Popular with female students, re-airing
Manga Space Battleship Yamato
I have a dream
Overcoming the local station with direct appeal
TV programs that are popular with viewers are often re-broadcast, and recently, TV Miyazaki in Gion-cho, Miyazaki city, has brought back the manga and film series Space Battleship Yamato for the first time in years. This program is an adventure science-fiction manga action series made for boys. However, for some reason, the TV station was flooded with letters and phone calls from junior and senior high school girls requesting that it be broadcast again, and they were overwhelmed.
The person in charge blinked in surprise, saying, “it’s a science-fiction program, which isn’t usually very popular with women, but I guess the romance of space has made it popular.”
Space Battleship Yamato, which has captured the hearts of female students, is a TV anime series that aired for many episodes starting in October 1974.
The story is about Earth, which has been attacked by the Planet Gamilas and is afflicted with radiation, pushing humanity to the brink of extinction. In order to save Earth from this crisis, the Space Battleship Yamato travels 40,000 light years through space to retrieve a radiation removal device. The animation was well received, making it a popular program, not only among preschool and elementary school children, but also among middle and high school girls.
Even though years have passed since the show ended, people have been asking the TV stations to “please broadcast it again,” for the past four months.
“Please don’t think I’m too old for manga. I really do…” And so on.
“I receive about 50 postcards and letters a month at times.”
They even went so far as to call directly and plead for a re-broadcast. 90% of these requests come from girls. One of the most enthusiastic fans, a first year of high school student, praised it highly by saying, “both the animation and the story are wonderful, and they inspired dreams.”
The station was surprised by the unprecedented “high-pitched voices” from girls, and commented that they were elementary school students.
“We’ve received requests for it many times, though…“ they said, surprised. They immediately decided to re-broadcast it, and it has been airing five times a week since the fourth of this month, from 5:25 PM.
Gunko Maeda, the programming director at the station, commented, “the content is substantial, and the animation is superb. It’s one of the masterpieces among anime and manga films. I think the romantic setting of space is appealing to impressionable middle and high school girls.“