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Rating: 
Summary: Good Show, Bad Layout
Review: "Kaguta Ninja Tai Gatchaman" ("Science Ninja Team Gatchaman") is an anime series that debuted in Japan in 1972. It was about a team of 5 kids (4 teenagers and a preteen) that fought the evil Galactor organization, which was bent on world conquest. Sandy Frank brought the series over to the U.S. in 1978. Due to Standards and Practices restrictions at the time, a lot of violence had to be cut before the series could be dubbed into English. To fill in the time and gaps left in the story, new footage was animated of an American-made character, 7-Zark-7, a robot (which looked a lot like R2D2 to capitalize on the "Star Wars" craze at the time) that watched over the team from Center Neptune (an underwater base; don't ask), and his robotic canine companion, 1-Rover-1. Zark's job was, through voice-overs, to assure the audience that nobody died, or, if a plane got blown up, a robot was at the controls. Oddly, for a character that was created to censor things, Zark had a lot of sezual conversations with Susan, his robotic love interest on Pluto, over space radio. The fact that Susan sounds like a phone sex operator, and that Zark's antennae spring to full erection when she talks to him, makes this even more hilarious. Whereas Gatchaman was entirely Earth-based, BotP often had the kids going to another planet that looked exactly like Earth. I think you can see where this is going. In addition, the kids got name changes - even those that already had English names! Ken, Joe, Jun, Jimpei, and Ryu became Mark (as in Hammill), Jason, Princess (as in Leia), Keyop (WTF?), and Tiny Harper. The voice casting wasn't that great. Casey Kasem (Mark) sounded nothing like a teenager. In total, 85 of the 105 episodes got "the BotP treatment" (though not exactly the first 85 episodes). Personally, I think that this dub is so bad, it's unintentionally funny. Later, Turner did their own dub of Gatchaman, called "G-Force". The voices were better, more violence was retained, and there was no Zark. However, the characters were renamed again. This time, the names were extremely stupid: Ace Goodheart, Dirk Daring, Agatha Jun (Aggie to her friends; the only sensible name), PeeWee, and Hoot Owl (Hootie). Again, 85 of the 105 episodes were dubbed, but they weren't exactly the same 85 episodes that made it into BotP. One annoying (or hilarious, depending on the person) thing about "G-Force" is that they often added a repetitive, pulsing techno beat in the background. I crack up whenever it comes on, and it comes on multiple times per episode. It's so totally out of place, yet I enjoy it. Anyway, this DVD contains 2 episodes of "Battle of the Planets" as the main feature and the 2 corresponding episodes of "Kaguta Ninja Tai Gatchaman" and 1 episode of "G-Force" as special features. The BotP episodes have the original 2.0 mono track and a 5.1 remixed track. The Gatchaman episodes have the 2.0 mono track only and the option of English subtitles. The "G-Force" episode has the original English track as well as Spanish and Brazilian dialect Portuguese tracks. I think that Rhino was trying to offer a way for us to view all 3 versions of the show, but, by including only 1 episode of "G-Force", they totally messed it up. The format is 2, 2, and 1. So, Volume 1 contains Gatchaman and BotP episodes 1 & 2 and "G-Force" episode 1, Volume 2 contains Gatchaman and BotP episodes 3 & 4 and "G-Force" episode 2, etc. It makes no sense. We didn't need the Spanish and Portuguese tracks. This is America! They should have put those tracks on the foreign DVD releases. Without those extra tracks, there would be enough room for a second "G-Force" episode, and that would keep the right episodes paired together. Overall, I recommend this disc and the others in the series. For those of you that have never seen "Battle of the Planets", this will give you an idea of the censorship on American television in the late 1970s. For those of you that are buying this to relive your childhood, be warned: your love of "Battle of the Planets" is probably based on nostalgia only; you might find the series to be completely retarded now.
Rating: 
Summary: About Bloody Time!!
Review: It has been about 20 years since I ran around with a Yo-Yo, pretending I was Princess. And I have seen many different Anime since then, and I'd say my tastes have matured. Expecting the worst, I watched this DVD, and I tell you, it is amazing what I had forgotten. 7-Zark-7 was from a different anime, Casey Kasem was the voice of Mark, the hero. Some of the characters were annoying, but it was great!! Death, smoking, violence, all that are missing from today's children's entertainment, since were worried about scarring them. I loved every minute of it, and felt some of the old thrill I had when I was a child. And to top it off, the DVD had the original Ninja Science Team, Gatchaman episodes. And another Gatchaman Series, I hadn't known about.
The only thing I didn't like, was these episodes focused too much on Mark, and that Volume 2 was released before volume 1. But, other than that, it is a great buy.
Rating:
Summary: Slight technical difficulty
Review: Lots of other reviews here do an excellent job covering the content of this DVD. I just wanted to mention that there is a slight technical problem with this DVD (and the rest of vols. 1-4). The English language track on the G-Force episode is virtually inaudible, which is a real disappointment and knocked the DVD down a star. I tried on two different players (Pioneer DV-626D and Playstation 2), and they both have the same trouble. I even wrote in to Rhino's technical support and they kindly exchanged the discs for me, but sadly, the replacement discs are the same way. I just wanted to put out the warning here. The rest of the disc is fine and has great content - it's just that one problematic audio track.
Rating:
Summary: Slight technical difficulty
Review: Lots of other reviews here do an excellent job covering the content of this DVD. I just wanted to mention that there is a slight technical problem with this DVD (and the rest of vols. 1-4). The English language track on the G-Force episode is virtually inaudible, which is a real disappointment and knocked the DVD down a star. I tried on two different players (Pioneer DV-626D and Playstation 2), and they both have the same trouble. I even wrote in to Rhino's technical support and they kindly exchanged the discs for me, but sadly, the replacement discs are the same way. I just wanted to put out the warning here. The rest of the disc is fine and has great content - it's just that one problematic audio track.
Rating:
Summary: So will the annoying kid get squashed? Tune in to find out!
Review: OK, I'll admit it -- when I picked up volume 2 of Battle of the Planets, I was hoping that the annoying brat in "The Space Mummy" suffered a less kind fate in "The Giant Mummy That Calls Storms".Seriously though, it wasn't an old-fashioned Godzilla-style stomping that I was looking for; I was looking forward to watching the sanitized U.S. versions of the show and then comparing those episodes to their corresponding stories in the original Japanese. (For the uninitiated, Battle of the Planets was a very loosely translated version of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman. The latter was an edgy, groundbreaking anime that didn't feature any cutesy robots.) Now that Rhinomation has gotten me watching Gatchaman again, I can't stop. I hope they won't confine themselves to releasing the 85-episode run of Battle of the Planets episodes; after all, they don't cover the entire run of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, which ran 105 episodes. Can you imagine if a publisher decided to print only 85 pages of a 105-page book? And in the missing 20 pages were some of the best parts of the story as well as the ending? I'm very much hoping that Rhinomation doesn't force us to ask those questions. Come on fans, don't settle for anything less than the whole series! There are 105 episodes to be seen so tell Rhino (or its parent company, Time Life Warner) that you want to see them all!
Rating:
Summary: Early Japanese Anime
Review: The second volume of Battle of The Planets, a classic Japanese cartoon that appeared on American television in the late 70's and early 80's. The G-Force is five teenagers who don bird costumes and fight evil. There major weapon is the ability to join together and form a fiery Phoenix. The cartoon has some cool animation and storylines, but the fact they only put two episodes per DVD is fairly weak.
Rating: 
Summary: A must for all anime fans
Review: This DVD contains two original broadcasted episodes of Battle of the Planets, the original Japanese version of two episodes as Science Ninja Team Gatchaman and one episode of G-Force in three languages. My review will go threw each feature. Battle of the Planets: Episode 3
Content: B+
Animation: B
Music: B
English Script: B
Action Scenes: B+ When 7-Zark-7 discovers a new planet, he discovers a numerous amount of plane crashes on his new planet, Zarcadia. He sends out G-Force to find out the problem. After Mark meets up with Dr. Sweet and his nephew Buddy, Mark discovers a giant mummy is causing all the plane crashes. Later, Dr. Sweet's brother returns disguised as Zoltar, head of Spectra. Zoltar wants Dr. Sweets anti-pluton, but Mark wont let him have it. And the mummy attacking the plane station is a perfect chance to try out the anti-pluton.
Edits: Sweet's brother's plane crash scene, gun pointed at Buddy's head, scenes of mummy crushes planes edited down. Battle of the Planets: Episode 4
Content: A-
Animation: B+
Music: B
English Script: C+
Action Sequences: B+ When Dr. Harlem is killed by a giant centipede made by Zoltar, his daughter, Debbie, wants to seek revenge. So Mark brings Debbie along on the mission to destroy the centipede.
Edits: Debbie put in bed scene edited out, Debbie does NOT press the button in the end. Gatchaman: Episode 3
Content: A-
Music: B
Japanese Script: B+
Action Sequences: B+ Same plot as episode three with a few name changes. The Japanese version has more zing to it and the screaming from all the people at the airport when the mummy attacks is almost dead on. Gatchaman: Episode 4
Content: A-
Music: B
Japanese Script: A-
Action Sequences: B+ The voices really sound great in this episode. And give a few hints that Ken might have a girlfriend. G-Force: Episode 102
Content: A-
Animation: A-
Music: B+
English Script: B+
Spanish Script: B
Portugese Script: B+
Action Sequences: A- After the G-Force gets out of another daring escape, they come head to head with one of Galactor's henchmen. And uncover a secret at the bottom of the ocean. Overall, a good disc that is just as great as the last. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: what can I say
Review: This is one of my favorite tv series from the 70's and 80's. I was so happy to hear this was finally coming out. The only thing i was disappointed with was there's only six of these and there's not my on the way of dvd features. But the eposodes themselves make up for the lack of extras. give it a look.
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