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From: mae@aplvax.UUCP (Mary Anne Espenshade)
Newsgroups: net.comics
Subject: Re: appropriate scene from Gatchaman
Message-ID: <190@aplvax.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 3-Feb-86 17:34:03 EST
Article-I.D.: aplvax.190
Posted: Mon Feb  3 17:34:03 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 7-Feb-86 08:34:30 EST
References: <645@sfmin.UUCP> <1699@jhunix.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: JHU/Applied Physics Lab, Laurel, MD
Lines: 43

quotes from:
>> Jeff Skot	jeffj@sfmin.UUCP
>  Sue Shambaugh  ins_acss@jhunix

First, to clear up a detail:
>>	In the first book, there are the usual fights with the Spectar
>>agents (they are the scientific ninja team after all) and they are
>>introduced to a gentlemen in a red outfit.  He turns out to be
>>Ken's father, who was presumed dead from a plane crash.
>>Father and son are reunited after taking the enemy base.
>The red-clothed man in the plane is Red Impulse. And according to
>the version of the show I have on tape (in Japanese), Ken's father
>is actually Anderson -- he calls him "o-toosan" ONCE in the first
>episode. 
Red Impulse is Ken's father, but Ken was raised by Nambu (Anderson)
from a very young age (4 or so) and believed that his father was dead.
Red Impulse feared that Galactor (Spectar) agents would get to him
through his family, so he sent his son to be raised by his best friend.
Joe was also raised by Nambu.  He saw his parents killed by a Galactor
assassin with a bomb.

To get back to the main subject:
. . . American censors added
>>things like "of course Ken's father escaped in the nick of
>>time" or "of course, all those enemy agents in the control room
>>got out before the base was blown up".  Despite this mini-flame
>>of american tv, I wished to point out cultural differences.
>>Have I succeeded?
>Yes! Apparently, the Japanese see nothing wrong with the notion of
>children growing up KNOWING that people shot with guns BLEED and DIE,
>and neither do I.
Another agreement.  Japanese shows also acknowledge that people die in
wars and are killed by explosions.  I find this a far healthier
attitude than pretending that nothing bad ever happens and that
super-heros can have planet-wide battles without harming any bystanders.
The same kind of changes were made in StarBlazers, especially in the
last few episodes.  Robotech has done better by this.

--
Mary Anne Espenshade
...!{allegra, seismo}!umcp-cs!aplcen!aplvax!mae
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