What does a military writer think of the latest Space Battleship Yamato film?
A thorough review of the film Be Forever Yamato REBEL 3199
Space Battleship Yamato has captured the hearts of children for 50 years. The latest film in the series, Be Forever Yamato REBEL 3199 Chapter 1, Dark Invasion, is now in theaters. A military writer who has never seen Yamato experiences the world of Yamato and writes about his fresh surprises and emotions.
Text: Tadamasa Miyanaga
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Author profile:
Born in 1973. After graduating from the Department of History, Faculty of Letters, Sophia University, and dropping out of the Graduate School of Humanities, Tokyo Metropolitan University, he worked as a magazine editor in charge of quality assurance at Waargaming.net, and is currently working as a freelance writer, editor, translator, and supervisor of movies, animation, and games.
He deals with military vehicles in general, mainly from World War II, but is currently focusing on the global reevaluation of European military history and introducing it to the Japanese military scene. His main works include Wars of Japan (Kaiseisha) and Fantasy World Building Textbook (Takarajimasha). He currently runs the Youtube channel Tadamasa Miyanaga’s Military Archive.
The memory of the Showa era lives on in Yamato
When I received a request to review REBEL 3199, I was happy, but I was also hesitant, so I initially declined because I have never seen the Space Battleship Yamato series.
It’s already been six years since the Reiwa era began. These days, I feel that the Showa era is starting to be lumped together in a rather vague way. However, the layers of the Showa era are deep.
As a writer born in 1973, TV was already in color when I was born, [baseball player] Shigeo Nagashima was nearing retirement, Elvis was quite fat, and my first Olympics memory was the 1984 Los Angeles Games. Just because it was the Showa era doesn’t mean I was exposed to all the content.
As for Yamato, by the time I became aware of things, the original TV anime series had ended, but I don’t remember it being a big hit among my classmates. However, my seniors who are 3 to 5 years older than me all love Yamato, and still talk about it passionately. They also use “Yamato-speak” as a common language, so the perception of Yamato is probably very different between those born in the early and late 1960s.
But if you look at it from a different perspective, there is value in the fact that I was never exposed to Yamato at all. What does that mean?
Yamato from the viewpoint of a military-savvy writer
Normally, reviews of new movies like this, especially for a series like Yamato, are a good place for (A) experts who are knowledgeable about the work to provide commentary for core fans, or share their unique worldview, and (B) provide a series guide or introductory trivia to appeal to new fans who are unfamiliar with Yamato. Reviews like this will likely become standard.
Now, let’s look at the case of an old man from the Showa era, who had never heard of Yamato and kept missing the right moment to see it. How will he feel when he sees Be Forever Yamato REBEL 3199 without any prior knowledge? This is a new challenge.
However, since I am entrusted with reviewing it, I also have a perspective. That is, I am a publishing professional with a quarter century of experience, and a writer specializing in military history. Even though I don’t know Yamato, I have written a huge amount of text about the battleship Yamato, the Japanese Navy, military aircraft, tanks, world war history, etc., and have published several related books and translations.
The theme of Yamato is war, and weapons play an important role. So, I thought that putting my first Yamato experience into words with the viewpoint of a military expert would create something unprecedented.
Yamato: a timeless creation
However, it is not realistic to have absolutely no prior information, so I decided to examine the status of the Space Battleship Yamato series.
Basically, Yamato is broadly divided into the original series and the remake series. Furthermore, each series has its own theatrical anime movies and TV anime specials, which can be confusing. If you’re not a fan of the original, it seems best to keep in mind the remake series that began in the 2010s.
However, the title suggests that this remake will also be in three parts: Space Battleship Yamato 2199 (2014), 2202 (2017), and 2205 (2021). And since this work is REBEL 3199, I assumed that it would be set about 1,000 years later, so I went into the work with that assumption in mind.
It begins with a digest of the series. Hmm. The time is roughly 200 years after humanity’s moonshot. Humanity has advanced as far as Mars and is in the midst of an expansion period within the solar system, but one day, they are attacked by a mysterious alien force.
I see. I believe the villains are the Garmillas aliens, led by Commander Dessler, and Earth has been contaminated by Garmillas’ attack and is in dire straits. Then an emissary arrives from Iscandar with advanced technology, and the Space Battleship Yamato goes alone to Iscandar to obtain the Cosmo Cleaner. Yeah, I’m pretty familiar with that plot. And Dessler had his own deep reasons for invading Earth.
It’s a satisfying digest, as the fragmented information seems to come together. However, the digest doesn’t end with the Cosmo Cleaner. It also tells us of the emergence of a new hostile force called Gatlantis.
Earth is on the verge of becoming a militant star system, customizing the Wave-Motion Gun technology gifted from Iscandar. After a series of events, the protagonist Susumu Kodai and heroine Yuki Mori get lost in a higher dimension of the universe. Earthlings are moved by their sacrificial spirit and seem to have regained their love.
But then a new force called Dezarium appears and crushes Garmillas, then attempts to free Iscandar, which is in a binary orbit, and take the planet away. This is because Iscandar is full of super technology that even aliens admire. However, the beautiful sisters who are the guardians of Iscandar refuse to hand over the planet, leaving Susumu Kodai alone with brother’s little girl (Sasha) born to an Iscandarian.
The digest ends here.
Yamato updated in Reiwa
This is the honest news and storyline I understood from watching the digest. There is a high possibility that the terminology is different and my understanding is off. I’m sorry for that, but I have to ask for your forgiveness. If my interpretation is wrong, that’s not only my problem, but also the fact that the digest that does not convey the creator’s intention.
Now, the first and second episodes, titled Chapter 1 Dark Invasion, currently being shown in theaters. It starts with a giant mothership of unknown affiliation that suddenly appears in the outer solar system, breaking through the defense line set up by the Earth Federation and neutralizing it while approaching Earth.
In the area where the mobile fortress appears, a squadron of the Bolar Federation, a group of people who seem to be on bad terms with Earth, is arguing about whether to violate airspace, and the situation is that Earth’s sovereignty extends to the outer edge of the solar system.
However, when a political officer of the Bolar Federation sees the mysterious giant ship and is frightened, he runs away with a suggestive line saying, “The breath of the witch at the center of the galaxy that freezes the universe,” so it seems that it is not a completely unknown entity.
This mysterious giant ship uses its ECM capabilities to break through the defense line while neutralizing Earth’s warships. The beams and physical attacks of the warships are nullified by the barrier, so attacks are completely ineffective. Along the way, it is caught in a very powerful explosion in a minefield, but the main body is completely unharmed.
In the last defense line over Earth, it is intercepted by a fully autonomous fleet called the command-class Gladiator, and it breaks through. However, rather than this just being the capabilities of the giant ship, there’s a hint that a virus has already been planted in Earth’s defense ships, strongly suggesting that there’s a traitor somewhere, quite high up in the ranks.
In the second part, the giant ship finally begins its attack on Earth. This is a military invasion by the Dezarium forces, and it is revealed that a number of important people on Earth have been in collusion with Dezarium and are guiding their military invasion.
However, the forces that oppose this have already established a program called Operation DAD with the space fleet. DAD stands for “Defense Against Dezarium.” And the key to this operation, which is the last hope to save the Earth, is the Space Battleship Yamato, which has been mothballed as a reserve ship…
And with that, the curtain falls.
The previous prediction that the story will take place 1,000 years in the future seems to have been completely wrong at this point. However, the number “3199” must have a grand meaning.
Many gimmicks that will impress movie fans
In conclusion, it was more interesting than I expected. However, that’s because of the digest. Rather than being interested in how Yamato 3199 will turn out, the storyline is that the planets Garmillas and Iscandar have disappeared, and Earth faces a completely different threat in this new story. On top of that, Yamato 3199 has a hidden gimmick that will attract a wide range of movie fans, which is interesting.
The sense of pressure that comes from superior technology from outer space approaching the Earth sphere is reminiscent of the SF drama series The Expanse. Not only that, the land-based weapons of the Dezarium that attack Earth are a tripod from War of the Worlds (2005), and I miss the classic feel. The tactics of the mobile infantry of the Earth Federation Defense Forces, which drag down this tripod, are like the defense battle of Zion in Matrix Revolutions (2003).
Of the 26 episodes planned for Yamato 3199, I only watched two this time. However, even if you’re not familiar with the Yamato series, the structure was very well thought out, and it was a great reward to be interested in the meaning of the main story, which ran with high tension from start to finish, especially the history surrounding the main character. It has motivated me enough to add the remake version of Yamato to my list of future viewings, even if it is unrelated to work.
If you’re not familiar with the Space Battleship Yamato series, now is a good time to watch it. First of all, I think it’s worth watching Yamato 3199, and then going back to the remake version to find out the answers to the fascinating but mysterious worldview and characters. This will allow you to absorb the enormous content of Space Battleship Yamato without wasting any time or effort.