Space Explorers Captured/Escape From Demon Castle

I'm going to combine the commentary and analysis, for the most part.

Space Explorers Captured

Our heroes approach planet Arus, under attack by Zarkon.  Only, they're not our heroes.  They're the Vehicle Voltron Air Team.  Yeah, I said I wouldn't discuss the obvious changes, but this is different.  I remember from a few interviews with the World Events Productions staff that they were initially going to tie the two (or three) Voltrons together more tightly, but ultimately gave up early on and just did all Lion episodes, and then all Vehicle episodes.  That may have been because the Vehicle episodes got too complicated to realistically complete on time--I'll discuss my thoughts on that when we get to them (errant sun/lost asteroid belt/nuclon waste--WHY IS PLANET DRULE EXPLODING?!?!?!?!).

Anyway.  Scenes from later episodes, Dairugger, and the actually destruction of Earth all edited together to make our five space explorers approach Arus (where all the people are safe in their underground shelters!) and get captured by Yurak.  And his robots.

(I'll get this out of my system, honest).

Ah, the "danger approaching" music.  I'm pretty sure I hummed Voltron's background music until my early teens.  No wonder I didn't date until college.

Now, Galaxy Garrison.  Two Voltrons, woven together.  Until it got too hard.

Galaxy Garrison discusses the Voltron Force, and now Yurak's slave ship (did he switch from his Black Rooster of Death ship to the Skull Galley?  har har, I know.  Edits).  Every know the Voltron Force here.  And what they're there for.  I accepted that as a seven-year-old.  It seems a bit odd now.

They introduce Zarkon, Haggar, and the arena now. Whenever I hear Jack Angel (Zarkon) in any other 80s cartoon role, I laugh, because I can only think of Zarkon.  And Astrotrain.

This introduction of Zarkon isn't quite the mockery I remember.  He's far more bumbling as the series continues, but he seems pretty ruthless here.  And Yurak--NOT QUITE whipping and stabbing slaves.  The slaves are driven into the arena, and, um, real bad hurt by the Blue Robeast.  Then Zarkon calls for the Space Explorers, who discuss escape plans.  And their Zarkonian slave tattoos.

Pidge jumps abou 30 feet to a window, looks down at the Robeast eating bone soup.  "Put the bones in a bone-bag."  They discuss ways to escape, and Lance is a jerk to everyone.

Zarkon sure is set on having them fight the Robeast, like NOW.  And then, guards come to check on them, see they're sleeping, and . . . move on?  Let them rest, so they fight better?  Um, the Doom gladiator gig is a lot more easy-going than some outfits I've been in!!

Of course, they're not asleep, their sneaking.  Sneaking their way out the window, to take the Doom vulture express.  It is nice of Castle Doom facilities management to leave rocks and ropes just hanging around the dungeon. They bend the bars, get out, and Hunk is afraid of heights.  Well, him and Silverbolt (leader of the Arielbots).  Was this a weird 80s character-flaw thing?

And, they catch vultures and reach the ground.  Which is a pile of bones.  The most they explicitely say about being on a carpet of human/alien remains is Keith's "I sure hate to think what this place means."

They make it to the lightly guarded spaceport ("Daddy, why is that robot yawning?"  "Shaddup and get back under the house.  Why are you watching this trash!"
Robot guards attack them with throwing swords.  And then with slashin' swords.  But are no match for Galaxy Garrison hand-to-hand combat training.

They get to the bridge (?), or cockpit (?), or driver's seat of the Doom slave galley.  And it's apparently fusion powered.  And they intentionally ram Castle Doom.  Which Zarkon thinks is a bomb.  Well, he's starting to be bumbling.

Yurak takes off in the Assault Rooster of Doom (honestly, I kind of like these ship designs, but this thing has a comb!).

The Assault Rooster bombards the slave ship.  They start to tumble off course before returning fire, to no avail. They plummet through a space-thunderstorm, and get blown away by a lightning bolt.  The burning ship falls toward a planet until a tunnel of light stops their fall.  The light is coming from a winged lion statue (I've wanted a statue like that sucker in front of my house ever since.  Actual black lion inside it is optional).

Now Keith tells us Voltron's origins--after all Voltron and Arus are the reason they're out there.  Which is kinda convenient, right?  They escaped right back to the planet they were captured from?

And Haggar is responsible for Voltron being disassembled into five lions.  When was this?  Just recenty?  Because twenty minutes ago these five guys just watched Zarkon invading Arus.  Was that the endgame after Haggar disabled voltron?  Keith's narrative seems to imply it was long in the past, though.

And now, for something completely different (yet the same).

Escape from Demon Castle

Here we start right off with the legend of Golion.  And it's pretty undeniably ancient.  It was the goddess of the universe, not Haggar/Honerva who disassembled him and dropped him on Altea (the narrator even says "several thousan years have passed"). 

A quick word about the music--when I first got this series in 2008, I watched it with one of my anime friends who's too young to have either seen the original Voltron run or the one on Cartoon Network.  And she refused to let me fast forward through the openings of any episode because she liked dancing to the music.  And I kinda feel the same way.  One of the reasons I like the late 70s/early 80s anime is the funk soundtrack.  For every series (the Ideon is another show with a danceable score).

This episode was probably th most radically changed for Voltron, structurally speaking.  After we get Golion's origin, we go right to Sadak on the great Slave Galley.  And he's torturing slaves.  Damn, hasn't even gotten them to Galra to put them to work, and he's beating them.  Yeah, the Galra folks are much more ruthless than their Doom counterparts.

I really like this introduction of Daibazaal.  Here's the classic bored despot--I've conquered everything worth conquering.  Isn't there anything to amuse me?  Something about this scene makes me think of a Chinese folktatle.  "Little did he know that the despot would get his wish."  Yeah, Golion'll keep him all kinds of interested.

We now meet the future Golion pilots.  I also prefer that they're nobodies here.  Just some more slaves (who've already fought in the gladiatorial arena) mouldering in the dungeons.  I also like that they've been here for a while.  The Voltron timeline--they get there, get assigned to a room, and break out immediately--is too rushed for my clearly advanced and adult tastes.

The fight with the deathblack beastman is awesomely brutal.  The dismembered slaves, lying in their own blood, cursing Galra with their dying breaths . . .  Oh, yeah, those are willies on your spine!

Now, through flashbacks, we find out how the five got to Galra--oh, that was EARTH in the throes of a nuclear war?  Complete with still images of people being irradiated.  That music playing behind this scene is haunting in every moment in which it appears.

Our Space Explorers were on some "school trip" in a spaceship when Earth decided to annihilate itself.  I do kind of like how, y'know, Earth was clearly on the brink beforehand, but here are some schoolkids (?) going about their space business when war breaks out.  That's how it goes--I remember reading an interview with the death metal band Benediction, who were playing a concert in Yugoslavia when the country decided to fragment.  They were playing in an open-air venue and could see explosions from artillery in the night.  That's the kind of thing this makes me think of.

Still the same weirdness--rocks and rope in their dungeon room, allowing them to escape.  Although, since not everyone on the planet knows who they are and wants them in the arena immediately, the guards checking on them while they pretend to sleep makes a little more sense.

Yup, they get onto the exterior of the castle, and Seidou is still afraid of heights.  So weird.  They again take the vulture express to the Pit of Skulls.  And Seidow shows his noble side, desiring vengeance on Daibazaal for all the massacred slaves.  Kurogane is just as much a jerk as Lance was.  Maybe more.

And, the sprint to the spaceport--which Kogane saw while he was on work detail.  Just a throw away line, but it adds to the sense that they've been there for a while.

Again with the throwing swords.  And the inexplicably apt fighting.  I will admit, the sound editing for this series is weird for Toei (were they breaking in a new editor?) but I still love the weird old mecha anime sound effects.

This time, they seem to crash into the castle accidentally.  And instead of "We've been hit by a bomb!!" Daibazaal just chews some scenery.

A word about the Galrans--are all the different looking people just different ethnicities?  Like you've got the purple ones like Sadak and Daibazaal (and eventually Sincline), some of whom have hair, and then you've got the dark grey or black ones like the guards and the arena spectators.  And cybernetics.  Like Sadak and his lieutenant.  Are those implants that light up all Tron-like on Sadak's uniform?  And what's with his eye?!  And in a later episode, I seem to remember a weapons port or something in Sadak's lieutenant's chest.

Same space battle, mostly one-sided, and then the slave galley is eased down on a gentle glide over a mysterious planet, with a mysterious castle, with two mysterious people.  I wonder which was more effective, the mystery, or the urge American kids felt to stick around just to see what this Voltron guy was all about?

I couldn't honestly tell you, because I first saw the middle of episode 4--I didn't really know the opening story until reruns.  Oh, the horrors!

That's it for today!