anyone know this cartoon series?

Cafe Society
1

I’m trying to remember a cartoon series from my childhood - it’s japanese style cartoon and it was the adventures of these 5 crime fighters who wore bird-like costumes (that is, bird wing capes and helmets with beak-shaped visors). There was 4 guys and 1 girl. The girl had a white and pink swan costume, there were a couple of eagle costumes, a duck costume and an owl costume (worn by a nerdy kid with glasses). They were ordinary kids but when needed, would report to a special place and wear their costumes to fight crime. (A bit like Power rangers but much much cooler).

I don’t know if it was widely screened, but it used to be on in Australia on one of the main networks early in the morning.

Can anyone please help name this cartoon? :confused:

Thanks!

2

This is probably Battle Of The Planets or the later reworking called G-Force. Both were redubbed and edited versions of the Japanese anime series Kagaku Ninja-Tai Gatchaman, or just Gatchaman. If you remember it from the late 1970s, it’s the first one. If you remember it from the mid-1980s, it’s probably the second one.

3

More info on G-Force: http://www.yesterdayland.com/popopedia/shows/saturday/sa1698.php

4

Wow. I’d never heard about the Eagle Force version of the show.

5

You guys certainly nailed it!

Although I don’t recall knowing it asGatchaman, the latter names - Battle of the Planets or G-Force - seem a better fit. Of course the version I recall had anglicised names.

Now I’ll have to find videos somewhere! :slight_smile:

6

Glad to be of service.

7

Paging tavalla.

8

Try VideoFlicks.com for that.

9

Amazon has an English-dubbed box set available.

10

Right here :smiley:

Good news, ninevah - Shock Video have bought the rights to release Battle of the Planets videos and DVDs in Australia (the video will have only BotP episodes, the DVDs will contain original Gatchaman and G Force episodes as bonus material). They were supposed to be available last week, but there was a problem with the master copy, and there’ll be a week’s delay.

If the character names you remember are Mark, Jason, Princess, Tiny and Keyop, then you remember Battle of the Planets (aired on the ABC). If the names were Ace Goodheart, Dirk Daring, Agatha Jun, Peewee and Hooty, then you’re remembering G Force (aired on Channel 9).

Nice to see another Battle fan in Australia!

11

Tavalla, you’re a goldmine! Thanks very much for all the info. I will endeavour to check out Shock Video for the dvd.

It must have been Battle of the Planets that I remember - the names Mark, Tiny and Princess confirmed it.

Thanks one and all! :smiley:

12

I seem to remember that the first incarnation was considerably more ‘adult,’ in that people got killed when things blew up, and so on. The 80’s version was considerably more kiddified.

In either case, they cut out the girl’s bladed yo-yo, which she would kill people with and then do tricks with. I’m not making this up. :slight_smile: Also, that little, suspiciously R2-D2 like robot (7-Zark-7, I think) was apparently added on the American side, hoping to catch onto the coattails of Star Wars.

There was actually a third version, released as Eagle Riders by Saban in the late 90’s, a bit after the whole Dragon Ball/Sailor Moon thing started to take off, usually shown in a block with Samurai Pizza Cats. I saw an episode or two of it, but nothing of interest adhered to my memory. I’ve heard it used

And actually, there was a fairly recent ‘update’ OAV series, released in Japan around 1999 or so. Which, from what I saw of it, was brutally bad. (We couldn’t even make it through the second episode. And I watched BOTH M.D. Geist OAVs)

Just as a little warning, though, don’t get your hopes up too high. I remembered Voltron (the lion one, of course) as the coolest show ever for years, and was underwhelmed when I finally got to see it again in college. Some things are best left bathed in the soft light of nostalgia. (Then again, some things aren’t . . . Robotech was much better watching it as an adult)

Now, if only someone would release the original Tekkaman Blade/Technoman . . .

On the other hand, any show who’s full title involves the phrase ‘science ninja team’ has at least that much going for it . . .

I also have to get a better spell checker. This one dosn’t even know ‘ninja’ . . .

13

About 9 years ago, I visited some relatives in Mexico and there was a cartoon on TV about some super heroes and villains that took after the zodiac. For example, some guy named Gemini was like powerful or whatever 'cuz he could split in two or something to that effect.

I’m sure this was a Japanese cartoon dubbed in Spanish. Anybody know about this one?