Space Battleship Yamato, the anime that changed history, would not have been possible without Leiji Matsumoto’s precision and mechanical sense!
Posted at Reminder on February 13.
See the original article here.
Yamato was launched by a group of up-and-coming staff and animators
“I want to float a battleship in space.”
The project for Space Battleship Yamato was launched from this idea of producer Yoshinobu Nishizaki. Then, Eiichi Yamamoto, who worked as an anime director at Mushi Productions, Keisuke Fujikawa, who wrote for Mazinger Z, and science fiction writer Aritsune Toyota joined the project and exchanged ideas to create a proposal. This was in 1973.
In the initial proposal, the characters had an American comic book style, and Yamato was designed to look like nothing more than a lump of rock. After hiring up-and-coming animators such as Takeshi Shirato, Toyoo Ashida, and Kenzo Koizumi, and staff selection was almost complete, Nishizaki felt that “the background art is weak. I want more depth in the universe.” So he visited Leiji Matsumoto’s home in Tokyo’s Nerima Ward with the proposal, introduced by key staff member Yoshihiro Nozaki, and Matsumoto readily agreed to design the mecha and characters. This transformed Yamato into its current sophisticated form, and captivating characters such as Juzo Okita, Susumu Kodai, and Yuki Mori were drawn.
Composers, singers, voice actors, and other first-class people gathered together and launched Yamato in 1974!
At the time, Leiji Matsumoto had established his position as a manga artist with Otoko Oidon, but he also demonstrated his overwhelming drawing skills with mecha and beautiful women in The Great Pirate Harlock and Sexaroid series. According to Matsumoto’s wife, manga artist Miyako Maki, he loved Disney’s animated movies and said that he wanted to draw moving pictures and animation from the beginning. She said that when he heard about Yamato, “I think he was happy because it was something he wanted to draw.”
In 1974, the production of Yamato began. A new premise was written from Matsumoto’s designs, and a script and storyboards were created. Matsumoto’s drawings went from animation to cel drawings, and then to film.
The music was completed by Composer Hiroshi Miyagawa, including the theme song sung by Isao Sasaki. Voice actors including Kei Tomiyama, Goro Naya, Yoko Asagami (now Shunsui Ichiryusai), and Masayuki Ibu (now Masato Ibu) brought the characters to life, and the series finally began airing on television on October 6, 1974.
The ratings for the original broadcast were poor, and the series was cut short to 26 episodes, out of a planned 39. This was partly due to the fact that the rival program was Heidi, Girl of the Alps, which was hugely popular at the time. However, reruns of the series gradually ignited the popularity of Space Battleship Yamato.
Some anime fans had already realized that Yamato was different from other anime. The word gradually spread, and private Yamato fan clubs were established all over the country. This movement developed into a petition campaign to make Yamato into a movie, and the film was released in 1977. Mre than 20,000 people lined up on opening day, including those who had stayed up all night.
Its popularity was supported by the excellent story, based on detailed concepts and Miyagawa’s musical achievements, but above all by the mecha and character designs of Leiji Matsumoto.
The opening credits saying “Director Leiji Matsumoto” are also proof of this. Toei producer Tatsuya Yoshida, one of the core members, also asserts that “Yamato would not have been possible without Matsumoto’s precision and sense of mechanics.”
A world view that connects to other works in the universe created by Leiji Matsumoto
In the year the first TV broadcast began, Matsumoto himself drew a Yamato picture story in six installments in Shogakukan’s 5th Grader magazine, and also serialized a work of the same name in Akita Shoten’s monthly manga magazine Bouken Oh. It was also published in book form with Susumu Kodai on the cover. It was written in parallel with the anime, but since it was serialized in a monthly magazine, the story was greatly simplified. Kodai’s brother appears as a masked pirate who calls himself Captain Harlock, and there is also a scene where he saves Yamato from a pinch.
In Matsumoto’s universe, Yamato and Harlock, as well as his later works Galaxy Express 999 and Queen Emeraldas, and Matsumoto’s original work Super Dimension Battleship Mahoroba (in which a Yamato-class space battleship plays an active role), all live in the same world.
Following the huge success of the Yamato movie, the animated film Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato was released the following year, in 1978. It was a huge hit, attracting 4 million viewers and earning 4.3 billion yen, and the last scene of this movie is still talked about among fans. Just when they thought they had defeated the powerful White Comet, a super-giant battleship appears. Susumu Kodai decides to make a suicide attack. Next to him is the body of Yuki Mori, who had been previously killed in the battle. “Let’s be married among the stars,” he whispers, and crashes into the gigantic battleship.
Matsumoto was against the glorification of kamikaze attacks and insisted that the will to survive, even if the battle was lost, should be depicted. Matsumoto was born in Fukuoka Prefecture in 1938. He clearly remembered the day the war ended in 1945, and grew up hearing directly from his father, who was a squadron commander in the Army Air Corps, about the horrific conditions on the battlefield. In the TV version Yamato 2, which aired after the movie, the story was changed so that all the main crew members survive along with the ship.
Everyone will eventually die, but he believes that we should live to the fullest until then
Following The New Voyage in 1979, the theatrical anime film Be Forever Yamato was released the following year. Matsumoto said the following during the production press conference: “I never thought I would be on a ship with such a long voyage…I will put an end to the question of what Yamato‘s voyage was all about. The issue of sensitivity is the same as in my other works, I don’t like people dying so easily. Everyone will die eventually, but I believe in living to the fullest until then. It’s the same in Galaxy Express 999.”
In 2000, 20 years after the release of this movie, Matsumoto serialized New Space Battleship Yamato [A.K.A. Great Yamato] in Shogakukan’s monthly manga magazine Comic GOTTA. Set in the year 3199, when Yamato has become a legend (1000 years after the original work), the story depicts the descendants of Yamato‘s crew, including the 32nd Susumu Kodai. A worldview different from the anime version of Yamato was alive and well in Matsumoto’s mind.
On February 13, 2023, Leiji Matsumoto passed away at the age of 85. His soul must now be flying freely through the vast universe he depicted.
BONUS
When the above article was located, it linked to a previous one on the same website…
50th Anniversary! A Shining Monument in the History of Anime: Space Battleship Yamato – A Symphonic Suite Created by Hiroshi Miyagawa
Posted at Reminder on December 15, 2024. See the original article here.
The first episode of Space Battleship Yamato aired on October 6, 1974. On December 25, 2024, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first broadcast, Symphonic Suite Space Battleship Yamato 2024 Mix will be released. With today’s technology, you can listen to the original sound source more clearly.
The three pillars that make Space Battleship Yamato a masterpiece: story, characters, and music
Space Battleship Yamato is one of the most prominent figures in the history of Japanese animation. There are three main reasons for its appeal.
The first is the fantastic story of the battleship Yamato, a relic from the Pacific War, traveling as a spaceship. This, combined with the detailed concept that set it apart from the sci-fi robot stories of the time, made children feel a big difference from previous anime. The detailed and realistic concepts are unprecedented, such as the warp navigation of the wave engine provided by Iscandar to save Earth, which exceeds the speed of light and enables a journey of 148,000 light years. It is said that it was Space Battleship Yamato that led to TV Manga being called “anime.”
The second is the character designs of the people and battleships by Leiji Matsumoto. At the initial planning stage, Yamato was a vehicle that looked like a lump of rock, but Matsumoto transformed it into a flying ship. The beauty of the shape of the curved surface that continues from the bow to the stern, the fineness of the pulse laser cannons, and the attention to detail that the ship has a waterline even though it is a spaceship; if it had not been for that color and shape, viewers would not have been so fascinated.
The appeal of characters such as Susumu Kodai, Yuki Mori, and Captain Okita can also be said to be unique to Matsumoto. Not only the other crew members, but also Starsha’s mysterious beauty, Dessler’s villainous appearance and the hidden aesthetics within; the world view that can be called Matsumoto’s is by no means aimed only at children, but is a highly refined work of art.
And the third is the music surrounding Yamato. Hiroshi Miyagawa was in charge of composing the theme song, the background music used in the film, and the ending theme. He is known for composing songs such as The Peanuts’ Vacation of Love, but he also composed many hit songs and TV program theme songs, and was involved in all of the music for the Yamato series.
His commitment to music was largely influenced by the fact that Yoshinobu Nishizaki, who planned Space Battleship Yamato, originally came from the music industry, and it was decided from the beginning that “music would come first.” It seems that the singer for the theme song, which begins with “Farewell Earth,” was searched for until the very last moment, and it was only two weeks before the broadcast that Isao Sasaki finally recorded it.
Also, a remake of Space Battleship Yamato has been in production since 2012, and it is touching that the music is handled by Akira Miyagawa, the son of Hiroshi Miyagawa. Since there were no written musical scores at the time, he started by writing them out while listening to tapes. By the way, Akira Miyagawa himself is also active as a composer and arranger, and is known for composing the hit song Matsuken Samba II, sung by Ken Matsudaira.
Not only the sound source, but also the jacket has been beautifully restored, and the excitement of that time is revived again
50 years ago, the first TV broadcast was canceled due to poor viewership, but it became popular after reruns and was made into a movie three years later. At the time, most theatrical anime was aimed at elementary school students, but the movie version of Yamato, which was supported by students from junior high to college, was a huge hit, attracting 4 million viewers and earning 4.3 billion yen at the box office. At the time, there were more than 800 Yamato fan clubs nationwide, with a total membership of over 150,000. In response to this popularity, the album Symphonic Suite Space Battleship Yamato was released in the winter of 1977.
Hiroshi Miyagawa rearranged and re-edited the background music, added new songs, and re-recorded it with a full orchestra. This album, which recorded astonishing sales at the time and became a milestone in anime soundtracks, has been reissued after 50 years. In the 2024 Mix version, the jacket is also reconstructed from original materials. The digital data of the original painting was scanned and retouched to bring back the same vivid colors. In addition, the background space was designed to give a sense of depth, and the title logo follows the LP design of the time. The appearance and content are full of the production team’s attention to detail.