Arthur Rankin, Jr. (1924-2014)

I know it has been a few days already since his passing.  Still, of all the losses this last week, the loss of Arthur Rankin, Jr. (1924-2014) is noteworthy to me.  I felt compelled to express a debt of gratitude to all of his wonderful work along with frequent partner Jules Bass as part of Rankin/Bass Productions founded in 1960 and with the understanding many creative minds were involved like Romeo Muller.

Rankin, Jr. was responsible for endless nights of fond childhood memories during those seemingly endless cold winter months.  Thanks to him my brother and I often plopped ourselves down in front of a television in Underoos or Feet Pajamas to enjoy the annual holiday repeats around Thanksgiving and Christmas.  There was a whole host of holiday specials and without DVR or VCR or DVD or whatever, if you blinked, if you fell asleep and missed the night, if you didn't get the pocket-sized TV Guide, you were screwed for the year. It was done. It was over.  Bye bye. You missed out pal. In fact, this led to much taunting at the bus stop.  "What do you mean you missed The Year Without A Santa Claus? It was on last night and you missed it? How the heck did you miss it?" Okay, easy does it neighborhood friends. I missed it.




Without those wondrous specials I wouldn't have had those memories with my brother.  There was an endless run of fun provided by Rankin, Jr. in the form of Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964), The Little Drummer Boy (1968), Frosty The Snowman (1969), Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town (1970) and The Year Without A Santa Claus (1974).  These were perhaps our favorites of which we never tired and sometimes missed forcing us to writhe in pain with the knowledge we must wait a full year for another shot at the brass ring.  Heat Miser and Cold Miser received much love from us as kids and Rudolph was infinitely quotable and can still be recited to this day. To a lesser extent we tolerated Rudolf's Shiny New Year (1976), which looking back feels a bit like the equivalent of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999). It just never quite measured up, but it was probably better than Episode I. But who didn't love the characters from Rankin's world. Winter Warlock. Yukon Cornelius. Clarice. Hermie. Bumbles (they bounce ya know). The Land of Misfit Toys like Charlie-In-The-Box. And who didn't love to just say the word Burgomeister Meisterburger! It was like saying Salsa.





For a time, too, Rankin, Jr. collaborated in conjunction with Toho Studios in Japan, home of Godzilla, and Eiji Tsuburaya's Tsuburaya Productions.



King Kong Escapes (1968) was the massive fruit of those labors and remains a classic to this day. The film is headed to Blu-Ray this year.




Rankin, Jr. worked with Tsuburaya on the wonderful 1970s gem The Last Dinosaur (1977).  Other films include The Bermuda Depths (1977), of which I hope to review here at Musings Of A Sci-Fi Fanatic in the future, The Ivory Ape (1980) and The Bushido Blade (1981) starring the late, great Toshiro Mifune as well as Sonny Chiba, James Earl Jones and the late Richard Boone, who starred in The Last Dinosaur.  The Ivory Ape features Jack Palance and remains extremely elusive to this day. It's made in the spirit of The Last Dinosaur and this Rankin, Jr. fan is still waiting for a release.




He also delighted animation fans with a version of The Hobbit (1977) and The Return Of The King (1980).  Another notable film was The Last Unicorn (1982), in yet another collaboration with a Japanese group called Topcraft Studios. Topcraft was involved in Barbapapa (1974-1975), Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind (1984) and even contributed to Tatsunoko's Gatchaman (1972-1974) currently under consideration here at the blog.





So, it is with a heavy heart we bid farewell to one of the great American talents blessed with a rich, adventurous imagination.  I would be remiss not to pay tribute.  So given the profound influence upon my childhood, especially with the epic and unforgettable Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer and its every single frame, I am sorry to see him go.

Battle Of The Planets Ep4: The Space Serpent

"Big 10!"

-Mark-

Our dear team, G-Force, faces off against serpent-like mecha, which is actually more like a centipede-like mech in Battle Of The Planets, Episode 4, The Space Serpent.






Earth is in jeopardy as Spectra zeroes in on the oil refineries of our resource-rich planet.  The mech steals valuable crude everywhere with two long metallic tentacles.

Zoltar rejoices as Spectra wreaks havoc across the globe creating seismic disturbances. Chief Anderson knows something is amiss and requests Mark meet with Dr. Harlan, a seismologist, to confirm the culprit as Spectra.

Old friend Dr. Harlan congratulates Mark as the leader of G-Force. Mark is humble in his response.  "Officially yes, but we're a team really. United, but each with his own special skills."



Upon visiting Harlan an earthquake strikes.  Mark and Harlan tumble down a crevasse.  Mark transmutes and makes every effort to hang onto to Harlan but his grip slips and he loses his old friend forever but survives himself.

The scene cuts to Mark visiting Harlan's grave as a civilian.  How rare it is to see a figure die in a children's cartoon and then follow up with a scene at an actual cemetery where Mark expresses genuine remorse over the loss of a friend.




In most programs of the period, even The A-Team, cartoon violence in the 1970s and 1980s often resulted in men walking away.

Here, Mark finds himself in a world very much under the microscope of a potential alien apocalypse. Losing those around him he loves is a reality. Harlan was like a father figure to him and now he is gone.




At the grave site Mark is attacked by Harlan's daughter, Debbie, and must convince her he tried to save her father.  He feels guilt but knows, despite possessing extraordinary powers, he's still human.  He also feels pain attacked by a loved one of someone he cared for too.  Mark is sympathetic and Debbie crumbles in an emotional heap on Mark's shoulder and he carriers her away.

Later, Mark seeks to find the space serpent and while flying his Cessna utilizes one of its in-built gadgets, an infrared scanner.

The mech fires missiles at Mark forcing him to transmute into the G-1 Summit Jet.





Battle Of The Planets demonstrates great psychological depth, unusual for a kid's cartoon, as Mark is tortured by the voice of his friend Harlan pleading for help followed by the voice of his daughter blaming him. Mark bears the weight of other's pain on his shoulders and still feels responsible for an event that was beyond his control or at least sealed by the hand of a fate beyond his powers. He is haunted by the ghost of his friend here.

Like the classic Toho films centered on Godzilla and other famous Toho kaiju pictures, the military is unable to halt the metallic monstrosity. Ground and air forces are annihilated. The hapless military is essentially useless. Only G-Force bears any chance against such a treacherous menace.




Zoltar demands his henchman attack.  In this particular entry even his henchman is a robot.

Mark rejoins the rest of his team. Surprisingly, even civilian Debbie is along for the ride on The Phoenix. Really? I never could understand that one. With such dangerous missions it always seemed a little odd to see an innocent civilian on board with the G-Force team as they prepared to wage war against Spectra.

This is a job for the TBX nuclear missile.  Jason is ready to hit the button. Keyop warns they are too close.  Mark and Keyop literally struggle to pull Jason away from the firing button.





In an interesting turn, and in an effort to offer Debbie closure, Mark tells Debbie that if she pushes the red button she will destroy the very creation that took the life of her father. He literally offers her a sense of revenge or relief.  Marks goads her, "your last chance for revenge."  But Debbie can't pull the trigger.  Mark retorts, "Good, revenge never solves anything."  Lesson learned. We get that tidy little morality play for the young ones.

That serves Jason just fine as he's more than happy to handle the revenge chores for the team destroying the mech.

Mark comforts Debbie and tells her, "Your father would be proud of you today."






In the kind of sweet moment that was not uncommon on Battle Of The Planets, Mark and the team return grave side with Debbie to pay their respects and conclude the episode with a touching and dramatic denouement.

The finale feels a little sudden given the short run time. Apparently, the viewer is led to believe that Mark handled the mission a little too personally. We never actually see or feel that given the lack of character development. So we're a little stunned when the moment comes whereby Mark offers to tender his resignation. Chief Anderson assures him that we all make mistakes and admittedly is too harsh on himself. We see a tear in Mark's eye grateful for the second chance. Besides the fact The Space Serpent never quite sells that moment, Battle Of The Planets was certainly filled with good faith efforts at generating real emotional depth. It was indeed surprising for any cartoon to do so particularly in the 1970s. But Tatsunoko and Sandy Frank, stateside, never failed to deliver those kinds of qualities.





Mark retains his G-Force wrist bracelet.  Mark forgives himself.  His burden is also eased by Debbie's forgiveness. "That eases my mind," Mark submits to Debbie. The team is pleased to embrace their team leader, including the sometimes combative Jason, proving this is indeed something of a family affair for G-Force. All is well that end's well for now.  Valuable lessons are learned all around.

7-Zark-7 enjoys an oil shower followed by a delightful call from Susan.



The Space Serpent acts primarily as a Mark vehicle.  The spotlight is undeniably on his character.  The rest of G-Force makes an essentially brief appearance.  It's also one of the least interesting episodes without the team's interplay. Further, it lacks some of Tatsunoko's jaw-dropping finest when it comes to animation, but it has its moments.  Given deadlines and other factors, this isn't the company's sharpest art work, yet even still a bad day for Tatsunoko is nevertheless an impressively good one.




For me, the dramatic high points surround Mark at the cemetery toward the mid-point of the episode and in the final minutes. It strikes a somber, elegiac and emotional tone for the character. These are always the best moments in Battle Of The Planets.

Further enhancing this view is commentary by Sarah Lindholm, ADV lead translator for the English dub of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman in 2005. Lindholm points to this very episode, The Space Serpent, or rather its Gatchaman counterpart. "The show has much more moral complexity than we normally give titles like that credit for. Ken and Joe [Mark and Jason in Battle Of The Planets] are making decisions all the time about who's going to live or die, and they're just kids!" (Newtype USA, May 2005, p.21).

Though sadly, writer Kevin Gifford of Newtype USA stated this aforementioned subtext and emotional depth was "largely ignored"  (p.21) for Battle Of The Planets. This entry is proof that simply isn't true or at least not in this particular example of which Lindholm was specifically referring in the article. Despite edits, this is a long held belief is something of a myth that just doesn't always stack up.

For the time being, the team has fought off the alien apocalypse and the group literally runs off into the sunset like the kids they are.

The Space Serpent. Writer: Jameson Brewer. Director: David E. Hanson.
Science Ninja Team Gatchaman title: Revenge On The Iron Beast Mechadegon.

Up next: Ghost Ship Of The Planet Mir.

Science Fiction Non-Fiction: Hofius And Khoury (Gatchaman)

"The characters were distinctive, having depth along with individual personal quirks.  This was a show where the characters were real; they had to have a responsibility for their actions because otherwise innocent people could pay a violent end for their consequences.  It was the show that broke the mold for anime and made it more mature and more exciting...."

 

-Jason Hofius and George Khoury, G-Force Animated: The Official Battle Of The Planets Guidebook (p.10)-

 

Gatchaman (1972-1974) was the real deal and though Battle Of The Planets (1978) was, for all intents and purposes stateside, a watered-down version of the Japanese original minus much of the more thrilling, graphic violence, surprising for a cartoon now more than forty years old, Battle Of The Planets still retained much of the emotional punch and depth.  It was the dramatic arcs and small touches to its characters that was never lost on kids.  The violence may have been reduced, but the overactive imaginations of children everywhere filled in all of the gaps.

40 years!  Can you believe it?