Sunday, December 10, 2023

Shin Tetsujin/New Gigantor

 

This show premiered in Japan in 1981, and about 1992 in the US, on the new Sci-Fi Channel.  It had also been dubbed into Spanish sometime in between those years, as I saw it that way in San Diego on a station out of Mexico.  It was a good choice by Fred Ladd to bring this show out, though it is presented as a sequel rather than a remake.  Naturally they softened a lot of the violence, though since the cartoon was on cable at 6 AM, it wasn't that important like it would have been in the 80s.  And Fred kept the fantastic theme song from the 60s.

That song is way better than most of the music used in the Japanese version.  The series had two main recurring villains, Branch and the Space Demon King.  What is fun is that these two don't show up in every episode.  It prevents the series from being somewhat repetitive, which can happen on occasion.  I like both of them, and I wish the English version was on the Blu-Ray disc.

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