Star Blazers is my favorite space opera

Star Blazers first premiered on American television sets back in 1979. It is an epic, highly sophisticated production that excells on all levels: story, animation, voice acting and music.

It was originally released in Japan in the early 1970s as Space Cruiser Yamato. I have read several different online sources which claim Star Wars creator George Lucas viewed Yamato before filming Star Wars.

The thing that makes Star Blazers stand out the most is that its story takes place (in a 24-esque way) over the course of 26 half-hour episodes--which I can watch again and again. It never gets boring.

The Voice Cast of Star Blazers is exceptional, as the voice actors were composed primarily of acting students who were looking for work while they were finishing up school. For years, their identities remained a mystery to Star Blazers fans due to the fact the students were non-union, and couldn't allow themselves to be identified. Watch as Star Blazers' credits roll, there isn't one single voice credit given. As time has gone by, however, the voice actors have come forward and their identities are now known to Star Blazers fans everywhere. The principle voice cast is as follows:


Eddie Allen as.........Gamilon Leader Desslok
Ken Meseroll as........Derek Wildstar
Amy Howard Wilson as...Nova Forrester
Tom Tweedy as..........Mark Venture
Lydia Leeds as.........Queen Starsha
and
Gordon Ramsey as.......Captain Abraham Avatar


The Story

It is the year 2199. Earth has been under attack by a mysterious planet from outside of the Milky Way Galaxy, Gamilon. The Gamilon's planet is dying and they are seeking a new home to inhabit and have settled on earth. They have been bombarding earth with radioactive bombs to make it livable to their bio-chemistry; of course, the radiation is going to kill all life on earth so the entire population has fled to underground cities.

In 2199, Earth has reached out into space, technology-wise, but has only colonized and established bases within the solar system. "We" have not actually moved outside of the solar system or have developed interstellar flight. Naturally, the Gamilons have, seeing as their home world is located outside the Milky Way Galaxy in the Large Magellanic Cloud, and, Earth's defenses are no match for them. The Earth Defense Fleet (think United Nations) has made a last stand at the planet Pluto. As the battle rages, an unknown craft flies through the battle, continues on for millions of miles, and crashes on the planet Mars. Two young soldiers stationed on Mars, Derick Wildstar and Mark Venture, rush out to investigate the crash. They find a beautiful young woman who has died in the crash, with a message player in her hand. The message is from Queen Starsha of Iscandar. She knows about the Gamilons and wants to help Earth. She offers them the technology to make the journey out of the Milky Way Galaxy to her home world (and advanced weapons technology as well) located in the same system as Gamilon. There she will give them a device that will reverse the damage the Gamilon's radioactive bombing has caused to Earth, which only has about a year left before the damage is irreversible.

The EDF realizes they have to trust Queen Starsha at her word, as they have no other options, and quickly modify an ancient (for the time setting) World War II battleship, the Yamato, with Starsha's plans. They rename the ship the Argo, assemble a crew of the finest young military personnel on Earth (called the "Star Force", led by Captain Abraham Avatar) and set off from Earth to make the trip to Iscandar, having to go through deep, uncharted space to get there--with a very dangerous enemy lurking everywhere.

Will they make it in time? Is Queen Starsha on the level? Will they all make it back alive? To find out the answers to these questions, you will have to watch and see for yourself!

The Dvds

Star Blazers is 26 episodes contained on six discs.

The total run time is 598 minutes.

The special features are sparse, if any at all, for the first couple of discs--Disc 1 does not even have a main menu! However this gets much better as the discs go along and you wind up with a very nice interactive main menu and quite a few features: detailed sketches of the Star Force and Gamilon main characters, a virtual tour of the Argo, an interactive map of the trip to Iscandar, one deleted scene, and a trailer for the next sequential disc.

To Sum Up

I recommend Star Blazers to everyone. 5 out of 5