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Title: Gatchaman Original Animated Video Release Dates: 10-1-94 (Volume 1), 1-1-95 (Volume 2), 4-1-95 (Volume 3) Number of Episodes: 3 Released By: Nippon Columbia and Tatsunoko Productions; English version released by Urban Vision Current Commercial Availability: Videos are available in Japanese, and subbed and dubbed in English |
Jump ahead to the year 2066, where Earth finds itself besieged by a cunning syndicate bent on global rule and supported by an ancient alien menace who would love to see the Earth cleansed of the human scum crawling over it. The only thing standing in their way is the International Science Organization and its carefully planned secret weapon... the Kagaku Ninjatai.
Twenty two years to the day after its initial release, Gatchaman returned to television screens as an original animated video series. The characters and designs were updated, and the villains updated to a more competent and formidable form. The stories were essentially retellings of the main events in the original 1972 TV series, with some changes added in an odd, but attractive blend of old and new.
For a review of the English versions, click here.
Character Designer: Yasuomi Umetsu: Best known for his designs for the "Clockwork Angel" ("Presence") segment of Robot Carnival and designs for Megazone 23 Part 2 and the remake of Casshan. Umetsu is a popular designer in the 90's, and employs a definitive realistic style when drawing bodies and male features. He worked for Tatsunoko Studios on the Time Bokan and Shurato series and has done artwork for Tatsunoko CD digests and other merchandise.
Mechanics Designer: Kimihito Yamane:
Yamane made his design debut at ARTMIC with Bubblegum Crisis and has created mech designs for Genocyber, G-Gundam and the Casshan remake.
Soundtrack: Maurice White & Bill Meyers: When producer Ryu Yoshida was watching original series Gatchaman for the first time, it was the middle of the 1970's, when the popularity of the band Earth, Wind & Fire was at its peak. Since certain sounds bring back certain memories, what better than to combine the two? Yoshida commissioned Earth, Wind & Fire vocalist Maurice White and sound arranger Bill Meyers to contribute their unique, nostalgic jazz-rock sound to the new Gatchaman soundtrack. The result was mixed: some of the music fit, some didn't, and the OAVs suffered from a case of "Let's Fly" abuse ("Let's Fly," sung by Lance Matthews, was the only vocal track included). To fill in the gaps, tracks from the original series soundtrack and the symphonic suite for the 1978 theatrical compilation were also used.
Theme Song: Ichiro Mizuki: Though it was not featured in the opening credits of the OAVs, a modern remix of the classic (and still popular) "dare da" Gatchaman theme was released as a separate single in June, 1994. Singer Ichiro Mizuki (the voice behind many classic anime theme songs) breathed new life into the Gatchaman theme, and later improved upon it with a "cyber mix" of the same tune. This theme song accompanies a special video that was included with Volume 3 of the OAV.
As part of the tribute to Gatchaman, producer Ryu Yoshida tried to revive a bit of the seventies sound by bringing in composers from Earth, Wind and Fire to create the soundtrack. Unfortunately, while the music was jazzy and pleasant, it didn't do much to reflect what was happening on screen. By Volume 2, Tatsunoko had already substituted snippets of the original 1972 series soundtrack, which jarred with the jazz.
Overall, I think Tatsunoko should have either used the original characters (original faces, new clothes, updated weapons) and put them into three new episodes, or created a "next generation Gatchaman" of all-new characters and launched them into new situations, much like what they did with Tekkaman Blade. This might have even spawned a successful television series for the 90's.