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Star Blazers Available Online
Amphigory writes, "Anyone who was young and geeky in the 80's remembers Star Blazers -- an anime sci-fi series. Anyway, some of the episodes are now available online in their entirety. The only problem is that most of them won't play in Xanim. " I absolutely adored this show in my younger years. Lately watching Lain, DBZ and Battle Athletes has rekindled my adoration for this stuff. Highly recommended if you're nostalgic.
Most of the time when animation buffs here the words "American Animation" they either gag, or they pretend like they have never heard the term before.
:)
However, I am opposing that opinion. As much as I enjoy Japanese Animation (and yes, it is better than American Animation - but I'm arguing that not all American stuff is in the gutter), I have enjoyed many purely american shows that have the same essential elements as any good anime series or movie.
The most anime-like American animation out there is, most likely, Batman: The Animated Series. The series, IMO, is the epitome of what American animation houses - even if it is Warner Brothers - can produce when money isn't everything. The original artists for Batman were given some extra money to do the series, and it turned out to be a hit. Dark though it was, the series took into account everything a good story should have - great plots, essential character flaws (for instance, Bruce Wayne's constant struggle between living a "normal" life versus the life of Batman, or the clash between his love for Selena Kyle versus the fact that Catwoman is a criminal). The new Batman / Superman adventures, and even Batman Beyond to an extent, aren't as great as the original Batman, but they are measuring up pretty well.
And who can forget The Simpsons? The show has definitely captured what it means to be "American" down to the most minute details (with exaggeration for laughs
[shameless plug] I have started an online petition to have Batman: The Animated Series published on DVD here NOTE: *PLEASE* don't Slashdot this site. As much as I would love to have a thousand people sign my petition, I'm pretty sure it's a small server that would just cringe at the oncoming traffic. [/shameless plug] Quite surprisingly (or should I say not surprisingly?), a number of people have answered the question "how much would you pay?" with the words "Whatever it takes!"
You should never take life too seriously - You'll never get out of it alive.
Just last week I was trying to remember what crappy cartoon of my youth had the imagination capturing WAVE MOTION GUN. It could take out a whole fleet in a single blast -- but only infrequently and after the 'big things are happening' music had been playing for at least five minutes.
I thought about not saying anything, but "information wants to be free!"
(For the record, I don't see anything wrong with Rob doing that -- I just find it amusing.)
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-- Slashdot sucks.
"Lain, DBZ and Battle Athletes"
Well, that's a pretty eclectic selection. We've got:
Lain: Complex and surreal, at times expressionistic. A classmate of the main character, Lain, commits suicide. Shortly afterwards, members of the class start receiving e-mails claiming to be from the deceased girl. That's not what Lain is about, but to explain further would require interpretation on my part. I highly recommend you watch it and make your own interpretations. Requires patience. Also recommended for viewers of Lain: Key the Metal Idol, Angel's Egg, Neon Genesis Evangelion.
(Plug from an Otakon staffer: Both the creator and character designer for Lain will appear at Otakon 2000, the East Coast's biggest anime convention, located in Baltimore, MD.)
DBZ: Journey to the West meets the WWF, anime style with some SF thrown in. Loosely based on the ancient Chinese tale of a monkey king who was born from a stone, and I do mean loosely. Fun, but not very cerebral. The story breaks down in later episodes as characters spend much of their time hurling chi-blasts at each other. Also recommended for DBZ fans: Er... I haven't a clue what would appeal to DBZ fans.
Battle Athletes: Cute schoolgirls compete for the "Cosmo Beauty" prize. A little silly, takes a while for the story to kick in. Animation quality is pretty good, on par with most of Pioneer's other stuff. Also recommended for Battle Athletes fans: Sailor Moon, Gunbuster.
Close the World. Otakunize the Next
And don't count Robotech 3000 out yet; it's looking like production is indeed proceeding on it...
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
It takes some time for me to realize that Star Blazers is the anime I loved, Uchu Senkan Yamato, when I was 11 years old. It was in year 1975, and the show was the reason why I wake up before 11 on Sunday morinings. (My local station showed it on Sunday mornings.) I think that was the show that made ``anime'' mainstream in Japan.
But I never have seen Star Blazers. According to this, the show was made suited for American audience. Seems quite different.
After growing up, I had chances to see Uchu Senkan Yamato couple of times. I realized that there were so many right-wing things going on in the show. Some points were embarassingly nationalistic. Maybe that was the Japanese mentality in those days. And modifying the show may be justifiable.
However, the whole point of Yamato was that they used WWII battleship, which was already obsolete at the time it was born (ironically the Japanese made it clear that the time was not for battleships but for airplanes), but still the biggest and perhaps the most beautiful, as a spaceship. Many Japanese see the battleship as a tragedic ship. It was used for a Kamikaze attack. The ship being revived to save the earth naturally had quite a power to attract Japanese audience. The ship being named Yamato was a crucial point of the story.
It also seems that Star Blazers was tamed for younger audience. The original show was not meant for kids at least, it just seems that creators of the show created what they wanted to create, not thinking of marketing or anything. In fact, IIRC, the show was cancelled or shortened by commercial pressure. (But the popularity exploded after the show was over, and they made sequels, movies, etc.) But because of this show, and people realizing that creating good story in anime can be successful, anime in Japan completely changed.
So, if you could have a chance, I'd recommend to see the original. (Is dubbed or subtitled version available in the U.S.?)
Did you see the live-action version of this? It got canceled, but it was the one where the earth will be pretty much dead withing a small number of years unless our heroes leave in an alien-tech ship and find the solution. They have only their skills and a really big gun front-mounted in the nose of the ship that they can only fire in the most dire situations.
;-)
Oh sorry, that was Crusade
C'mon, Galen; tell them that we're looking for Trillana!
Yeah, Sailor Moon couldn't have been screwed up more for American audiences than it was. Congrats (sarcasm noted) to DiC[k] for totally ruining the show. :/ Urusei Yatsura r0x my s0x.