The Star Blazers Page

STAR BLAZERS

Written by Kevin McCorry

"We're off to outer space.<br>We're leaving mother Earth.<br>To save the human race.<br>Our Star Blazers!<br>Searching for a distant star.<br>Heading off to Iscandar.<br>Leaving all we love behind.<br>Who knows what dangers we will find?<br>We must be strong and brave.<br>Our home we've got to save.<br>If we don't in just one year,<br>mother Earth will disappear.<br>Fighting with the Gamilons.<br>We won't stop until we've won.<br>Then we'll return, and when we arrive,<br>the Earth will survive.<br>With our Star Blazers!"

U.S. children's television's answer to Star Wars , Star Blazers is the American adaptation of a popular series of Japanese science fiction/fantasy films, titled Space Cruiser Yamato . Dubbed into English, of course, and packaged in episodic instalments, the Space Cruiser Yamato saga became known to Generation X in North America as Star Blazers , shown usually at times after school by American television stations in 1979-80. WVII-TV, in Bangor, Maine, aired Star Blazers at 5:30 P.M. Atlantic Time on weekdays during that time period, and all cable television companies in Canada's eastern Maritimes received it. Though its dialogue is juvenile in places, the concepts in Star Blazers are interesting. The television programme is not strictly accurate scientifically, but what work of the science fiction/fantasy genre is? Three series of twenty-six episodes each were made, but only the first two of them were widely distributed for broadcast. WVII-TV showed only the first two series.

Star Blazers is essentially the epic story of the maturing of hero Derek Wildstar, who suffers the loss of his parents, overcomes his resentment of the Captain for whom his only brother is for a time believed to have died to protect, and rises from space battleship gunner and spaceship fighter leader to be Captain's deputy and eventually succeed the deceased Captain as commander of the Earth-defending Star Force, which, after sparing Earth from irradiated extinction by the planet-bombing aggressors of Gamilon, combats a galaxy-marauding empire with a fortress-headquarters situated in the nucleus of a seeming comet, then seeks a new beginning for the population of Earth when the Sun becomes unstable.

Precision animation and backgrounds, strikingly deep visuals with variable use of colour, a curious blending of seafaring imagery with space, fanciful yet realistic landings on known planets of the Solar System, soul-stirring music, and, above all, likable characters on a continuing mission to preserve, to secure, humanity's future account for the enduring North American appeal of this Japanese opus.

Below is an episode guide to the first two series of Star Blazers .

While en route to planet Iscandar, a Star Force expedition party to the planet Beeland in search of edible plants encounters a fractious society of bee people and is held captive by one of the belligerent factions of those bee people.

Series I- The Quest For Iscandar<br>In the late 2100s, the planet Gamilon, a world far beyond Earth's Solar System, declares war on all of Earth. The nations of Earth unite to fight against the Gamilons, but one by one, Earth's space battleship fleets are defeated. When the nations of Earth refuse to surrender, Gamilon begins bombarding Earth with Planet Bombs, radioactive missiles that look like meteors, which gradually spread deadly radiation all over Earth, killing plant and animal life and forcing what remains of humanity to retreat to underground cities. Earth is contaminated beyond any human repair, and Planet Bombing continues to spread radiation deeper and deeper into the planetary crust. By the year 2199, human life on Earth is entirely underground, plagued by radiation sickness, and gradually losing hope.

"The Battle at Pluto"<br>The last of the Earth forces, led by Captain Avatar, battle with alien Gamilons near planet Pluto, but the only surviving<br>Earth space vessel is forced to withdraw from the combat and return to Earth. Alex Wildstar's space battleship, the<br>Paladin, is lost and presumed destroyed. While on duty at a Mars surface-station, Derek Wildstar, Alex's younger brother,<br>and Mark Venture discover a spaceship of extra-galactic origin that has crash-landed on the Red Planet. Thrown from it is<br>a beautiful, dead woman grasping a message capsule. The message is later analysed and determined to be an offer from Queen<br>Starsha of planet Iscandar, to spare Earth from radiation poisoning by Gamilon, and the dead woman is revealed to be<br>Astra, the sister of Starsha. Having returned to Earth with Mark and descended to one of the underground cities, Derek<br>learns of his brother's fate from Captain Avatar, now back on Earth after the Battle of Pluto. Mournful Wildstar and<br>Venture meet an eccentric doctor, Sane, a funny robot, IQ-9, and a beautiful nurse, Nova, who resembles the dead sister of<br>Starsha. Within little more than a year, life on Earth will be extinct, even underground. The message sent from...