro had never known his father, he was said to have died before Tetsuro was born in opposition from getting Machine Bodies. Tetsuro only had vivid descriptions of him from people who knew of him including his mother and Captain Harlock. In some stories, Tetsuro had encountered the Black Knight Faust, being one of the very few people that made Faust feel anything remotely human. This was revealed to be because Faust was once Tetsuro's father who had his mind forcibly transferred into a Machine Body. Meeting Tetsuro made Faust feel proud that his son had grown so fast without him, giving him peace. Tetsuro naturally felt bad that he had lost his father after so long but chose to move forward in his father's memory.

Maetel
Tetsuro encountered Maetel after his mother was killed, with Maetel acting as a guide throughout his journey. Overtime they grew very close to each other, Tetsuro being grateful for what Maetel is doing for him but also wants to be of help to her so as not to drag her down. Maetel admires Tetsuro's kindness and his wish to fulfill his mother's wish, having lost all opportunities for a good relationship with her own mother. Their overall relationship resembles that of a mother and son, complete with some disagreements between them as well as tender moments. Sometimes it looks as though when one side would lose the other, both Tetsuro and Maetel would do anything to keep each other safe, no matter how drastic.

Emeraldas and Captain Harlock
Tetsuro had on several occasions had managed to make contact with both of these infamous space pirates, notably some of these encounters included not being in their real bodies until much later. Tetsuro's first encounter with Emeraldas was when Emeraldas was controlling an android body. They were very close to killing each other had there not been some interventions. While Emeraldas had her doubts about Machine Bodies, she respected Tetsuro's desire for one as it was based on an selfless desire, compared to their shared hated Machine Empire enemies. Tetsuro had even managed to help out Emeraldas in when they were in danger, leaving Emeraldas to pay off the debt at a later time.

Tetsuro's encounters with Captain Harlock were originally with the impostor doppelgänger of the Machine Empire which were not very satisfactory, especially since Maetel seemed disgusted that the impostor would copy Harlock's appearance and sully his reputation. Tetsuro's real encounters with Harlock were much more positive, with Harlock acknowledging Tetsuro as a young man capable of plotting out his own destiny.

Both of these characters even see their shared friend Tochrio Oyama in Tetsuro due to their similar beliefs and other traits.

Others
Tetsuro had encountered many people over the course of his journey with each influencing parts of his life and his final decision once at his destination. Many of these characters had died with Tetsuro making sure that he never forgets any of them after which. One of which was Claire Crystal, with Tetsuro keeping her shards and when meeting Claire's mother Agate, he gave what was left of Claire to her so that they could be reunited in spirit.

Abilities and Equipment
While not very trained or educated, Tetsuro is highly capable of learning subjects very quickly. His curiosity brings him into situations and is capable of learning at a breakneck pace with full focus. This includes physical skills such as gunmanship to the point of using a Cosmo Dragoon he received from Setsuko Oyama as well as a katana he received from a ghost.

Etymology
Tetsuro's full name literally translates to "Iron Son of the Stars" (Hoshi no Tetsuro), referring to his desire to get a Machine Body by going into space.