0:38 Part 1: Yuusha Raideen in Context
3:17 Part 2: Structure and Style
19:38 Part 3: Tragedy and Comedy
42:48 Part 4: Duty and Obligation
52:57 Part 5: Confrontation
1:04:56 Part 6: What Followed Yuusha Raideen
1:10:21 References and Acknowledgements

Before Gurren Lagann, before Gundam, before Voltron, there was Yoshiyuki Tomino and Tagao Nagahama's Yuusha Raideen.

Airing in 1975, Yuusha Raideen was the first super robot show not affiliated with Dynamic Productions, and was one of the earliest anime not based upon a previously existing intellectual property. The show exhibits a strong tension between the sponsors' wish to portray the robots as cool and the toys as desirable and the writers' desperate and flawed efforts to communicate that maybe the status quo the giant robot was defending wasn't necessarily good. The outcome is frequently facile, but also fantastical and bizarre.

Many elements found in later and better known (and better produced) works in the super robot genre can be recognized here, making Yuusha Raideen very formative despite it's obscurity.

This video is an exploration and analysis of Yuusha Raideen through the first story arc (up through episode 27).

This is the second release of this video. This version features a restructured and (in my opinion) much tighter and better integrated part 2.

_____

Yuusha Raideen is currently not available for purchase or viewing in English, but several other shows featured in this video are. These include: Mobile Suit Gundam, Ideon, and soon Voltes V.
Please support official releases.

свернуть