Still Stronger Than Strong: 'Gigantor' on DVD

| Print Post This | Like (0) | Comments (0)

EVEN IN BLACK and white, Jimmy Sparks must have seemed like the coolest kid in the 1960s. He's 12 and doesn't go to school, but he does drive a car, carry a gun and sometimes fly a jet fighter. Oh, and he controls this 50-foot flying robot his dad built.

Yes, it's "Gigantor," the mid-'60s import cartoon (sorry, "anime") from Japan whose 52 episodes sometimes beat Walter Cronkite in the ratings and whose first 26 episodes have been digitally transferred from the original 16mm film for "Gigantor: The Collection Vol. 1" (E1 Entertainment, $39.98). It's a strange mix: There's a lot of humor, but the plots, usually involving some would-be conqueror and a lot of onscreen shooting deaths, are deadly serious. (Speaking of serious, you can't hit pause during an episode.)

As a spry Fred Ladd relates in the commentary, in producing the U.S. version, he kiddified the character names so that Jimmy's mentor was Bob Brilliant and his secret-agent friend became Dick Strong. Amazingly, only four U.S. actors handled all the voices, and they'll sound very familiar to fans of "Speed Racer" and other imported '60s shows.

Kiddie camp aspects aside, the show holds up fairly well, as the series' comic-book roots made it easy to plot muti-episode story arcs. And it's hard to overstate the timeless appeal of a kid with a big robot: 1999's "The Iron Giant" owes a lot to Gigantor. What's noteworthy, though, is the fact premise that Gigantor isn't a hero, but a neutral piece of technology — he obeys whoever holds his control device. In that light, it's not too surprising to learn from Ladd that the characters' artist-creator lost family at Hiroshima.

If you just want timely campy satire, though, check out the scene in which Captain Spider demands a scientist build him one "weapon of mass destruction" because "all I want is to wipe out an army base here and there so I can take over the world."

Written by Express contributor Paul Stelter
Photo courtesy Foundry Communications