Figure King No. 35 - Robot Anime Hellscape - Nail it this time!!
In the spring of 1984, “Super High-Speed Galvion” began broadcasting, at the same time as Mamoru Nagano’s “Heavy Metal L-Gaim” and Studio Ammonite’s “Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross”, the young mecha designers behind these shows were gaining attention for their work, as robot anime was being broadcast on a channel somewhere everyday.
Early autumn, 1983. “Subspace Mission Srungle” continued broadcasting after the closure of the Clover toy company, but a new project would have to be outlined and finalised for the toy sponsor of the next program. I went in to deliver a presentation in my role as a designer while accompanying the sponsor, but we got nothing more than a chilly response as this was immediately after the closure of the major manufacturer.
However, a link had been forged with the plastic model company for “Super Dimension Century Orguss”, Arii Manufacturing, so things finally began to move forwards. President Arii, as if to have our unease about the prospective future abated, asserted strongly, “just as how the Zaku was a hit in Gundam, robots with the cable and armour motif will sell from now on! Truck Yarou model kits are doing well too. In other words, we need the real world detail of a raw and powerful exposed engine. Draw me a robot that crosses these two, then leave the rest up to me”. At this point, I was young and ignorant of the world, I learned that this kind of person was exactly what is said to be a “man”!
So on and so forth, I burned with a desire to create an exciting new design. In fact, the president showed up at the presentation alongside the co-sponsor for Orguss, the Imai Kagaku company. After the explanation of the general designs (illustrations 1, 2 and 3), the president, who had been silent with his arms folded, shouted brazenly, “Hey, Mr. Imai, this might work!”. Thus, it was there and then that Imai Kagaku agreed to be the sponsor!! LS Models, famous for their scale models, as well as Takatoku Toys, in which Orguss had dropped from its successor programming slot, joined and the project gained momentum, the four companies working together to develop a toy was like a dream.
As a result of this, we were able to complete something visually fantastic about the fight between a futuristic automobile transformation robot and the previous generation of military robots, but… Just as we had also decided on the program title “Super High-Speed Galvion” prior to broadcasting, an emergency call from the president was made. “We want changes to one of the robots we plan to make (illustration 4), something to this effect”. The picture that was shown was the design from “Heavy Metal L-Gaim” which would be starting at the same time! The president’s eyes were drawn to how they had the opening leg cover gimmick, so he asked to do that here.
Certainly, in spite of the great respect I had for his ability to discern what’s popular, I had the worst sense of competitiveness, and the idea that I came up with for a different gimmick didn’t get the ‘O.K’. Sooner or later, I guess he got fed up of the underhanded opposition and said bluntly, “can you not let go of your pride? Fine, I won’t say no anymore. Let’s make this!” (Illustration 5). Once again, I was looking at a “man”. Supposing the president did not make a decision at this time, I might have been foolish and young enough to say “hey, if that’s all you want, you can copy the design of the robot that sold well, then!”.
Even though they had already copied Gundam and Macross with their series of models in “The Anime-Image” line, Arii Manufacturing had not lost its creative spirit! That can I say without a doubt.
After several years, the same company released a plastic model of a deer that made deer droppings following the boom in popularity of a song about deer droppings by comedian Tamori from “Waratte ii tomo!”. When Mr. Toshihiro Hirano showed me the gimmick of the brown pellets coming out of that fawn’s butthole, I thought again of the president that day, “that is a man…”.
Illustration 1: “A concept of Galvion following the instruction to draw a transforming robot with ‘a raw exposed engine’. A transforming toy was set to be released by Takatoku Toys, but it was cancelled due to their sudden bankruptcy. However, bootleg versions would later come out on the market.”
Illustration 2: “Concept design of the Military Robot Metal Battler that appeared during the show. During the presentation, the president of the company, with a serious face, said strongly “draw a design for us that is going to be an absolute hit that no one has ever seen before”.”
Illustration 3: “This is also the prototype basis for the Metal Battler. The visual of combining its head in its chest was a concept that made its way to the final design.”
Illustration 4: “The police robot that was designed on the request of President Arii. When the president saw this, he said with a stern face “It looks kind of weak, will this sell more than the lead robot?” (omitted)…”.
Illustration 5: “Plastic model packaging of the police robot “Road Chaser” that was released. Please note how the design reproduces the opening and closing leg cover feature (regardless, the program was cut after half a year. It’s not my fault, you know…)”.
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