A little while ago we looked at 1965 - now we're going to skip forward ten years and look back thirty years at a selection of 1975's outstanding achievements in the field of Japanese animation. And there's no better place to start than with a cartoon about a bee.
The 1970s were a decade in which Japanese animation cemented its international reputation as a reliable supplier of children's entertainment, and part of that was due to a series of high profile international coproductions, like this one, Maya The Bee. Raised to be a good bee, Maya's adventurous spirit leads her to defy her bee overlords and leave the hive to explore the world, meeting a wide variety of small creatures with which she learns important life lessons. Based on a German children's book from 1912, subsequent adaptations thankfully toned down the nationalist militarism of the original, and the 1975 Zuiyo Eizo / Nippon Animation series went so far as to introduce Willy, Maya's lazy bee boyfriend. This 52 episode series aired around the world in various languages, and in Saban's English dub on YTV and Nickelodeon. Since then Maya has appeared in several new animated adaptations, video games, stage plays, amusement parks, you name it, the world is buzzing for Maya.
Gamba no Bouken, or as we call it The Adventures Of Gamba, is one of those anime series that had a big impact in Japan but barely made a ripple in the English language market. Our hero Gamba is an adventurous mouse, and he and his friends defend the island of Yumemishima and defy the white ferret Noroi. The TMS series only ran for 26 episodes, but had enough staying power to inspire a 1984 theatrical release, another film in 1991, and a CG version in 2015 that was dubbed into English and given the mystifying title "Air Bound." The absolutely melodramatic 1975 adventure of Gamba was directed by the master of melodramatic adventure, Osamu Dezaki, and had a tremendous impact on Japanese kids, some of whom would grow up to become anime professionals. In 2006 a poll of Japanese celebrities selected their top 100 anime titles, and the winner, beating out One Piece, Naruto, Dragonball, Evangelion, and Fullmetal Alchemist, was Gamba.
Kum-Kum Wanpaku Omukashi, or "Naughty Ancient Kum Kum," is a show from the studio that would become Nippon Sunrise and is all about misbehaving prehistoric children romping through the dawn of prehistory. The series was created by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko, whom you know from Mobile Suit Gundam, and directed by Rintaro, whom you know from Captain Harlock and the Galaxy Express movies. Don't expect scientific accuracy from this show, which has has dinosaurs in it as supporting characters, but the series is a lot of charming fun and the English dub was from Paramount TV and aired on television around the world, including, as I'm reliably informed, Canada.
As we saw last time, Tatsunoko Animation started in 1965 with Space Ace and spent the next decade producing world wide hits like Mach Go Go Go and Science Ninja Team Gatchaman. In 1975 the studio would score another SF hit with the comedy Time Bokan, a 61 episode Fuji-TV show which would go on to inspire nine subsequent companion series. The story? Top time scientist Dr. Kieta vanishes after building a time machine, and his lab assistant Tanpei and his granddaughter Junko set off through time and space to rescue him, followed closely by the evil Majo and her henchmen Grocky and Warusa, who were the inspiration for Pokémon's Team Rocket. Another tremendous Japanese hit that was successful everywhere except the US, two Time Bokan compilations were dubbed by Jim Terry (Timefighters In The Land Of Fantasy) and Harmony Gold (Time Patrol).
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| Timefighters In The Land Of Time Patrol |
Speaking of science fiction and Tatsunoko, Space Knight Tekkaman blasted the muscular hero action of their Gatchaman, Casshan and Hurricane Polymar adventures right into outer space. In the 21st century, Professor Amachi creates the invulnerable "tekka" metal and with it, builds the robot "Pegas," equipped with the "Teksetter" system which transforms space pilot Joji Minami into the powerful Tekkaman to battle the Waldarian space invaders. With character designs by Yoshitaka Amano, Tekkaman would run fifty episodes and find a limited American audience via thirteen English-dubbed episodes that were briefly broadcast on UHF television and sold via home video cassette. The 1991 reboot/sequel Tekkaman Blade was a popular show that appeared on UPN as "Teknoman."
When Akira shouts "fade in," Raideen emerges to battle the evil Fossil Beasts for the fate of mankind! Nippon Sunrise/Tohokushinsha's super robot anime Brave Raideen was the first transforming giant robot anime TV show, and also the first transforming giant robot TV show to be broadcast on American television, helping to start North American anime fandom as we know it today. Created by a top notch team of anime talent that included Yoshiyuki Tomino, Tadao Nagahama, and Yoshikazu Yasuhiko, Raideen ran for fifty episodes and has never had a proper English release.
これがUFOだ!空飛ぶ円盤 aka "It's A UFO! A Flying Saucer" aka "Get That Flying Saucer" is a real space oddity that could only have come from the 1970s. If you weren't there at the time, well, believe me when I tell you that the 70s were the high water mark for all kinds of far-out fantastic nonsense. Bigfoot, ancient astronauts, ESP, Atlantis, the Loch Ness Monster, and UFOs all appeared in pop culture presented as fiction, as fact, and as something in between. Japan was not immune to paranormal fever and perhaps the purest expression of Japan's singular UFO fascination is this film, a sixteen minute featurette screened in March of 1975 as a concentrated distillation of postwar flying saucer fever.
We see anime Kenneth Arnold spot UFOs from his Call Air model A-2, anime Captain Mantell's tragic encounter with an unidentified object, and Toei's versions of Barney and Betty Hill and their famous "missing time" close encounter on the lonely roads of Vermont. Before you ask, no, they don't cover the so-called "Roswell incident" because that was not really part of the mythos before the 80s turned it into a thing. After the testimonials, "It's A UFO" switches gears and ventures into theorizing what the inside of a UFO might look like and why these space aliens might be observing the Earth and what this means for the future of mankind. Heady stuff for a Manga Matsuri short! But it's all in the service of laying the groundwork for their next featurette.
Uchuu (space) Enban (saucer) Daisenso (large battle), or The Great Flying Saucer Battle, was included in Toei's July Manga Matsuri festival. Combining the UFO craze with the super robot fad, this film was a Dynamic Pro vehicle that served as a pilot film for October's UFO Robo Grendizer series, and while the characters and vehicles are different, you can see the Grendizer framework clearly, as outer space refugee Duke Fleed arrives on Earth incognito with his saucer-based Gattiger robot in tow, pursued by an evil alien repo-armada who is intent upon recovering said saucer-based Gattiger robot.
I mentioned earlier that the 1970s was the decade where Japanese animation cemented its place in worldwide entertainment. Well, UFO Robo Grendizer, the Go Nagai/Dynamic Pro super robot series from Toei that was given a trial run with Uchuu Enban Daisenso, began airing in 1975. Grendizer ran 74 episodes and was a massive hit in Italy and France and the French-speaking world, cementing Japanese animation as the go-to entertainment for Romance-language speaking children for years to come. The story of Grendizer is a mix of royal intrigue, UFO hysteria, and super robot mecha-violence that begins as the evil Vegans destroy the planet Fleed and all its people save the prince Duke Fleed, who escapes in the super robot flying saucer Grendizer. Arriving on Earth, he goes undercover as a simple farmhand, but when the Vegans threaten, he and Grendizer battle them alongside guest star Koji Kabuto from Mazinger Z.
By the end of the series Duke and Koji are joined by Fleed's sister Maria and local horse girl Hikaru who each pilot their own super mecha that combine to make Grendizer even more awesome. Grendizer aired in the US as part of the "Force Five" series, and the 2024 reimagining Grendizer U was partially financed by another nation full of Grendizer fans, Saudi Arabia.
The 1970s in general weren't a big time for anime feature films. Apart from festival shorts, The Little Mermaid was the only theatrical-length anime release in 1975. Toei's adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's fish-girl story is a widescreen film directed by Tomoharu Katsumata that arguably is closer to the original fairy tale than the later Disney version. This release was dubbed into English and made its way to American television and the home video market and was later released on DVD and Blu-Ray by Discotek Media, and also given a comedy commentary track by the former MST3K comedians of Rifftrax. The Little Mermaid remains a fairy tale, but Katsumata frames the film like a widescreen super robot epic, complete with giant monsters.
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| catch The Little Mermaid Sunday on the Superstation |
Economic factors, market forces, changing demographics, flying saucer sightings; they all worked to shape Japanese animation in 1975. With hindsight it's easy to see how the field was shifting towards original properties and international licensing and how the potential for massive toy sales drove anime studios into the arms of various super robots. Speaking for myself, when I look at 1975 I see favorites I grew up watching like Grendizer, I see favorites that became hits among the next generation like Maya The Bee, and favorites that never took off in the West but remain vital cornerstones of anime in Japan, like Gamba and Raideen. The groundwork of 1965 was paying off ten years later, with Japanese animation solidly in place as global entertainment, even if the globe didn't quite realize it yet. Next: 1985!
-Dave Merrill
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