Review: "Space Battleship Yamato" movies

Review: Space Battleship Yamato (1977)

Originally this was the movie that tied into the 1970s animated series that became Star Blazers in the US, a Japanese space opera war anime movie about 2199, in an alternate universe, where the Gaminlans, clearly an archetype for the US, bomb the Earth with radioactive asteroids in order to invade the planet. The story has been retold several times and expanded into a series of episodes which became Star Blazers in 1978. So it actually predates the US release because the Japanese one came out in 1974. The film version should be treated as a slightly other timeline, as all of the Yamato movies should be. It is meant as kind of a strange love letter to an old battleship that the US sank in World War II. The ship is rebuilt as a space battleship cruiser and launched into space for a 1 year journey top another galaxy, using an engine and gun designed by the powerful Stasha of planet Iscandar. The planet shares a common past with planet Gamelus, and the battle for peace is fought with war and the eastern honor spirit. The movie also implies a fatalistic logic where the heroes face unstoppable odds and must win or die, and in some ways want to die in the end, but then they achieve their aim of finding the device that can restore the Earth. US cartoons of the time were sanitized, as is Star Blazers, so that the whole fatal thing never really happens, and it appears to be an all out superiority story where this little ship can take on millions of warships and survive. Sound like Robotech? It should. Macross becaome Robotech and both were heavily influenced by Space Battleship Yamato.

Review: Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato (1978)

The second season of the 1970s animated series gets chopped up into another movie, or so it would seem, as a new commander, Kodai, flies the Yamato into battle with the White Comet Empire, which does sound like the second season, but isn't. This is yet another timeline because the heroic crew actually has to sacrifice itself to destroy the comet battle station before it crashes into the Earth. Evidently the director was feeling some kind of intense loneliness or something. Or maybe he was simply trying to be ironic. The Comet Empire revives Desslar to actually fight them. The story was then reworked as the series second season, and is likely actually a bumper for it, as they made the second season after the movie and threw away the part where Kodai destroys himself. Maybe it was a little too much even for the producers. The movie was likely actually produced in 1975 just after the first season.

Review: Yamato The New Voyage (1979)

The Kodai brothers are back in this sequel to the other films, and the series, where the Bolar wars also happen, similar to the third aired season from 1977. The story is slightly an alternate timeline where there is a daughter born from Kodai's brother's union with Teresa, and Desslar is back, looking for a new planet, and there are strange battles, warping planets, and a lot of that honor spirit going on. This time the ending is virtually a take on the comet one, except this time, they borrow for Star Wars, which is irony at best consider Star Wars ripped off The Hidden Fortress. Same idea. But this time our heroes need not die with honor.

Review: Be Forever Yamato (1980)

Meant as a prequel to the voyage story, it is treated here as a sequel, as Be Forever has an older Sasha, the daughter, serving on the ship, and the new threat is the Dark Nebula Galaxy, and it is not at all like other empires, snicker. Actually it is pretty much the same story as Bolar and even uses similar battle scenes, but it is distinctly a Yamato story and Kodai is in it, and another captain too. So apparently that time he died a few sequels ago never happened. Earth is again threatened with an atomic device, but the heroic forces manage to prevent the ultimate doom. Again.

Review: Final Yamato (1983)

Several years after the series, the supposed final movie in the series returns the original commander, Akita, from being in 'suspended animation' to battle the Gamilans, the remnants of the Dark Nebula, and a giant water planet headed for Earth. The crew must fight on using elements from the other movies and series, a lot of explosions, a raid on another space battle station, and a clear nod to Star Wars, and various other ideas. Also Akita must sacrifice himself alone to destroy the water planet bomb, using the Yamato as a bomb. That's pretty messed up to have the same kind of ending twice in two movies, but to do it three times is just like, wow. Guess this is another timeline again. Kodai will marry his sweetheart (in the unedited version).

Later variations of the series including an unfinished 'rebirth' not reviewed, feature the rebuilt ship, so it just won't die.

Also some of the aliens, blue skinned guys living on floating islands on water planets, indeed are ripped off by James Cameron in Avatar. Also he ripped off the space marines directly from this movie series, in Aliens, in 1986. And Star Trek ripped off this series several times. But hey, why not have inspiration. As Desslar said, 'Resistance is futile'! Oh, so did Star Trek, years later. Got to love something that inspires so much copying. The Bolar are clearly the Cardassians. Ha.

The oddity of this series of movies is that in the middle the producers seem either bitter about family issues, possibly a divorce, or losing a child also, and are projecting their angst onto the characters, making it really quite bleak. It is not a children's movie series at all. They even have a kid get killed accidentally, as well as multiple deaths with honor of characters, and blasting of people to ashes.

The series takes place between 2199 and 2204, too short a time for there to be a grown Stasha on the ship, but explain this away by saying she is half alien and aged to an adult in just one year.

Well planets can't warp through space and the rest of the science fiction is fantasy more than science, so okay.

But still, the fleets manage to rebuild in mere yearlong time spans, including as vast type 2 civilization like the Gamalans or the Bolars, and it is nothing for them to rebuild millions of ships, only to have Yamato destroy them all and reset it again.

The goddess imagery repeats a lot as there are three types of this, all of them fair haired, and all possessing powers which would have been used to prevent the series from even happening.

The reset button angle was often ripped off in Macross, Robotech, and Star Trek.

Macross handled the decimated Earth angle a little better though.

Still this is kind of where it all began. Shows like that would have never been made it it weren't for Space Battleship Yamato.

Review by Adam Browne