Yep, I never have understood it. Could never determine if they do that in order to appeal to worldwide (read: "white" ) audiences, or based on some internal self-hatred.
As for the Starblazers thing, thanks to you I blew an hour on You Tube watching eps of the Comet Empire and Iscandar series. I really, really loved that show. Decades later, though the animation's not as clean as nowadays, the show holds up perfectly. Amazing time spent on the jets, things you never saw in American 'toons like the sunlight sliding down the Argo as it emerges from the ocean, or the ship dippling slightly as it transitions from water to air. Amazing! One thing about anime that captivated me from the start was the more mature stories that had real world results to the action. Even as a younger kid, I never got why no one in US-based cartoons ever died. Remember how in GI Joe, whole jets would explode, then they'd take pains to show the pilots jump to safety? Whether it was C.O.P.S, Thundercats, Bravestar, Batman, Superfriends, whatever, in American toons no one died. Not that I'm ghoulish, it just seemed unrealistic. So when I saw the likes of Speed Racer, where dudes died all the time in car crashes, it caught my interest. The same with Starblazers, where ships exploded all the time in combat, and no pilots were jettisoned to safety. And that's speaking of the Americanized, sanitized versions of both of those series. American toons were always too busy with one-note villains around which the entire series were built, or dealing with that horrid 70s-era mandate that all cartoons had to be non-violent and have a moral. Remember the "And knowing is half the battle BS of 'GI Joe'" or all the message-heavy shows like "Shazaam" and others back in the day? Even in recent years, toons like "The Batman" have all the cops shooting laser weapons instead of projectile ones. Why? Because the censors feel guns are too intense for youngsters. Ugh! The first American-based 'toon I can recall that had mature, complex plots, attention to the real physics of how ships would move, and realistic battles in which people paid the ultimate price, was Exo-Squad. It's one of my favs of all time. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mr. Worf" <hellomahog...@gmail.com> To: scifinoir2@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, July 5, 2010 6:08:38 PM Subject: Re: [scifinoir2] Space Battleship Yamato aka Starblazers That's one of the things about anime that I find disturbing. The style in most anime movies is that the characters take on caucasian appearances. Although the character's name may be Japanese and their mannerisms, customs etc are Japanese. Unfortunately, that is how it has been since the beginning. The live action movies have been different though, sometimes having a mixed cast. For example, the later Godzilla movies. On Mon, Jul 5, 2010 at 2:48 PM, Keith Johnson < keithbjohn...@comcast.net > wrote: What a trip. I am a *huge* fan of the Americanized version that I saw back in junior high, and have several eps on tape. I loved the Comet Empire arc as well, especially the finale when the Starforce attacked the base. Interesting. While the two Starblazers cartoons shown on TV here had decidedly European looking characters, everyone in this movie is clearly Japanese. Maybe they should have shipped some of them over for M. Knight to cast in his flick! :) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mr. Worf" < hellomahog...@gmail.com > To: scifinoir2@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, July 5, 2010 4:48:04 AM Subject: [scifinoir2] Space Battleship Yamato aka Starblazers My innerchild is dancing right now. It is taking a lot of concentration to type this out, but the movie is due this December!!!!! Here is some info on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Battleship_Yamato Here's the advanced trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoHXxWg7pw4 -- Celebrating 10 years of bringing diversity to perversity! Mahogany at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mahogany_pleasures_of_darkness/ -- Celebrating 10 years of bringing diversity to perversity! Mahogany at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mahogany_pleasures_of_darkness/
