Monday, March 9, 2009

Super Robot Profiles: Daitetsujin 17

Daitetsujin 17 (pronounced "one seven," or perhaps more properly, "one sevuuuuun," in case you've never been told how the Japanese pronounce Arabic numerals) is something I've rarely discussed-a live-action super robot.



Not related in any way to Tetsujin 28. Really. All they have in common is blueness and super-robotness.

Anyway, Daitetsujin 17 was dubbed as "Brain 17." How you translate "giant iron being" into "brain," I don't know, but somehow they did it.



I suppose they might have done it because the robot is occasionally controlled through the helmet the kid wears, but whatever.

The reason I like what little I've seen of Daitetsujin 17 is because it has such a distinct visual style from other tokusatsu (live action with special effects from Japan-i.e. like Godzilla movies with a bit lower budget) programs I've seen. (There used to be a music video with a nice remix of its theme and the coolest footage from the series, but it apparently doesn't exist anymore. Ah, well.) It's also kind of scary to watch DTJ 17 take out that steamroller robot-I have no idea what he was doing to him, but it looked like it hurt.

-Signing off.

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