Described as a "tragic, troubled loner," Condor Joe was also a magnet for disaster. A seemingly doomed childhood was cut short when a "Devil Star" assassiness from Gallactor shot down both parents right before eight-year-old George Asakura's eyes. The assassiness then hurled a bomb at him and left him for dead. Dr. Nambu found George lying on the beach, declared him dead and had an empty coffin buried in his name. George then changed his name, acquired the training it took to become one of the Kagaku Ninjatai, and swore revenge on Gallactor for what they had done. Unfortunately, it went downhill from there--Joe was the one who saw the worst of the war; discovered the mangled corpses and accumulated the battle scars. With a karma similar to Wile E. Coyote's (though not as amusing), Joe discovered that some days, it just doesn't pay to get out of bed.#5 "Ghost Fleet from Hell": Joe displays both his passion for revenge and his remarkable ability as a marksman... but unfortunately runs out of Bird Missiles while doing it.
#19 "Hell's Speed Race": Joe plays bumper cars with a number of Gallactor drivers in a high-speed game of "keep away." Later, he takes on Katse personally and tries to pull off the infamous mask, only to get a scalpel stabbed into his arm for his trouble.
#20 "A Critical Moment for the Science Ninja Team": Joe stops in the middle of a battle to rescue an orphaned puppy, and winds up with a piece of shrapnel embedded in his brain. Can he be healed? Will the rest of the team fight successfully without him? (This episode was shown in "G-Force" but not in "Battle of the Planets.")
#27 "Gallactor's Witch Racer": Joe enters the African 9000 rally race with an old racing partner, Lucy, who has now turned enemy agent. He is there to appropriate information on the Gallactor motherbase; Lucy is there to kill him. Through the course of the race, Lucy changes her attitude and expresses her attraction to him. They go through with their agreement--money for information--but Lucy is revealed to be a cyborg and forced to self-destruct before she can tell Joe about the base.
#31 "Plan to Assassinate Dr. Nambu": While driving the professor to the ISO, Joe tangles with a Gallactor Devil Star on the road. The encounter causes him to recall how his parents died. Later, he arrives on the final battle scene late, but just in time to duel with one Devil Star agent. Her death will rise up to haunt him later....
#70 "United! Death Girls": Joe falls for a young girl who is actually the leader of a Gallactor squadron of mannequin mechs. In truth, the girl wants out of the Syndicate, and is doing the assignment on the promise of freedom upon its completion. Unfortunately, the only true way out of Gallactor is in a body bag.
#76 "The Bracelets Exposed": Late for a team rendezvous, Joe becomes the first to experience the Gallactor's new Mechaziner ray, which painfully knocks him out of Bird-Style. He must find and warn the others before they encounter the same fate.
#78 "Deadly Danger! 10,000 Meters Beneath the Sea": Joe starts having nightmares, flashbacks and violent reactions to bright lights. During an undersea mission, Ken forces him to face his affliction and flashbacks, and Joe rediscovers the truth about his parents--that they were leaders in the Gallactor syndicate.
#81 "Duel on Gallactor Island": Joe returns to his old childhood home on BC Island on the anniversary of his parents's deaths. Unfortunately, his resemblance to his father attracts Katse's attention, and the leader orders his men not to let Joe off the island. In the meantime, Joe has met Father Alan, his childhood friend, and discovers that the Devil Star he'd killed back in #31 was Alan's fiancee. (Shown as Gatchaman only.)
#94 "Electric Devil Beast Angler": While speeding to a rendezvous, Joe accidentally hits a little boy who runs in front of his car. He takes the boy to the hospital and donates blood for the operation, but the surgery needed to save the boy's life is threatened when Gallactor starts messing with the power supply.
#96 "Invasion of Gallactor Headquarters": Katse singles Joe out for a brutal whipping, and the two express their mutual feelings for each other.
#98 "Grape Bomber Spherical Iron Beast": While fighting a sudden blindness attack triggered by bright lights, Joe hits a little old lady with his car, and his delayed from joining the team. The bright lights are triggering his illness again, and this time he knows there is something physically wrong. Dr. Nambu sends him on a special mission to bring back a man named Mikhail, and to get his own confidence back, but only Ken's appearance at the right time prevents a disaster.
#99: "Wounded G-2": Helped along by an accidental blow to the head, Joe's illness gets much worse. His vision blurs, his fighting falters, and he falls out of the Tatsumaki Fighter ("Whirlwind Pyramid") twice. He is left behind in the Godphoenix to rest (terrified at the prospect of no longer being able to fight), but winds up the only one left to rescue his friends.
#101 "Hebi Cobra Sniper Group": This episode begins with an all-out fistfight between Ken and Joe. By showing his concern for his friend's recent actions, Ken is meddling where Joe thinks he shouldn't. Joe responds with a left to Ken's jaw. The fight is interrupted by a call to base. Ken and Jun are sent on a special mission, but Joe tracks them down and tries to save them... if only to prove to himself that he still can.
#102 "Reverse! Checkmate X": While checking with a disreputable private physician to find out what's wrong with him, Joe discovers the Gallactor's female general. He tracks her to a final confrontation. Katse blasts Joe with the Mechaziner, Joe blasts Katse with the Mechaziner (he makes it backfire), and we see Katse unmasked for the first time.
 #103-105 The Black Hole Plan Climax: Now that his identity has been revealed, a Gallactor squad soon tracks Joe down to where he's doing practice laps on a private racetrack, captures him and takes him aboard their latest mech for an interrogation by Katse. After a brutal battle, Joe escapes from the mech by skydiving 3,000 feet in Birdstyle and nearly getting hit by a car. A local doctor diagnoses Joe as having a fatal head injury (bullet/shrapnel fragments remaining from a previous injury are causing more damage), and gives him at most ten days to live. Joe decides to spend his final hours in one last grim battle within the motherbase at Cross Karakorum. Joe's final farewell and the last battle of the Kagaku Ninjatai set a new standard in anime angst for that period. |
