For kids growing up in the early 80’s there was only one Saturday morning TV show worth waking up for – I’m not talking about Swap Shop with Noel Edmonds or even Tiswas but the space saga Star Fleet. This is undoubtedly my all time favourite kids show ever! It totally captivated me and still does. Why is it so special in my eyes – well it’s got an epic storyline, great characters, heroics, betrayal and tragedy, dogfights in space, awesome special effects and a cool end theme tune – what more could you ask for. I didn’t even know that this was a Japanese production until I went on the internet searching for information about the series.
The Crew Of X Bomber
Star Fleet is a puppet special effects show and was called X Bomber in Japan. What I find surprising is that it didn’t do all too well in it’s native country. Somebody in the TV industry in the West must have picked up that this kind of series might be cool for kids to watch, bought the rights and redubbed the Japanese soundtrack with English voice actors.
The sailing ship The Skull comes under attack (sorry about the bad audio in the clip)
A difference with other puppet series like Thunderbirds is you can’t see any strings with the puppets. The Japanese instead used rods from underneath the characters to control them hence why you can’t see any of their legs. Also instead of a standalone episode which wraps up the plot in 30 mins, Star Fleet had a long dark storyline which ran for 24 episodes. We all know that kids attention span isn’t that long and you’d think that they’d get bored by the long storyline but they’d keep returning to watch it week in week out – helped of course by the action that took place in each episode. Star Fleet grew to be so popular that Look-In magazine introduced a weeky comic strip and a Christmas annual was released too. There was even a special promotion for a Dai-X t-shirt over several weeks in Look-In.
So what about the story that the series revolves around? The story begins with a devastating attack on Pluto Alpha Base by the Imperial Battlecruiser who have invaded our galaxy under Commander Makara and her 2nd in command the insect like Captain Orion. The Imperial Alliance is searching for the mysterious F-Zero One and will do anything in it’s power to get it. But the Earth Defence Force (EDF) has no idea what F-Zero One is. They send 3 rookies (Shiro Hagan, Barry Hercules and John Lee) to their secret Moonbase to join up with veteran Dr Benn and their newest incomplete and untested battleship The X Bomber to stop the threat. Also part of the crew is a young girl called Lamia and her alien guardian Kirara. Little is known of Lamia’s past except for the fact that she was found as a young baby alongside Kirara by Shiro’s father Professor Hagan. Rounding up X-Bomber’s crew is PPA, a small flying android. With Makara’s superior, the Imperial Master growing increasingly frustrated at her lack of success in finding F-Zero One, Makara becomes even more cunning and dangerous in her quest. For the crew of X Bomber, F-Zero One could be closer to them than they think.
Dai-X versus Death Ball
For many fans it is the sight of the big red robot Dai-X that reminds them of this brilliant series. In line with the robots you get with Power Rangers series these days, Dai-X was a combination of 3 smaller vehicles that docked underneath X-Bomber – Brain Com (head), Main Body (arms and chest) and Leg Trak (legs). When these three combined together they formed the mighty Dai-X
Queen guitarist Bryan May even became a huge fan thanks to his young son. Such was his enthusiasm for the series he formed a group wth his friends which included Eddie Van Halen. They called themselves The Star Fleet Project and made a record. It was released as a 12″ EP with 3 tracks. i was lucky to buy this years later from a mail order record shop and it’s still at my parent’s house somewhere. Apparently it was released on CD too. Must try and track that one down.
The Imperial Battlecruiser aims to destroy X-Bomber
People in their late 20’s/early 30’s have been clamouring for a DVD release for a long time. Enoki, the company that owned the series said their rights to the series had expired and that there was no hope of a DVD release but obviously that proved false. Bootleg copies have been floating on Ebay for a while which is how I got a copy of the series. It was never released in full on video in the UK apart from 3 very badly cut compilation tapes. The US got the complete series though albeit in a slightly edited format (better than nothing though). When I heard that Star Fleet was being released in January 2009 naturally I got very excited. A chance to see all 24 episodes as they were when I was a child. I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy and wait with anticipation. Already pre-ordered it!
