Anybody remember Battle of the Planets, aka Gatchaman?
 

I remember loving this cartoon when I was younger about a team of futuristic ninjas with batman style devices and vehicles. There was a team of 5, 3 men, a boy and a pretty girl who when they yelled "TRANSMUTE" (or "BIRD, GO!" in japanese) they would transform from hip teenagers in bellbottoms to the ultra cool G-Force!



I was looking at a thread about buck rogers when I hit the theme song for this old show and I got a little nostalgic. :D

Here is a pretty good copy of the theme if you wanna relive it:
http://www.angelfire.com/d20/7zark7/battle.html

and here are a few pics!
http://www.80scartoons.co.uk/botp.html

i use to love that cartoon. i downloaded a couple episodes from kazaa. and the phoenix was a bad arse ship.

nightscape

I Loved this cartoon, too bad there are not any re runs on television.
I remember that in first grade I even had a lunch box with G Force on it!

Do I remember Mark, Jason, Princess, Tiny and Keyop, and watching over them from Centre Neptune – Seven Zark Seven?

No.

Peter ;)

Yeah! Great show (but some ropey plots in places!)

I've got a few episodes of Battle Of The Planets on DVD. I think it's time that a proper dub of the original Gatchaman series was done.

Ian_W359

The Gforce was one of my favorite cartoons growing up.
I loved it and couldn't get enough of it. Now my kids
have Ggundum and shows like that.

I always rememember that shot where you saw that Princess was wearing white knickers! :naughty:

Peter

Prog entry in cult children's encyclopdia
 

Has anyone got a copy of the encyclopida of cult children's television? The entry for Battle of the Planets is very interesting. For example, 7- Sark-7 (described in the book as a robotic John Inman!), was added to replace segments from the original Japanese series considered too violent for U.S audiences!

yup!

i got the original series in japanese and its waaay violent. Also Joe the second guy DIES!!!!

You and millions more my man! :D

Battle of the Planets was a top rated show. And for many the first time you saw what japanese animated shows were about. (if you grew up in the 60's then it was "Speed Racer")

Although it must be said the original japanese series wasn't kiddish at all. Ultra violent in places, and most of the time dealt with terrorists plots and personal trauma of working together in the team. not to mention their enemy Zoltar was a "Hermaphrodite" and was the main villain only in the first season in the Japanese version. there were others.

Go here to learn more about the series!

www.vacuform.com/Gatchaman/index.html

And if you want more, read the 12 issue comic book series out now from TOP COW/Image comics.

BOTP/Gatchaman trivia:

Name changes

U.S version character names!

- Mark. The Eagle. Number 1. Team leader

- Jason. The Condor. Number 2. The Sharpshooter

- Princess. The Swan. Number 3. The Spy/ and Demolition expert

- Keyop. The Swallow. Number 4. The assassin (Not in the U.S. version)

- Tiny. The Owl. Number 5. The Pilot

Japanese Version character names

- Ken (A.K.A. Mark) 1.

- Joe 2.

- Julia 3.

- Jinpei 4.

- Ryu 5.



KJ



:)

P.S.

Weirdly enough Keyop wasn't a funny speaking kid in the Japanese original. He was normal. in the U.S. version he was a created genetic misfit who wasn't finished and thus spoke with strange warble.

Joe A.K.A. Jason the second in command and sharpshooter. was a rival to Ken a.k.a Mark. He had a darkside and was revealed in the Original anime to have had brain damage as a result of a bomb attack on his home town back in his childhood.

And poor old Chief Anderson their boss in the U.S. version was brutally tortured and killed in front of the team. In a episode which aired in the later Japanese versions that weren't in the 85 aired U.S and european episodes.

KJ

I hated the new verion1 I thought i was going to throw up!! What was wrong with the original U.S. version that I grew up with? I want to buy the DVD series of what i watch when I was a kid!!


Same thing with StarBlazers!! I want my DVD!!

hey look!

http://www.totalimagespecialists.com...acters/Jun.htm

Princess looks like Angelina Jolie or whatever that tomb raider actress is called. :D

I love the music to this show. The original version that aired in the USA. It took me along time to find this. But just for our wonderful CF members, here is a little gift. :)

I don't think anyone would really care if we post this. Enjoy friends.


botp theme
you have to right click and save to your hard drive. Then you can play it. I don't know why it won't just play when you click it. :(

I picked up the 6 DVDs recently (and thankfully they have the original versions on them as well) and wish they would release more :)

But the BOP theme song will always be my fav :)

I hated the NEW version myself. I didn't throw up
although I did fall asleep.