SF Saiyuuki Starzinger

Starzinger was renamed Spaceketeers for the United States' market, and this is the version that was overdubbed for the Yugoslav market and what I watched as a kid. Not much survived in my memory so I decided to watch the series, alas the fandub was only made up to episode 16. And it is one uneven show, with both strengths and weaknesses. But it certainly doesn't deserve to be wiped from existence, so I am perplexed by how it became as obscure as it currently is. It is a work of Leiji Matsumoto after all!

Sure the weaknesses are easy to spot while the strengths only ... become apparent after a number of episodes, so if you know yourself to be impatient with anime and maybe value the smoothness of the animation over the work put into writing the characters and weaving the plot, this anime is probably not for you. Also the science is non-existent, scientific terms are thrown around and made to mean whatever, and generally any verisimilitude towards the natural world is missing. These are naive kids stories, imagine it as a story being told to a five-year-old. The only strength the animation really has are the abstract landscapes of space, with vivid colours and strong strokes they give you impossible worlds. Otherwise the animation relies on repetition a lot, and each character is either a caricature or a more realistically drawn person and this doesn't change to suit the mood of the scene.

However there are also strengths to Starzinger: the music and the drama. The funky tunes add a lot to a show built around action, however they too are used repetitively, to what you might or might not object. Finally, what I feel is the sole reason this anime might be worth watching is the character drama. Kugo is a hot-blooded warrior while Aurora is an idealist devoted to peace and universal well-being, and this conflict between our two main characters is what drives the plot. Always the difficult questions arise over what is the right thing to do, and these questions are underlined by personal experiences and grand tragedies. To build a kids show around moral dilemmas and tragic confrontations, how foreign! It is also worth noting that Starzinger bases itself on the Journey to the West, not unlike Dragon Ball or a number of other anime. And yes, on the topic of relationship dynamics, it is a reverse harem, with all three of our cyborg warriors pining for the Princess Aurora - I am told this is somewhat rare.

All in all, this is a show one watches for the character drama as the ideals of pacifism are confronted with a world that mutates everything into vicious monsters.