while watching the original Mazinger Z I just realized how fear of war the narrative itself. its will probably fall under over analyze kid show with robots, but I guess its fit my liking for kid shows with robots.
1. The scientist in mecha show have double role, both the bringer of peace and the evil conqueror. in the show its start by presenting the bringer of peace, the grandpa of the main character, Dr. Kabuto, which later on succeed by one of his students who show his discoveries of a new alloy called "Japanimium" in a somewhat adversary of defense and for a better technology. he also build the main mecha in the show used to defend form the evil enemy. on the other side there is Dr. Hell, a rough student of , Dr. Kabuto, who discover an Mycenaean temple with bunch of destructed robots, when they check the records in the temple they find out that the Mycenaean built this robots to war which ultimately ended up destroying themselves. Dr. Hell renew the robots the help of a scientist team with the hidden plan in mind of world domination.
In it we see play with the role of science, both as a defense and bringer of good and help to maintain society, but as bringer of war which connected to unjust, chaos and war. the backdrop in it is of course WW2 and Hiroshima, event which lend echoes throughout much of the mecha world, surely the production as well as Go Nagai are not strangers to the work of Osamu Tezuka or Yokoyama which heavily dealt with such issues in series such as Tetsujin 28th, Tetsuwan Atom, and so on.
2. play on the Classical vs modernity, both in their good and bad, but ultimately lead to highlight the imperfection in them. the evil forces flash out to be originated form the Mycenaean, hence the past. the choice itself is also unique as the specific time have some classical element but its not classical in the classical sense, that is saying its not a prime example to learn from when we usally think on Ancient Greek. Dr. Hell shown constantly in backdrop of greek temple with his mage like stick(which translated erroneously in HK subtitles to crabstick) he both show the past in his sources, imagery, and combined with small touch of anti-religious messages inherited by the European tradition Japan partially absorbed. the focus is on the war in fairly one sided manner but with the images its show more complex image then just the big evil doctor and the dealing itself is with the usage of technology in war.
In it we see play with the role of science, both as a defense and bringer of good and help to maintain society, but as bringer of war which connected to unjust, chaos and war. the backdrop in it is of course WW2 and Hiroshima, event which lend echoes throughout much of the mecha world, surely the production as well as Go Nagai are not strangers to the work of Osamu Tezuka or Yokoyama which heavily dealt with such issues in series such as Tetsujin 28th, Tetsuwan Atom, and so on.
2. play on the Classical vs modernity, both in their good and bad, but ultimately lead to highlight the imperfection in them. the evil forces flash out to be originated form the Mycenaean, hence the past. the choice itself is also unique as the specific time have some classical element but its not classical in the classical sense, that is saying its not a prime example to learn from when we usally think on Ancient Greek. Dr. Hell shown constantly in backdrop of greek temple with his mage like stick(which translated erroneously in HK subtitles to crabstick) he both show the past in his sources, imagery, and combined with small touch of anti-religious messages inherited by the European tradition Japan partially absorbed. the focus is on the war in fairly one sided manner but with the images its show more complex image then just the big evil doctor and the dealing itself is with the usage of technology in war.
On the other hand, the good side show as modern city dwellers, blessed with the technology, liberal life and overall peaceful, though behind it lies the danger of the technology. as Dr. Hell is creation of this world, and the main robot, Mazinger Z have his own inner demons, as its embed within itself a demonic uncontrollable force, which can always come out. in fact the opening shot of Dr. Kabuto showing the new alloy to some government and investor like figures also hide such tenets on the role of technology as well as the immediate development for defense. further more when Dr. Hell find the temple its as if he was finding Atlantis, hidden culture that for some reason in Japan took the face of war in more then just Mazinger Z, but also Umi no Triton.
3. Its a bit outside the claim on war but another interesting feature is in the contrast between heroes and villains, the main hero of the show Kouji Kabuto showed as a simple young man who try to help in full-heart and passionately, there is no ambiguity in his aim and overall he pretty naive image, naivety that also contain tacitly danger of lack of knowledge and gullibility. on the other hand the evil main agent, Baron Ashura, is a two-faced "monster" half face male and the other female, in the manga at least he contain certain tragic elements as backstory that slowly build up. In a way its can be connected as if I remember correctly Ashure play similiar role of naivety, only he dragged down to the dark side, though I can't recall completely. a lot of Ashura reflection in the story is on what can be called the war within as its character that in fact contain two and at certain parts, each part of Ashura can disagree with the other, at least from what I recall from the manga and other entries in the Mazinger saga.
3. Its a bit outside the claim on war but another interesting feature is in the contrast between heroes and villains, the main hero of the show Kouji Kabuto showed as a simple young man who try to help in full-heart and passionately, there is no ambiguity in his aim and overall he pretty naive image, naivety that also contain tacitly danger of lack of knowledge and gullibility. on the other hand the evil main agent, Baron Ashura, is a two-faced "monster" half face male and the other female, in the manga at least he contain certain tragic elements as backstory that slowly build up. In a way its can be connected as if I remember correctly Ashure play similiar role of naivety, only he dragged down to the dark side, though I can't recall completely. a lot of Ashura reflection in the story is on what can be called the war within as its character that in fact contain two and at certain parts, each part of Ashura can disagree with the other, at least from what I recall from the manga and other entries in the Mazinger saga.
