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The name change of the Sears Tower in Chicago brought on yet another bizarre piece of pop culture nostalgia.
Around the end of the 1980s the action figure craze and the laser tag craze met head on with the series Captain Power & The Soldiers of the Future. As a tie-in to the toys and the quasi-interactive TV series (written by future Babylon 5 emperor J. Michael Stracynski!), there was a trio of anime VHS videos produced by the studio that also made many of the cool shows of that era--A.I.C. Plus, ARTMIC (of Mospeada, Bubble Gum Crisis, and Gall Force fame) handled much of the design work, so the result nearly transcended its game roots.
In the second tape of the set, the heroes are forced to raid a landmark in the middle of a ruined Great Lakes city known as the "Tower of the Seer".
I guess if they made it today, it would be the "Tower of the Willies". I'm sure fans of It's Walky would get into that.
MISSION COMPLETE. CHECK YOUR POWER POINTS.
Around the end of the 1980s the action figure craze and the laser tag craze met head on with the series Captain Power & The Soldiers of the Future. As a tie-in to the toys and the quasi-interactive TV series (written by future Babylon 5 emperor J. Michael Stracynski!), there was a trio of anime VHS videos produced by the studio that also made many of the cool shows of that era--A.I.C. Plus, ARTMIC (of Mospeada, Bubble Gum Crisis, and Gall Force fame) handled much of the design work, so the result nearly transcended its game roots.
In the second tape of the set, the heroes are forced to raid a landmark in the middle of a ruined Great Lakes city known as the "Tower of the Seer".
I guess if they made it today, it would be the "Tower of the Willies". I'm sure fans of It's Walky would get into that.
MISSION COMPLETE. CHECK YOUR POWER POINTS.
Tags:
- anime,
- bubble gum crisis,
- fandom,
- games,
- geography,
- lasers,
- names,
- pop culture,
- science-fiction,
- toys,
- tv,
- war
( Three Title Clips From Anime Of The Awesome Eighties Behind This Cut! )
The Matinee is the title sequence of Super Robot Galatt, which was among the first "Super Deformed" shows and which followed the equally tongue-in-cheek Daitarn-3 in its time-slot. And it's a good idea for a series. In a future Earth in which a world government has banned private ownership of weapons, a mad scientist receives aid from good aliens who want him to arm Earth against an invasion of evil aliens. So he builds some bizarre little robots who look absolutely harmless. But when the bad guys show up, the robots transform to B@d@$$ Mode with the help of their pilots and save the day.
The second of our Triple Spin is Galvion, an obvious thematic stepping stone for Artmic, which went on the following years to make Bubblegum Crisis, Gall Force, and Megazone 2-3.
The nightcap is Dorvack, which could have been another chapter to Robotech if Carl Macek had been paying attention at the time.
More to come, I hope!
The Matinee is the title sequence of Super Robot Galatt, which was among the first "Super Deformed" shows and which followed the equally tongue-in-cheek Daitarn-3 in its time-slot. And it's a good idea for a series. In a future Earth in which a world government has banned private ownership of weapons, a mad scientist receives aid from good aliens who want him to arm Earth against an invasion of evil aliens. So he builds some bizarre little robots who look absolutely harmless. But when the bad guys show up, the robots transform to B@d@$$ Mode with the help of their pilots and save the day.
The second of our Triple Spin is Galvion, an obvious thematic stepping stone for Artmic, which went on the following years to make Bubblegum Crisis, Gall Force, and Megazone 2-3.
The nightcap is Dorvack, which could have been another chapter to Robotech if Carl Macek had been paying attention at the time.
More to come, I hope!
Tags:
Another Filler Bit Thingy
Jun. 15th, 2005 01:33 amDIRTY LAUNDRY 5
"Write Them Funky Comics, White Boy!"
One of the depressing things about becoming a fan of Japanese cartoons and comics after childhood is the discovery that ideas that you thought were your own are suddenly revealed to you as already being achieved by others. Case in point: Bubble Gum Crisis. A superhero who is also a pop musician? Nobody's ever done that before! Or so I thought.
We go back to a day in Florida, sometime in the middle 1980s. I have a keychain, and I notice a little pattern in the plastic fob link that the steel ring has worn into it...it is like a FACE...sort of like the digital faces on the cover of the Police album Ghost in the Machine. I doodle that face on a sheet of paper and file it.
Little by little that face becomes the face of a suit of high-tech armor initially called Tekanaut, but would soon drop that in favor of Halcyon. Little by little, his origin and adventures emerge.( I Was A Teenage Iron Man! )
By the time I was shopping this to publishers, the main part of the story had been completed in my mind, with Jackson (now ten years older, his mission completed, and married to Tricia) in semi-retirement. I had read Miller's The Dark Knight Returns about then and it was somewhat influencial in that regard.
I became an otaku in earnest about 1990. It was about then I saw Bubble Gum Crisis for the first time...man, how can I do better than THIS?
I close with a semi-filk...a song from the soundtrack, as it were. A "song" in Jack McKinney's Robotech novels inspired this song.
Pushers in the hood putting dopeheads on the wire.
Bangers in the night setting half the town on fire.
A little poor kid takes five bullets in his chest...
A rich man loads and locks--and you know the rest!
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
Any way you look at it the house is haunted.
It don't matter what way you want it.
I've got a weapon, I'll never pawn it...
I've got a bullet too--and your name is on it! [Yeah.]
Survivors in the morning get carted off to jail.
Losers never get the chance to hear the sirens wail.
Most everyone is armed 'cause now it's total war.
The Crosstown Freeway's running red with gore!
[That's why we say...]
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
So you ambulatory urban blight
Stay out of my line of sight!
These streets are ours, by divine right!
Here we are--we come to fight, again!
If you're looking for protection,
You're in the wrong direction.
I just can't help you, hon.
Maybe it's my playing,
I can't hear what you're saying...
But I'd rather hear the sound of my own gun!
Victory!
[extended instrumental]
You might think you have an armor-plated skin...
But you don't realize how big your mess is in!
Don't believe the situation is just temporary.
The hottest-going real estate is in the cemetary!
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
It don't matter what you do or say.
It don't matter where you are today.
All the sinners are due to pay...
So don't sort them out--they're dead anyway!
[closing instrumental]
FP
"Write Them Funky Comics, White Boy!"
One of the depressing things about becoming a fan of Japanese cartoons and comics after childhood is the discovery that ideas that you thought were your own are suddenly revealed to you as already being achieved by others. Case in point: Bubble Gum Crisis. A superhero who is also a pop musician? Nobody's ever done that before! Or so I thought.
We go back to a day in Florida, sometime in the middle 1980s. I have a keychain, and I notice a little pattern in the plastic fob link that the steel ring has worn into it...it is like a FACE...sort of like the digital faces on the cover of the Police album Ghost in the Machine. I doodle that face on a sheet of paper and file it.
Little by little that face becomes the face of a suit of high-tech armor initially called Tekanaut, but would soon drop that in favor of Halcyon. Little by little, his origin and adventures emerge.( I Was A Teenage Iron Man! )
By the time I was shopping this to publishers, the main part of the story had been completed in my mind, with Jackson (now ten years older, his mission completed, and married to Tricia) in semi-retirement. I had read Miller's The Dark Knight Returns about then and it was somewhat influencial in that regard.
I became an otaku in earnest about 1990. It was about then I saw Bubble Gum Crisis for the first time...man, how can I do better than THIS?
I close with a semi-filk...a song from the soundtrack, as it were. A "song" in Jack McKinney's Robotech novels inspired this song.
Pushers in the hood putting dopeheads on the wire.
Bangers in the night setting half the town on fire.
A little poor kid takes five bullets in his chest...
A rich man loads and locks--and you know the rest!
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
Any way you look at it the house is haunted.
It don't matter what way you want it.
I've got a weapon, I'll never pawn it...
I've got a bullet too--and your name is on it! [Yeah.]
Survivors in the morning get carted off to jail.
Losers never get the chance to hear the sirens wail.
Most everyone is armed 'cause now it's total war.
The Crosstown Freeway's running red with gore!
[That's why we say...]
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
So you ambulatory urban blight
Stay out of my line of sight!
These streets are ours, by divine right!
Here we are--we come to fight, again!
If you're looking for protection,
You're in the wrong direction.
I just can't help you, hon.
Maybe it's my playing,
I can't hear what you're saying...
But I'd rather hear the sound of my own gun!
Victory!
[extended instrumental]
You might think you have an armor-plated skin...
But you don't realize how big your mess is in!
Don't believe the situation is just temporary.
The hottest-going real estate is in the cemetary!
Victory! Oh Yeah! Victory!
It don't matter what you do or say.
It don't matter where you are today.
All the sinners are due to pay...
So don't sort them out--they're dead anyway!
[closing instrumental]
FP
