"Messenger of Iscandar" is the first episode of Space Battleship Yamato 2199 and the first episode in the Space Battleship Yamato remakes. It was first released theatrically in Japan on April 6, 2012 on on Family Gekijo channel.[1] It then premiered the following day in theaters alongside episode 2,[2] on the sixty-seventh anniversary of the sinking of the IJN Yamato. The two episodes together composde Chapter 1 "The Long Journey".[3]
Synopsis[]
The planet Earth withers under a merciless assault from the alien world of Garmillas. Earth's leaders launch a seemingly desperate counterattack against the enemy, while secretly finishing preparations for something greater.[4]
Summary[]
January 17, 2199[]
- For more details on the battle, see Operation M.
In the outer reaches of the solar system, the destroyer Yukikaze under the command of Lieutenant Commander Mamoru Kodai takes the vanguard position ahead of the ships United Nations Cosmo Navy First Fleet as they approach
The flagship struggles against enemy Garmillas forces.
Pluto. Out of range of Yukikaze, more than a hundred enemy vessels are detected heading for the main fleet. The Garmillas transmit a demand for the UNCN ships to surrender. Aboard the space battleship Kirishima, Admiral Juzo Okita bluntly rejects the demand, and the alien vessels open fire on the First Fleet. Numerous UNCN ships are sunk or damaged in the opening moments of the battle, while most of their own weapons fire bounces uselessly off their targets. Realizing that their main force has been ambushed, Lt. Cmdr. Kodai orders his destroyer to reverse course and race toward the battle. On the lower decks of Kirishima, Hikozaemon Tokugawa urges Sukeji Yabu and other members of his engineering crew to trust the admiral. Okita watches the devastation grimly, until he is interrupted by a report of a signal that "Amaterasu" is passing Neptune and is rapidly heading for Mars. He immediately sends a brief coded message to Earth.
Daisuke Shima (right) and Susumu Kodai examine the wave motion core.
Chief Administrator Heikuro Todo and Admiral Ryu Hijikata wait for an update on Operation M in the underground command center of the Far East Sector Headquarters of the United Nations Cosmo Force. The wait is broken when Yuki Mori informs them of Okita's message. Headquarters immediately alerts a two-person intercept team waiting on Mars. In a small shelter in the ruins of Arcadia Port, Susumu Kodai wonders aloud about his elder brother and the fight happening at Pluto, until he and Daisuke Shima receive the alert and take off in a scout plane. They spot "Amaterasu" burning in its descent and blow up, and track an escape pod to its crash site. They land and carefully approach the pod, find the body of a dead alien woman inside, and retrieve a wave motion core from her hands--the item that they have been waiting for.
Mamoru Kodai and the crew of Yukikaze cover the flagship's escape.
The onslaught against the First Fleet continues, and an enemy destroyer heads straight toward Kirishima and a kill shot, until Yukikaze fires missiles from behind and destroys it. With the mission on Mars complete, Okita issues the withdraw order for his flagship and Yukikaze, the only surviving UN vessels. Instead of following the flagship, Yukikaze stays behind. Okita pleads with Lt. Cmdr. Kodai to retreat, but Kodai insists that the admiral is too important to the future of Earth. He takes his ship toward the regrouping Garmillas forces. The bridge crew begins to sing the anthem of the United Nations Cosmo Force, and he joins them. Yukikaze engages the alien forces and successfully distracts them, firing its guns and dodging return fire, until one energy beam connects and a large explosion rips through the main hull. Kirishima continues toward the safety of the inner solar system.
Three Weeks Later[]
Shima and the younger Kodai rendezvous with Kirishima in Mars orbit, and learn about the loss of Kodai's elder brother from Hajime Hirata after delivering the wave motion core. As the damaged space battleship nears Earth, two glowing planet bombs are spotted on the starboard side plunging toward the red, waterless, and irradiated surface. Unable to stop them, Okita silently pledges to continue fighting the Garmillas as long as he can. Inside an underground city, Mori teaches a group of children about the eight-year Garmillas-Earth War, the costly but victorious battle against the Garmillas at Mars that led to the merciless planet bombing campaign, and the spread of alien plant life seeded on Earth by the enemy. One of the children asks why the Garmillas are doing this, and Mori suggests that they are reshaping Earth to suit their own needs, just like they did at Pluto.
Kodai demands the truth.
Mori leaves the class accompanied by Yasuo Nanbu, who asks her about a rumor that the Pluto battle was only a decoy--at the same moment that Kodai and Shima walk by. Kodai stops in his tracks and demands that Nanbu repeat what he just said. Kodai notices that Mori stunningly resembles the dead alien from Mars, but he snaps out of it when Mori angrily demands that he back off. Once she and Nanbu leave, Kodai informs Shima that they are heading to the hospital zone. Doctor Sakezo Sado's examination of Okita finishes while Hijikata waits. Kodai barges into the room and demands that Okita tell him about Operation M. Hijikata angrily orders his former student to be quiet, embarassing Shima as he waits outside the door. Okita hears Kodai's name and tells him that his elder brother was a great man, and bows in sincere apology for his death. Kodai accepts Okita's gesture, salutes both admirals, and leaves with his friend. Both of them are stopped in the hallway by Sado, who tells Kodai not to worry about his outburst but to be more mindful that everyone has lost loved ones in the war. To the consternation of Nurse Makoto Harada, the doctor eagerly invites them to a bottle of sake, but the two young men have already left.
Toward the Future[]
"It was worth believing and waiting. Her words were true."
Okita reviews a crew manifest in his office and finds entries for Kodai and Shima. In a busy laboratory with workers attending to a large capsule, Hijikata examines the wave motion core along with Shiro Sanada, Chief Administrator Heikuro Todo, and General Kotetsu Serizawa. They verify that the core is genuine, and that the Yamato Plan is now complete and the crew is ready.
Shima and Kodai enter a hangar bay and admire a Cosmo Zero prototype fighter. They are approached by Saburo Kato, who they recognize as an ace pilot. Kato warns them to stay away from his plane before he is called away by a member of the deck crew. An air raid siren blares and a warning goes out of a Garmillas squadron penetrating Earth's defense perimeter. Kodai tells Shima that there is no time to wait, and the pair ignore Kato's calls to stop as they take off in the Cosmo Zero. In the skies over what was the Sea of Japan, they quickly catch up to and target a reconnaissance craft. Kodai pulls the trigger, and nothing happens--the fighter is flying unarmed. The Garmillas craft pulls up and away. At that moment, one of the prototype's engines bursts into flames. Kodai guides the fighter to a crash landing on the hot desert floor.
The object of Garmillas curiosity.
As the two of them are walking away from the crash to the top of a ridge, Shima asks Kodai why he stopped. He stands alongside Kodai and the two of them look in awe at what appears to be the wreckage of an ancient battleship, sunk centuries ago and now baking in the sun. They wonder why the Garmillas would be interested in such a thing.
Analysis[]
- During the battle at Pluto, Yuki Mori reports that Sasha Iscandar's ship is passing Neptune and will arrive at Mars in ten minutes. The shortest distance between Neptune and Mars is more than four billion kilometers--28.43 AU, or 3.94 light hours. Although the ship is shown flying near Neptune at sub-light speed, the only way it could reach Mars in such a short time would be to perform a warp.
- Transmissions among the Kirishima at Pluto, Far East Sector Headquarters on Earth, and Kodai and Shima on Mars appear to happen instantaneously, meaning that humans have faster-than-light communication ability.
- Coded messages regarding the secret delivery and retrieval of the wave motion core from Sasha Iscandar use terminology from the Japanese Shinto religion. Amaterasu, who is the sun goddess and whose name translates as "shining in heaven," identifies Sasha's vessel. In one story, an angered Amaterasu hides in a cave and plunges the universe into darkness, until she is lured out by the kami Ame-no-Uzume, from which the code name "Uzume" is used for the two-person team on Mars. The arrival of "Amaterasu" and "Uzume" successfully obtaining the wave motion core from her promises to bring light back to humanity.
- The First Fleet suffers a severe loss at Pluto, but it is able to use a couple of technologies that keep the battle from becoming a complete disaster. The first are missiles fired by Yukikaze that destroy a Garmillas ship threatening Kirishima. The fact that these missiles are not regularly used by the First Fleet against their enemy suggest that they are either a new advancement or that Earth can produce only a limited supply. The second is Migobueza armor coating applied to Kirishima, which allows it to survive weapons fire that cripples or destroys other Cosmo Navy ships with a single blast. In an 2013 interview with Great Mechanics DX, Satoshi Koizumi, mecha designer for the Yamato 2199 series, noted that reflective armor coating was acquired from the wreckage of Garmillas ships destroyed during the Second Battle of Mars a year earlier. The Cosmo Force may have only recently learned how to manufacture it and was able to use it on only one vessel.
Questions[]
- What is the purpose of the large capsule in the UN lab? (Answer)
- Why does the Great Garmillas Empire want to destroy Earth's environment? (partial answer) (partial answer) (partial answer)
Noteworthy Dialogue[]
- With the battleship Kirishima leading an Earth fleet toward Pluto and Garmillas forces, Admiral Juzo Okita listens as a transmission is received:
- Kirishima Communications Officer: Message from the enemy fleet: "Attention Earth fleet, surrender immediately." How shall we respond?
- Okita: Tell them: "Nuts."
- After receiving word that "Amaterasu" is on its way to Mars, Okita sends a coded message to Earth confirming it:
- Okita: The Stone Door of Heaven is opening.
Behind the Scenes[]
- This episode and the subsequent episode were released together on the 67th anniversary of the sinking of the IJN Yamato.
Cast[]
Original Japanese[]
(Alphabetized by family name)[5]
- Kenji Akabane as Yasuo Nanbu
- Takaomi Ashizawa as Yukikaze Navigator
- Shigeru Chiba as Sakezo Sado
- Cho as Sukeji Yabu
- Masashi Ebara as Osamu Yamanami
- Akira Harada as Eiji Ishizu
- Yoshimasa Hosoya as Saburo Kato
- Fumihide Ise as Hajime Hirata
- Masaaki Itatori as Kirishima Radar
- Ryūichi Kijima as Kirishima Navigator B
- Taira Kikumoto as Kirishima Communications Officer
- Mikako Komatsu as Jiro Shima
- Houko Kuwashima as Yuki Mori
- Ei Mochizuki as Kirishima Navigator A
- Mitsuru Miyamoto as Mamoru Kodai
- Mugihito as Hikozaemon Tokugawa
- Toshiharu Nakanishi as Yukikaze Helmsman
- Houchu Ohtsuka as Shiro Sanada
- Daisuke Ono as Susumu Kodai
- Rina Satou as Makoto Harada
- Masayoshi Sugawara as Kirishima Gunner
- Takayuki Sugo as Juzo Okita
- Kenichi Suzumura as Daisuke Shima
- Hiroyuki Takanaka as Yukikaze Communications Officer
English dub[]
(Alphabetized by family name)[6]
- Felecia Angelle as Makoto Harada
- Z. Charles Bolton as Mamoru Kodai
- Bradley Campbell as Heikuro Todo
- R Bruce Elliott as Hikozaemon Tokugawa
- Ricco Fajardo as Daisuke Shima
- Stephen Fu as Yasuo Nanbu
- Kenny Green as Sakezo Sado
- Jeremy Inman as Hajime Hirata
- Doug Jackson as Kotetsu Serizawa
- Bill Jenkins as Ryu Hijikata
- Brian Mathis as Juzo Okita
- Mike McFarland as Saburo Kato
- Phil Parsons as Shiro Sanada
- Ben Phillips as Sukeji Yabu
- Mallorie Rodak as Yuki Mori
- Cristopher Wehkamp as Susumu Kodai
- Kent Williams as Osamu Yamanami
- Apphia Yu as Jiro Shima
Additional voices[]
- Ian Sinclair
- Jerry Jewel
- Cristopher Wekhamp
- Cris George
- Sonny Strait
- Ian Moore
- J. Micheal Tatum
- Justin Briner
- Garret Storms
- Justin Duncan
- Aaron Dismuke
- Kate Oxley
- Morgan Berry
- Drew Wall
- Marcus D. Stimac
- Matt Shipman
- Aaron Roberts
- Bonnie Mitchell
- Cory Phillips
- Kris Bryan
- Michael Speck
- Chris Guerrero
- Dave Woodrad
- Jennifer Alyx
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ Yamato 2199 #1 Previewed on TV on April 6 on Anime News Network
- ↑ New Yamato 2199 Anime Is Also a TV Series on Anime News Network
- ↑ New Yamato Anime to Be 26 Episodes, Split Into 7 Films on Anime News Network
- ↑ Space Battleship Yamato 2199 s.1 ep.1 on IMDb
- ↑ Space Battleship Yamato 2199 on Anime News Network
- ↑ Yamato 2199 S.1 E.1 on IMDb