Grendizer
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| UFO Robo Grendizer | |||
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| UFOロボ・グレンダイザー (UFO Robo Grendizer) |
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| Genre | Mecha | ||
| Manga | |||
| Author | Go Nagai | ||
| Publisher | Kodansha | ||
| Demographic | Shōnen | ||
| Original run | October 1975 – May 1976 | ||
| TV anime | |||
| Director | Masayuki Akihi | ||
| Studio | Toei/Dynamic Planning | ||
| Network |  Fuji TV |
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| Original run | October 5, 1975 – February 27, 1977 | ||
| Episodes | 74 | ||
| Animated film: UFO Robot Grendizer vs. Great Mazinger | |||
| Director | Osamu Kasai | ||
| Studio | Toei/Dynamic Planning | ||
| Released | March 20, 1976 | ||
| Runtime | 27 Minutes | ||
| Animated film: Great Mazinger, Grendizer, Getter Robo G: Decisive Showdown! Great Sea Beast | |||
| Director | Masayuki Akihi | ||
| Studio | Toei/Dynamic Planning | ||
| Released | July 18, 1976 | ||
| Runtime | 31 Minutes | ||
UFO Robo Grendizer (UFOロボ・グレンダイザー UFO Robo Gurendaizā?), is a super robot show created by manga artist Go Nagai. It was shown on Japanese TV in 1975 and lasted 74 episodes. In 1977 it was the greatest anime show in France, in 1978 in Italy, leading to a great merchandising, being the first mecha never show in those countries.
His first appearance in U.S. was as part of Jim Terry's Force Five series, under the title Grandizer.
The titular mecha was stolen by the Vegan Empire and recovered by the Prince of Planet Fleed, who piloted it under the guise of the masked warrior Duke Fleed.
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[edit] Plot
The Vega homeworld is becoming unstable due to the exploiting of Vegatron, a powerful radioactive ore. Seeking to expand his militaristic empire and find a substitute planet to settle upon, the ruthless King Vega unleashes his armies — composed of flying saucers and giant robotic monsters — and turns first against neighbors such as Fleed, a highly advanced but peaceful world. In a tragically ironic twist, the invaders' blitzkrieg turns against them: the once verdant, idyllic Fleed is turned into a radioactive wasteland. Too late, the only known survivor of the royal family, Prince Duke Fleed, manages to steal the Grendizer, the robotic embodiment of the Fleedian God of War, from the Vegan invaders who plan to use it to spearhead their invasion fleet. Grendizer is a giant robot that interfaces with Spazer, a flying saucer that enables the robot to fly.
(The French version of UFO Robot Grendizer mistakenly credits the construction of the Grendizer robot to the Vegan Forces using hybrid Vegan and Fleed technology. Most French-speaking Grendizer fans mistakenly regard this fact as canon. The mistake lies in the French translators' liberties taken with the original Japanese script. The Arab and Italian versions, however, retained the original Grendizer origin in the plot.)
Fleeing Vegan space by flying at faster than light speed, Duke enters our solar system and switches course to Earth, making a rough landing in Japan, on the slopes of Mount Fuji. He is befriended by Doctor Umon, a noted scientist who oversees a research laboratory (called the Space Science Lab) near a small ranch. The kindly Umon takes in the young alien as his son, under the assumed name of Daisuke, and assists him in hiding Grendizer. Taking the name Daisuke Umon, Duke Fleed works at the ranch run by Danbei Makiba (based on Danbei Hayami of Go Nagai's popular Cutie Honey).
A rough two years later, Kouji Kabuto returns to Japan after studying abroad in a flying saucer he personally designed and built (called the TFO). He heads to the Space Science Lab after hearing of multiple sightings of "flying saucers". He plans to contact the aliens if possible and make peace with them. Daisuke, however, scoffs at the notion and fears that these aliens, the Vegans, led by generals Blaki and Gandal, are preparing to attack Earth. Kouji ignores his warnings and flies out to meet the incoming saucers, only to discover the horrible truth. In order to save Kouji and protect his adoptive homeworld from destruction, Daisuke is forced to return to his true identity as Duke Fleed. He unearths Grendizer from its hiding place under the lab and sets off to fight his enemies.
The Vegans establish a base on the dark side of the moon and start to attack Earth from there. Kouji discovers Duke Fleed’s true identity and their bitter rivalry soon turns to friendship. The daughter of Danbei Makiba, Hikaru, also discovers Daisuke’s secret and becomes a pilot in order to assist him despite his objections. Later on, it is revealed that there were two more survivors from planet Fleed: Duke’s younger sister Maria Grace Fleed and a man who had rescued her and fled to Earth, raising her under the guise of her grandfather. Caught in a crossfire between Grendizer and a Vegan beast, he reveals to Maria that she is the last survivor of the royal family of Fleed (under the belief that Duke was killed) before dying from his wounds. Maria swears revenge on Grendizer and its pilot. She tries to ambush Duke, Kouji and Hikaru at the Space Science Lab, but the fight is short lived. Maria’s attacks brings Duke’s necklace (which is the same as the one she wore) into view and the truth is revealed. The lost siblings were reunited at last and Maria becomes the last addition to the team.
(An interesting fact is that Gô Nagai originally intended the fourth pilot of the Grendizer team to be Sayaka Yumi, pilot of the Aphrodite A robot in Mazinger Z. Reportedly, Shingo Araki, the character designer and co-plotter of the last 25 episodes of the Grendizer TV series, objected Yumi's character being added to the team, and at the request of Gô Nagai, designed a "new" character who eventually turned out to be Maria Grace Fleed.)
Near the end, it is shown that Duke Fleed was engaged to King Vega’s daughter, Princess Rubina, prior to the attack on Fleed. When Rubina discovers that planet Fleed is no longer polluted with Vegatron radiation and that her fiancé is alive and well, she rushes to Earth to bring him the good news. Unfortunately, one of King Vega’s generals uses this opportunity to ambush Duke Fleed, and Rubina is killed when she takes a shot aimed at Duke. This makes Duke even more determined to wipe out the Vegan menace once and for all.
King Vega decides to gather his remaining forces and make an all-out attack on Earth, destroying the Moon Base to coax his troops into fighting to the end and finally succeed in invading Earth and taking it as their new home planet. Duke and company go out to intercept them in Grendizer and the newly-designed space combat Spazers. After a fierce battle, they finally manage to destroy the Vegan mothership along with King Vega himself. Soon afterwards Duke and Maria bid a tearful farewell to Earth and their friends and return to help reconstruct planet Fleed.
[edit] Production
The original concept was shown in a 1975 30-minute pilot movie War of the Flying Saucers. The movie had the same basic plot, with a few changes: Daisuke appears as the Professor's biological son, the enemy was Princess Teronna from Planet Yarban, and the robot's original name was Gattaiger (gattai = Japanese for "combine"). The series, which started later the same year, is considered another sequel to the Mazinger series, partly because of the inclusion of Mazinger Z's pilot Koji Kabuto, and having giant robots, which made it a "Super Robot" mecha anime.
A lot of speculation has been made about the two half-turns executed when the pilot passes from the ship mode to the robot mode. Once asked about it, Go Nagai answered that "Duke being suspicious, he always checks that no one is following him", but it can be assumed that he was joking, leaving the mystery unsolved and strange explanations abound (one being that Grendizer originally needed a crew; Doctor Umon managed to create a computer able to automate most of the missing crew's capabilities, but due to data storage space shortage of the time, the pilot had to turn the data tape when switching mode...).
The Grendizer robot and Daisuke have been included in two short Go Nagai cross-over features: UFO Robot Grendizer vs. Great Mazinger, and Great Mazinger, Grendizer, Getter Robot G: Decisive Showdown! Great Sea Beast..
Grendizer is best remembered as one of the first anime shows to have a huge success in Europe and Canada, particularly in France and Quebec (known as Goldorak), Italy and Malta (known as Goldrake), where it holds a strong following even today. Grandizer was also one of the most popular anime series ever shown in Arabic countries. (All the episodes were shown in these countries. It is interesting to note that the Arabic version was identical to the Japanese one, the names remained the same.) Grandizer is also popular in Russia. Russian version is identical to the original one, too.
The French version of the show had the interesting idea of naming the characters after stars, planets and galaxies: Duke Fleed became Arcturus, both as his alien and Earth name; Kouji Kabuto became Alcor, Doctor Umon became Professeur Procyon etc. The show itself was known as Goldorak.
Twenty-six episodes of Grendizer were shown on American TV as part of the multi-mecha show Force Five, out of the total of 74 in the original series. Many character's names were changed: Grendizer spelling was changed to Grandizer, Duke Fleed was Orion Quest, and then changed his name to Johnny Bryant; Planet Fleed's name was changed to Antares, and so on. This corresponds to the first season and story arc (ending with the death of one of the main villains, who is replaced afterwards). Although Mazinger Z was later imported to the United States, Kouji's character appearing in both Tranzor Z and Grandizer was not acknowledged.
[edit] DVD releases
The licensed dubbed version for some French-speaking countries was officially announced in 2006. In 2005, a major crisis led Toei to take legal actions against DVD customers, all French megastores, and two major French anime publishers in France, Belgium, Switzerland and Luxembourg. The crisis started with the official release of unlicensed Goldorak DVD by Manga Distribution and Déclic Image websites and on Ebay. By November 28th 2005 the Manga Distribution and Déclic Images publishers were sentenced to pay 7.200.000€ to Toei and Dynamic Planning for selling unlicensed DVD boxset.
upcoming section material:
[edit] Cast
- Duke Fleed
Kei Tomiyama - Hikaru Makiba
Chiyoko Kawashima - Kouji Kabuto
Hiroya Ishimaru - Maria Grace Fleed
Rihoko Yoshida - Doctor Umon / Emperor Vega
Jouji Yanami
[edit] External links
- Information of Grendizer in Toei Animation (in Japanese)
- Pictures and summaries of UFO Robo Grendizer’s chapters (in Italian)
- The most important Grandizer Museum Online all about Grendizer Toys, Stories, curiosities, Collections.
- Grandizer fan site – Story, character profiles, weapons, image gallery, and sound clips.
- Grendizer Project – A fan non-profit project to create episode 0 of UFO Robot Grendizer.
- Absolute Anime – General information, message board, links.
- Goldorak, also known as Grandizer – Story, episode guide, links.
- Grandizer Fun site
- Grandizer at the Internet Movie Database
- (Italian) [SuperRobotProject: a no profit 3D project dedicated to Go Nagai's robots Grendizer & Great Mazinger]
- (Italian) Theufo.NetAnother no profit 3D project dedicated to Go Nagai's robots, and called The Ufo.
- Goldorakgo.com : A Good French Site
- [http://membres.lycos.fr/goldotriomphe/ :Goldotriomphe, a French Grendizer site made in Québec. Contains fanarts, fanfics and online Grendizer cartoons published in Europe in the late 70s.
- [1] :Home of the Monstrogoth Project. A project that compares Japanese, Arabic, Italian, French and American versions of UFO Robot Grendizer. Part of the Goldotriomphe website.
- UFO Robo Grendizer (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia
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