a curated selection of thoughts collected within a 1 gb limit
too often do we ponder about what the future would look like. visions of spaceships soaring across the galaxy and further advancements in technology seeping into the future of architecture. today, we seem to have a better grasp of what it could look like nowadays. but forty years ago, one animation studio teamed up with a well-renowned anime director and the artist behind a best-selling manga to take it upon themselves and answer one question: “what would the world look like if we achieved intergalactic travel backed by science of the future…and still used landline phones?” and that’s why we’re here today. we’re gonna take a look at an old school anime gem that stood the test of time while simultaneously not doing that at all. this is space adventure cobra.
okay, that’s just word salad right there. we’re not calling it that. anyway, without further ado, this is space cobra. ah, much better.
cobra is a manga that was created by buichi terasawa about this guy named johnson who lives a mundane life in the future. you know, the kind where you can go to a movie theater to simulate your own dreams as if they were real. so that’s what he does. he dreams about being a harem king commanding a battleship. in his actual dream, however, he becomes the infamous space pirate cobra, with his partner lady armadroid, and his trademark psychogun in hand. basically, he can take off his arm to fire a gun that’s powered by mental energy or something. after this dream movie(?) among some encounters with some real rough housers, the memories start coming back. johnson starts remembering that he is cobra, just with some really intense plastic surgery. and from that point onward, he continues his adventurous life with lady armadroid and the rest is history.
while the manga was being serialized by- wait, shonen jump? wow, small world. anyway, during its run, there came a full feature film as well as a TV series in 1982, both directed by the great osamu dezaki. you’ll recognize his directing work on tomorrow’s joe, karate master, a handful of the lupin III TV specials, and he even directed the animation for rankin-bass’ frosty the snowman. now that’s a portfolio right there. going back to cobra, don’t think this series came and went just because it’s obscure, at least nowadays. sure it only lasted about 30 episodes or so, but the manga lasted 18 good issues and was able to sell over 50 million copies. that’s about as much as inuyasha, saint seiya, and yuyu hakusho. but it seems like the show itself never really made an impact after all these years. there was the 2008 series, sure. plus, there was that music video on MTV that took a couple scenes from the film. but it’s pretty telling that the only thing that comes to mind when talking about cobra is the film, which isn’t even brought up that much anyway.
so how did i get into this show? well, i guess i better fess up. the only reason i got into it was because i saw the intro. yeah, the damn intro alone got me hooked. oh, don’t you dare look at me confounded like that. if you heard it yourself, you’d be all over it.
alright, let’s talk characters. cobra is our main man and he’s many things: an adventurer, a smug thief, and sometimes even a misogynist whose catchphrase might as well be “look at all those beautiful women out there!” and yet he’s still a walking chick magnet. seriously, i think half the women in this show want him badly. i bet if you put him against twenty other women, he’ll get smothered every time. but more on that note later. above all else, he’s a man of his word. he does what he sets out to do, he avenges his brothers, and he won’t stop until he completes his mission. if he’s out to get a magic macguffin, he’ll take out anyone who tries to beat him.
reoccurring characters include the aforementioned lady armadroid, who i actually really like. not just design-wise, but also in terms of character. she’s not a one-note sidekick made for the audience to ogle at. one moment, she’s someone you’d want to sit down and have a good coffee with. next thing you know, she’s fending for herself and yet no one stands a chance against her. she’s basically as capable as cobra. then there’s the three royal sisters, jane, catherine, and dominique. like, their last names are royal. not the- nevermind. point is, they’re all integral to the first story arc of the series, which involves cobra having to find the treasure of captain nelson, father of the sisters. apparently the map that leads to the treasure can only be found when the tattoos of all three sisters are placed together. how do you overlay them? well, obviously one would have to play piano melodies in order to convert the images to solid RGB colors and THEN they can be overlayed on top of each other. are you following this? good. because that’s all i can really spoil about that plot.
my favorite episode has to be episode 5, “mystery! who is the fearsome sniper?” by this point, cobra has already met catherine. and suddenly, they’re being chased down by this sniper lady. it's a really cool episode that has lots of suspense. it pretty much combines a lot of what i love about the show.
actually before i move on, can we talk about the actual science-y stuff for a minute? it’s got to be some of the most fascinating sci-fi i’ve seen in a long time. i don’t think i’ve ever been so mesmerized by a world like this in a long time. there’s a city that sinks underground every night as the lightning takes the sky. i mean, i could’ve phrased it better. but once you see this stuff for yourself, you can’t help but just look at it in awe. i can’t believe this was made for TV. it looks better than some of the anime that comes out today, let alone what came out back then. i've heard the cowboy bebop comparison at one point. but it's more like flash gordon meets those man with no name movies. it's basically a cheesy male power fantasy with aliens that look like ducks.
okay, now back to the plot. there’s actually a couple story arcs that take place. i think the weakest one is where cobra plays this sport called rugball. it’s like baseball, but with all the violent stuff about football. AND people get killed. great stuff, but again, it’s easily the weakest arc. now that i think about it, the show really did peak with its first, let’s say, eight episodes. it’s only really good when you’re learning about all this brand new world for the first time and it gets even better with two words: crystal. bowie.
this guy’s just awesome full stop. he’s got a gold body that impervious to bullets, he’s got this claw thing that he puts on his hand that just cuts through anything, he’s an incredibly sadistic assassin, and in the show he’s even voiced by the late kiyoshi kobayashi, the long-time voice of jigen in lupin III. he’s the perfect villain with the perfect voice actor. he’s so cool that he’s the main antagonist in the movie AND the show. but the real foil for the whole show is the almighty salamander, leader of the space pirate guild. yes, his name is salamander. he’s like darth vader mixed with the DNA of adolf hitler. wait…yeah, i think he quite literally is hitler. he’s got people doing nazi solutes to him. he's space hitler. i'm putting that out there. but the big reveal of him is shoddy to say the least. it’s a real cop out, i’ll say.
i think i’m comfortable talking about the negatives now. the whole show has this ginormous problem where it’s hard to get attached to any of the characters if most of them get killed a couple episodes after they’re introduced. i wanted more out of these funny looking aliens, but i guess it’s not interested in that. it’s weird because it’s so good at world-building that it forgets that it needs people in the worlds it builds. it’s not like there aren’t any people. it’s just that they’re all dead and buried. the stories themselves can get a little repetitive, too. that’s why i don’t recommend watching this in a binge mindset. bingewatching is just not plausible for every single show out there and i think this might be one of them.
another thing i especially do not like is how they represent their female characters. a lot of them are either blonde white women or they're legally required to show off their skin. not to mention it has that tendency to ogle a bit. it’s honestly weird because this is also one of the few animes in the 80s to actually represent black people correctly instead of mimicking old minstrel stereotypes of the 40s. plus, characters like lady and the royal sisters are perfectly fine on their own. there’s even this one villain named sandra, leader of the snow gorillas (gotta love the names), who’s just completely over the top and out of line. she’s great! but a good chunk of the representation is less than ideal to me. i get that this was the 80s so a lot of this isn’t going to age well. but even if you like the sex appeal, you gotta admit that it gets boring after a while. at the very least, it’s got a lot of muscle dudes for all the ladies in the audience. and even then, if you’re in the mood for strong women who make great villains, you’d probably get a kick out of this show. but it's still disappointing.
oh my god, the music! right, the whole soundtrack was composed by none other than yuji ohno of all people. yeah, the friggin lupin composer! jesus christ, it really is just space lupin, huh? the lead character is a pervert with a really cool gun, he’s being chased around by what’s basically space interpol, and they even have a space hitler. man, i think osamu dezaki was just destined to make stuff for lupin. good thing, too. because he just knows how to make anything feels so cinematic. every frame is a painting here and you almost forget that you’re watching an old anime. i would watch this show all over again just for its looks. it’s a visual marvel for its time and it’s still a visual marvel today.
now, about that movie…
believe it or not, i saw this movie after i got done with the show. i figured that if they can make the anime the way it is, they probably had a different way of doing it in the form of a feature film. it even came out months before the anime, which is the weirdest thing. it’s like the jimmy neutron of anime if you care enough to get that allegory. anyway, to put it bluntly, the movie is a spectacle. it has quite the psychedelic approach to visual storytelling and the plot may be overwhelming for some, but it’s basically the same story as the first 8 episodes. so maybe it’s good to watch those just in case. there’s certainly better aspects in here than the show. the royal sisters have slightly better designs, the plot twists are genuinely shocking, and crystal bowie’s design is way freakier. even the whole sex appeal stuff is used sparingly. it’s more in line with a figure drawing than, let’s say, a sports illustrated swimsuit issue. but then they put a thermostat in between lady armadroid’s boobs and suddenly it does get pretty stupid. i dunno. it’s like for every good thing, there’s a little asterisk taped onto it. it’s arguably classier, but not by much. the royal sisters look better, but they themselves are slightly more bland. even jane, who starts the movie by cutting off some guy’s head for a bounty, becomes a simple love interest who doesn’t do much. the music is great, but compared to yuji ohno’s music? don’t even try.
despite everything, it’s still surprisingly better than the show. it’s certainly an interesting movie. the voice cast is different, sandra and the snow gorillas actually team up with cobra, and the whole vibe of it is more like star wars meets james bond. it reeks of 80s in the best way possible. it’s like if a kid recorded home videos of all his star wars action figures and then a film director barged in and found a way to turn it into an entire space opera. there’s a sense of fast-paced action with a dash of patience and silence. above a sea of baddies out to kill you in cold blood, there’s the vast emptiness of space. but then you see a big explosion of colors and stars and suddenly you realize that maybe there is something out there. and suddenly you realize that maybe it’s not so lonely out there after all. maybe life on earth can’t last forever. but out there, it can last for eons. time is a mystery, but it will be a long time before it tampers with life itself. so enjoy it while it lasts and be prepared for the world of tomorrow.
i hope that kid’s proud.
space cobra is at its worst a dated piece of work with not enough to keep things fresh. at its best, it's a marvel. the action is great, the artwork is incredible, and it's basically a saturday morning spaghetti western with gold robot guys from outer space. every episode is available on youtube and pluto tv in english subtitles and there's even a latino dub with an even funnier intro. gotta love it when some intern finds out how to do computer effects for the first time and just gives it their all. just don't expect the most progressive show ever created. all you can really do is go along for the ride. it's a real treat.