Space Battleship Yamato: The New Voyage (1979) surely did what producers wished: It put the Yamato series back on track, capable of supporting more stories, something the story-ending film before it, Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato, could not support. This was what both fans and writer/producer Yoshinobu Nishizaki wanted – the story of Future Earth’s grand, metaphorical Battleship Yamato continuing on endlessly. And here we don’t even see the introduction of another random warring alien race. Instead, they simply continue on with the Black Nebula Empire (the BNE), the conclusion last time having been inconclusive…or nebulous. The standard series plot shall follow: Battleship Yamato will set on a trek across the stars to dredge up a long-shot victory against the latest warlords, but only with the help of the latest in a long line of blonde, androgynous nymph chicks.
I’m surprised that, this far into the series, the filmmakers’ storytelling skills haven’t improved significantly. We’re still seeing the same issues that plagued Space Battleship Yamato: The Movie, which were forgivable then since it was a theatrical reedit of a TV show. The signs of patching are still evident – on-screen titles for every new character, setting or object, and a narrator to over-explain (and even recap) the plot when the screenwriters feel lazy. All in all, Be Forever Yamato rather falls victim to the worst instincts of the Yamato franchise.
The BNE accomplishes its assault on Earth in the most classic way possible – as a War of the Worlds homage. Seriously, their technology is the perfect anime equivalent to George Pal’s 1953 spectacle. The first half hour or so (these Yamato movies are growing increasingly bloated and long…The New Voyage aside) pretty much encapsulates the H.G. Wells tale: a steady landing of mysterious crafts, the short-lived and fruitless military engagement, cities in flames.
I’ve said my peace about how boring I find Yamato’s battle scenes, meaning about 50% of this movie shall pass over with little commentary. With the story growing tired through retelling, there is no longer any substantial metaphorical or emotional investment in these sequences, leaving little to engage the uninspired viewer. Really, Be Forever depicts the sci-fi silliness inherent in the franchise sans the intelligence of former entries…The New Voyage aside.
Our main characters, other than the explosions, remain Susumu Kodai and his fiancé Yuki Mori. They endure a desperate reunion in the midst of BNE-based horror. Susumu Kodai’s brother, Mamoru Kodai, is also there, having been awkwardly reinserted into the plot in The New Voyage (that whole movie was just a film-long justification for this entry). Following his central personality trait, Mamoru’s first action in Be Forever is to…well, die. He’ll remain this way for the remainder of Be Forever, at least, meaning I can go back to calling Susumu Kodai simply Kodai, as is my wont.
There is one solution to the BNE menace. Say it with me, everybody: YAMATO! Yeah, the ship’s victory is so self-assured, there’s never even any real question now. Kodai and Yuki assemble their usual cast for the trek to go discover Yamato. Presumably, it’s now hidden away, which spits directly in the face of continuity The New Voyage established – this series has a problem in that arena. (Of course, had Yamato simply been on Earth from the start, this whole BNE thing would’ve been a complete non-issue.) There’s only one snag: In their secret evacuation of Earth, Yuki gets left behind in BNE clutches, pried straight out of Kodai’s hands. Rivulets of Niagara tears careen down everybody’s faces, somehow even the evil BNE baddies. Oh man, weeping in anime, man!
The remaining Yamato crew, now all male and thus farting freely, sails out to the asteroid belts, where Yamato is camouflaged as an asteroid – in “homage” to the defeated White Comet Empire. Actually, the thing’s so well-hidden, Kodai et al don’t even notice it once they’re already on the bridge. It’s only until the non-diagetic soundtrack intones the familiar “Yamato theme” that they’re clued in.
(Oh right, and the narrator fills us in on all the latest deus ex machina gods they’ve placed in their Yamato machine. These are the requisite new superweapons per entry, which will be conveniently forgotten about until the finale – and then presumably just forgotten about entirely come the next sequel.)
Yamato now sailing along, first mate Sanada (sort of the Spock of this franchise) announces two things – One, their new captain is a guy who’s suddenly here, named Yamanami. He is an older man, and a complete non-entity – we all know Kodai is the central figure, who’s really been captaining the Yamato – Why don’t they just acknowledge this in-film?
Two, here’s Yuki’s replacement. Replacement, in that this new character shall be doing Yuki’s Uhura job, and also in that she’ll be the same object of sick sexual desire amongst both the crew and audience. It’s Sanada’s 12-year-old daughter Sasha (um…uh oh), who is apparently even more desirable than Yuki, seeing as she’s even younger, plainer and ditzier. That the crew greets her with instant erections is deeply disturbing to me, as it is too when you realize just how young Sailor Moon is supposed to be. In U.S. terms, it’s the whole Hannah Montana thing. Oh…but it gets worse! Much worse!
Sasha’s Kodai’s niece! (Sanada’s just her adoptive dada.) And her real name is Mio now. Flashbacks to The New Voyage reveal how brother Mamoru sired her but one year ago. So just how in the name of Goku is she a tween?! Well, her mama was Iscandinavian (see The Movie, and the usual convoluted back stories of all space operas), meaning she ages real fast-like. Oh, so it’s OK then that everybody wants to fornicate with a one-year-old! Even Kodai! All this despite Mio’s (or Sasha’s) habit of rightly calling him “Uncle.” But you see, she looks just like Yuki – really because this series can only draw one type of female – only more underage, and therefore somehow sexier. And they proceed to treat this as a romantic subplot! Uncle and niece! Because his fiancé’s been gone for one day! (Again, Yamato nicely predicts Star Wars, this time in how icky Jedi will render Empire, re: incest. God, what is with space operas!)
But let us not fret about Yuki, because she has a disgusting romantic subplot all her own. And this one is inter-species! That is, I choose to be sickened that a humanoid, BNE alien (named…let me check…Alphon) wants to make it with her. Of course, she’s blonde, rail thin, and looks like a schoolboy – every Japanese man’s fantasy! Their dialogues largely concern interplanetary espionage, but I choose to ignore the mopey, melodramatic, pre-Twilight turn all this takes.
But wait, what’s Yamato’s goal in this one? Well, the BNE call from Earth with a convenient plot message. They’ve installed a “hyperon” neutron bomb, looking more like London’s Gherkin than anything else, which will destroy all Earth’s life if’n any rescue effort is attempted. It’s MAD, basically, the whole Cold War thing. For us post-USSR types, it’s the Doomsday Device from Dr. Strangelove. So Yamato will not be returning to Earth, but rather traveling to the Black Nebula itself, on the hopes they have the triggering mechanism. So once again, in order to promote peace, Yamato shall be singlehandedly eradicating an entire planet.
Off we go to the Black Nebula, a luminous nebula (I almost wrote “nebulous luminal”). Some easily decisive battles (in Yamato’s favor) take place along the way. So that’s 8 minutes killed per battle. They are not worth noting. We also get one of two songs sung in dirge-like tones, expositing the whole plot so far. So that’s 8 minutes killed per song. These songs are especially useful to the filmmakers, since it allows them an astounding animation rate of one image per half minute! Compare that to Disney’s twenty-four drawings per second. That’s budget conscious, and it also creates an old sci-fi cartoon as long as The Dark Knight.
Finally the Yamato makes its way through some sort of inky, dark “warp hole” in the nebula, due to a 1980s misunderstanding of what dark matter is. Warp imagery = 2001 rip-off. More interestingly, this “hole” is so powerful, it even affects the film’s aspect ratio! Yup, we go from 1:1.85 to 1:2.35 – that is, it’s now widescreen, which looks really dinky now that my screen’s got both vertical and horizontal bars on it.
Post-warp, what whole new can of wormholes have we found? Why, Earth! It even has the same landmarks every disaster movie destroys (pyramids, Statue of Liberty), no matter how that works with continuity. Obviously, this is now the future (2402 A.D.) and no longer the present (2202 A.D.). This is the one interesting new idea in Be Forever…unless you count an uncle romancing his toddler niece.
Kodai leads a scouting party, along with Sanada, the series’ iconic robot which I’ve never mentioned, and the aforementioned toddler niece, Mio (er, Sasha). The “Earthlings” they meet lead them to a central throne room to greet the great and stupidly-named Lord Scaldarf (a weird modification of “hot dog,” I guess). He provides a potted history of Earth’s fate – Ah, “fate,” what an easy word to gain unearned profundity points from philosophically-minded sci-fi fans who never actually read philosophy. Well, here’s Earth’s “fate”: After 200 years under BNE control, the neutron bomb was never used…and in the year 2402 (that is, now), Yamato will be destroyed.
“Ah, screw it,” Kodai says (but in a more high-minded, fate-conscious way), “let’s just f#&% off and go violate the prime directive someplace else.” Half the Yamato’s crew wants to follow Kodai; the other half agree with Captain Yamanami, eager to be blind submissives to “fate” like good Japanese. And Sasha wants to stay here on Maybe Future Earth, for insane reasons which are phrased in a very sane way: “There is no room in your [Kodai’s] heart. You’re my uncle.” You mean she just realized how WRONG this is?! It’s “melodrama,” in one way or another, and in stories like these, strong emotions can only lead to tragedy, no matter how stupidly self-enforced it is. Thus, Kodai abandons Sasha.
Left alone, Sasha sees her mother’s Virgin Guadalupe image in the sky speaking with a blah blah blah portentousness about her duty and fate and wuzza wuzza Star Wars stole this idea for its Force ghosts and woozle wuzzle tears. Yeah, “fate” is when you decide to stay some place for no reason. Suuuuure… (Of course, Momma did the exact same thing in The New Voyage.)
Back up on the Yamato – space battle! I think this is the seventh today, though I haven’t even been relating them. Apparently, the BNE enemies are using Logic Lasers, because suddenly certain Yamites have it all figured out: there’s no time travel in this franchise! Hence, that was not Earth of the future. Rather, the planet that is where the BNE home planet must be is actually the BNE home planet. Well zounds! And all it takes to figure this out is an unnamed minor character’s familiarity with Rodin – the French sculptor, that is, not the Japanese pterodactyl.
The Almighty and Generic Lord Scaldarf rather stupidly reveals his own hand moments later, removing his plastic “Mission: Impossible” mask and uncloaking the planet to reveal its true form: a spherical biomechanical ribcage with no surface to speak of. Illogical or no, the designs in this series are unique. And now Sasha conveniently radios from wherever on Planet Dezalium (titles having now revealed the keyboard smashing which named the BNE world). She knows the way to destroy the planet – A New Hope! That is, Yamato must sail through the single weak vent opening in order to destroy the planet core. In practice, though, it’s really more Jedi, meaning Yamato remains the leader in the great game of “Okay, what did George Lucas steal from this time?”
Sasha shall remain on Planet Deeznuts, in order to open things up for Yamato. And so in goes Yamato, discovering the planet core is a great, New Agey bit of nonsense called Crystal City (AKA Salt Lake). Kodai has control over the ridiculous Undulation Gun, ready to explode his third (or fourth) planet, only…he hesitates. See, he has an underage family member on this planet, whom he wishes to schtupp. Despite Sasha’s pleas, Kodai will not sacrifice her! Yeesh! Was the romantic thing really necessary for this sequence to play out?! Wouldn’t it be just as hard to sacrifice a loved one without the icky need for incestuous sexual yearning?
Well, the filmmakers write their way out of this one. Sasha faces off against Lord Scaldarf scant months before Luke and Darth did something very similar. And they both die. Now that the sexy toddler is a corpse, Kodai can only shriek dramatically, and fire off his Undulation Gun anyway…
The Yamato escapes, yet another world vanishing in its fiery wake. Yet again, the crew laments their annual genocide, when Sasha’s Force Ghost appears hovering over the whole galaxy. After having argued in favor of holocaust, she imparts to Yamato a hypocritical message of peace – gotta bow that movie out with a Message. Oh…kay then. So, Animaniacs, the Wheel o’ Morality sez that today’s Message is…man’s trust in man. And also: “Farewell Kodai, my handsome, young uncle.” Oh good gracious!
Yamato travels back to Earth – which is not freed yet, mind you, merely saved from the neutron bomb. (Considering the BNE’s goal was to exterminate all mankind to begin with, one must pause to question why they didn’t simply use the bomb in the first place.) We’re in the final stretch, the epilogue, meaning…meaning Lord of the Rings is as influenced by Yamato as Star Wars is, ‘cause all the expected resolution comes about in a Return of the King marathon of non-endings. Singing takes place over the imaginary re-re-reunion of Kodai and Yuki. I can only assume the occupying BNE forces are easily eradicated, all “Scouring of the Shire” like. (Yes, when reviewing anime sci-fi, one must break out any number of nerdy references.)
One can only ponder how Yuki will take the news of Sasha…
Four movies in, and with two seasons of television as well, I imagine there’s a good 48 hours of pure Yamato footage in existence at this point (1980). Sadly, originality is gone. Allegory and drama have been dropped. And Star Wars has instigated a rash of likeminded copycats, which Yamato cannot really stand apart from at this stage. We’re just retelling the same story now, with less value in it each time – yeah, your usual sequel problem. Perhaps someday I ought to examine the root of this phenomenon. For now, though, I can just hypothesize what happened with Yamato: inspiration was used up, and an available niche audience would more readily respond to warmed-over battle sequences than new and exciting ideas. Yamato got its start with an exciting and brave experiment. That experiment proved successful. Laurels could be rested upon now, and Be Forever Yamato is what that looks like.
Related posts:
• No. 1 Space Battleship Yamato: The Movie (1977)
• No. 2 Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato (1978)
• No. 3 Space Battleship Yamato: The New Voyage (1979)
• No. 5 Final Yamato (1983)
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