lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
|
Gatchaman episode 14: "The Fearsome Ice-kander"
|
|
Gatchaman Episode 14: “The Fearsome Ice-kanderâ€
BOTP Episode: “Perilous Pleasure Cruiseâ€
Happy music plays as a large cruise ship sails through a blue sea.
On board, passengers, mostly in swimwear, are lounging about in the sun, swimming or even playing badminton.
However, one man is wearing a suit and smoking a pipe. He's also sitting in a wheelchair.
A few boys, also quite formally dressed, are playing a game that involves trying to throw a hoop over a peg. A small girl is sitting alone nearby, with her eyes closed.
Her hair appears to be green and her eyes are big with long lashes -she could almost be a very young Jun (if Jun's head were too large for her body, and she were annoying, that is). The man addresses her, "Young lady?"
But she doesn't even open her eyes to look at him, and just says "Yes, sir," in an irritating sing-song way.
The man asks her if she's going to play, like everyone else. Finally, she opens her eyes (an unJun-like blue) and says "No, it's too boring," in the same annoying voice.
Just then, the ship's Captain (he's wearing a spiffy cap and sporting lots of gold trim on his uniform's jacket) tells the man that the little girl's father died three days ago in a traffic accident, and that she's being sent now to live with her mother (who'd been separated from the father).
So, this girl's father is barely cold and she's been sent packing, alone, across an ocean! Okay, now I'm prepared to cut her some slack for being annoying. She's probably traumatized!
Now, the man clearly feels bad for her, and he persuades her to throw and kick a soccer ball back and forth with him, and she does cheer up. But suddenly, the sky fills with dark clouds, to the consternation of everyone on deck, and strong wind blows and lightning flashes. The little girl is scared and she clings to the man, hiding her face.
Wind is roaring across the deck and high waves are rocking the ship as passengers in swimwear begin fleeing indoors.
Two passengers, however, see a large iceberg looming ahead and the ship is headed straight for it. Other passengers notice it too, and begin panicking.
Suddenly, two intense beams of light shoot up into the air and hit a large airplane that just happens to be flying low over the ocean during an intense storm (granted, the storm did come out of nowhere) and the airplane explodes -much to the horror of watching passengers on the ship. The iceberg shatters into pieces, and inside it is a giant mecha that rather resembles a walrus.
With a blast of cold wind from its mouth, the mecha coats the entire ship in ice and looms over it, menacingly.
Now we cut to a Science Ninja bracelet, lying on an end table as it signals an incoming communication. Ken is dressed in his civvies and lying on top of his bed's blankets.
He sits up quickly and puts on the bracelet before responding "Go ahead, this is G1, Gatchaman!"
It's Dr. Nambu, of course, and he politely says "Good morning, how are you today?" as Ken then demands "Why are you calling me this early in the morning?" Come on, Ken, sun is streaming in your window and you're already dressed -is it really all that early?
But Dr. Nambu says that "there's no day or night for the Team!" and that it's urgent. So, Ken goes running to his plane (and it's that oft-used bit of footage where he doesn't shut his door) while griping "I have to take off with no breakfast?"
As Ken runs, and runs, and runs (clearly his plane is much further from his door than it originally seemed), a faint image of Dr. Nambu's face overlies the screen and delivers exposition to the effect that a nuclear powered ship passing through the South Pacific has disappeared, and nuclear powered aircraft carriers and destroyers (we are shown brief images of these) have also disappeared -even submarines are disappearing "right in the middle of their drills).
Finally, Ken stops running and gets into his plane as Dr. Nambu points out that all the missing ships were nuclear powered.
Ken agrees this is too much of a coincidence, and his instructions from Dr. Nambu are to assemble the Team and go search for the missing ships.
This post has been edited 2 time(s), it was last edited by lborgia88 on 07-07-2010 at 05:17.
|
|
21-05-2009 14:31
|
|
lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
Ken transmutes to birdstyle and his G1 jet.
And we get all the recycled footage of Jun, Jinpei, Joe and Ken linking up with the God Phoenix.
On the bridge, an on-screen Dr. Nambu says in a very cheerful voice "Good morning, Science Ninja Team! I have something very interesting here for you all to take a look at," as if he's hosting a children's TV show.
What he's got is film footage from a patrol ship of some icebergs in the ocean.
Jinpei and Ryu are impressed by the icebergs' size, but as they watch, one of the icebergs sinks into the ocean quickly.
Now Ken asks Dr. Nambu to replay that part, noting that these icebergs are moving against, not with, the prevailing ocean currents.
Joe concurs with Ken's assessment.
Dr. Nambu praises Ken's observation skills, as Jinpei (playing with his bolas) pipes up that he thinks it's weird that one of the icebergs suddenly sank too.
"You're practically an adult member of the Team, aren't you?" says Dr. Nambu to Jinpei, a tad patronizingly but Jinpei is pleased and laughs "Thanks, Doc!" before accidently bonking himself in the head with his bolas.
Ken orders Ryu to take the God Phoenix north, the direction the icebergs were moving.
Somewhere at sea, dozens of icebergs are clustered together, and we see the entrance to a Galactor base in the side of one of them, with two goons standing guard on a platform outside.
The narrator informs us that Galactor "defeated many nuclear powered ships with its beast, Ice-kander, and transported those frozen ships here, to this arctic base" as we see that the ships in question are indeed inside the base, and coated in ice.
"They took the nuclear reactor from the passenger ship and kept the aircraft carriers and submarines to use as weapons," the narrator tells us, "And the ships' passengers were sent to the human conversion laboratory, to be transformed into Galactor's minions." Um, that doesn't sound good.
Large elevator cars full of nervous passengers from the cruise ship are descending.
The man in the wheechair and the little girl are part of one group. "My old body is sick," he tells the little girl, "And I don't know how many days it has left in it."
Poor kid, her father's just been killed and now her father-substitute tells her he's dying. She says a doctor could help him, but he tells her that his sickness is one even doctors can't cure. She stares at him, perhaps too young to really comprehend, and she tells him that he has to get better, and that he mustn't give in to the sickness.
He holds her hand and tells her that he feels braver now and isn't scared of anything anymore, as she hugs him.
Just then, the elevator stops and the doors open. Galactor goons order everyone out of the elevator. As the little girl helps the man, pushing the back of his wheelchair, a goon says "Hurry up, you little brat!" and smacks her hard.
This sends her sprawling face-first on the floor. The man demands to know how the goon "Could ever hit an innocent child like that?" but gets "Shut up, you old fool!" for a reply, and a kick to the back of his chair that sends him careening down the corridor into a wall.
He tumbles out of his chair on to the floor as the little girl looks up, distressed to see this. She runs to the man, asking him if he's okay, and then he shakes his fist at the goon and says "Just you wait, Galactor scum!"
Now, we cut to the God Phoenix, flying over the cluster of icebergs. Joe calls it "a big mess" and says "there's no telling which iceberg is the one we want."
Ken tells a suddenly pink-cowled Jun to bring the electronic radar online.
But even before they use it, Ken says "What's that?" "That" appears to be some kind of mechanical... thing (a periscope?) poking out of the water amidst all the icebergs. They all agree that it must be where the base is located and Ken tells Ryu to bring them closer. He lands the God Phoenix on the ocean's surface, and Ken and Jun now appear on the dome. They both leap and soar from the dome, as the God Phoenix then plunges below the surface.
Commercial break!
This post has been edited 3 time(s), it was last edited by lborgia88 on 07-07-2010 at 05:18.
|
|
|
21-05-2009 14:54
|
|
lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
Ken and Jun are still soaring through the air.
[Saturn: "Ken and Jun are flying towards the base."]
They swoop in on the platform where the two goons are standing guard at the base's entrance -Ken takes out one and Jun the other, and they're sent tumbling into the ocean below. With that, Ken and Jun enter the base and run down the long entrance corridor.
[Saturn: "They get into the base and find the nuclear powered cruiser."
They reach a very large interior docking bay where all the stolen ships (now free of ice) are being kept, and watch for a moment. Jun identifies one of the ships as the missing passenger cruise ship and as Ken says "Rock and roll," she then leaps up very high to an elevated walkway. "Whoa!" says Ken, watching. Clearly he's impressed at her athleticism, and the fact that she's literally gotten the jump on him.
Or is he? Jun is immediately confronted, from behind, by an armed goon and she surrenders without a fight. Is this part of some plan?
[Saturn: "Only minutes pass by and the Tatsunoko team really feels that there shouldn't be one episode where Jun is not going to play the damsel in distress, and here, as usual, Jun is caught by the goons (I don't understand why she doesn't use her yoyo, it is just one goon, after all), but no worries, the heroic Eagle is always ready to help."]
Seeing all this, Ken goes "Ohh!" and then he leaps up and conceals himself in the ceiling beams. Jun is ordered into a car-like vehicle by the goon. However, at that moment, the goon is grabbed from behind by Ken and dispatched. Ken then joins Jun inside the car, and she says "Thanks for the help, Ken." Hmmph -I still think she could have taken out that goon herself, but then, I can also see why she might like inspiring Ken to be all chivalrous on her behalf. Soon, the car starts moving and they are cruising fast down a long corridor, along with other cars.
[Saturn: "Ken and Jun get into a car and the car starts moving along the track. Jun asks Ken whether he knows where they are going, but Ken states that fact that he is not driving the car, so why don't they just enjoy the scenery, or even better, make the most of their time alone in the car doing something 'hot' to counter the cold weather? Okay, maybe not; it is just my wishful thinking,  "]
"Ken, where is this car taking us, huh?"
"How am I supposed to know where it's taking us? Do I look like I'm driving it to you?"
Sheesh, Ken -some people do ask rhetorical questions as a way to make conversation, you know. No need for what my mother would call "a snotty answer." Next time, Jun, take out the goon yourself!
"Getting all worked up won't do any good anyway," continues Ken, not helping himself any here (she's hardly "all worked up"), "Let's just let Galactor give us a tour."
Suddenly all the cars stop and give way to another red car that's zipping along, flashing a red alarm.
"Let's try following that car," says Ken, "Something's up."
"But we can't drive this car off its course, though, can we?" asks Jun.
"Then let's just try pushing this button," says Ken, frowning, as Jun also frowns and blocks his hand from the button, interjecting "If we make a wrong move, they'll notice us!"
At that moment, their car and all the other cars start moving again, and Ken smirks and snaps his fingers, saying "OK, then you'd better do a good job following him."
Hee, as much as I like Ken, I'm inclined to think he's being a little bit of a jerk here, but anyway...
Somehow or other, they do follow the red car, as the narrator tells us, "Into the very heart of the arctic base."
[Saturn: "Ken and Jun later follow the 'patrol' car (with very stupid, unsuspecting goons inside) into a place with the best, if not the most confusing, traffic signs of all time."]
We cut to an operating room, where a surgical lamp is descending from the ceiling over an operating table, and a really creepy looking surgeon is adjusting his gloves. Now we see that the "patient" is the little girl, blindfolded.
[Saturn: "The purple person and some green people are going to drill the girl (wonder why Galactor chose this girl, of all people, to be transformed into a Galactor minion -perhaps her disproportionately huge head makes Galactor think that finally they will have a 'brainy' minion). I also notice that they are all wearing white scrubs, which is weird because I know that scrubs are mostly green or blue, but then I remember that white actually signifies 'death' in Asian culture, well then, how appropriate."]
Just feet away, the man in the wheelchair is being restrained by creepy looking members of the surgical staff, as he yells "Stop! How can you dare do such cruel things to a child?"
[Saturn: "The old man tries to persuade the purple and green people to take him instead. I am much more confused on why this old man is inside the operating room in the first place. Perhaps Galactor need a spectator to cheer them up?"]
We briefly cut to Ken and Jun's car, still following the red car, before we're back to the man, saying "Can't you hear what I'm saying, you monster?" The surgeon, unsurprisingly, is indifferent to his protests and says "Let's begin." Wait, isn't that Katse's voice? 
Ken and Jun are still in their car, zooming along behind the red car with the alarm. Back in the operating room, several holes open up in the surgical lamp, and a bunch of nasty, pointy-looking drills emerge, all spinning rapidly and moving towards the little girl. Even at my age, I find this part quite disturbing! The man begs for her to be spared, but no one's listening.
Back to Ken and Jun, just before the red car is about to take a separate road from their car, they leap out of their car and land on the back of the red car without its occupants, two goons, noticing. Now we, and Ken and Jun, see that they've just arrived at the operating room itself, just as those horrible drills are nearing the little girl.
In a pretty cool sequence, Ken and then Jun smash through the window into the operating room, send the surgical team flying with kicks to the head and yoyo strikes, and pull the little girl off the table just before the drills pierce her.
[Saturn: "The drills are coming out from the ceiling, ready to drill the girl, but as usual, at the last critical second, Ken breaks the glass and comes to the rescue."]
I probably should know better than to ask how skewering the girl with a bunch of drills was going to "convert" her into one of "Galactor's minions," but I can't help but wonder.
[Saturn: "Galactor, not surprisingly (considering how stupid they are) ask these two 'familiar' birdies who they are, and Ken and Jun politely introduce themselves for the 100th time. Surprise, surprise (well, for idiots anyway) the purple person in the white scrubs is actually Katse (at least now we know that he is a hygiene-freak). Before running away as usual, Katse gives a parting gift for the people in the OR."]
This post has been edited 2 time(s), it was last edited by lborgia88 on 07-07-2010 at 05:20.
|
|
|
21-05-2009 15:45
|
|
lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
Ken and Jun (who's holding the little girl) now square off against the head surgeon -who laughs and then rips off his surgical mask and gown to reveal that he is indeed Berg Katse! Katse wastes no time congratulating them for finding the base but telling them it's the last they'll ever see before activating a bomb and then fleeing the room with other surgical staff members. The door seals behind them, trapping Ken, Jun, the little girl and the old man in the wheelchair.
[Saturn: "Ken and the others are trapped inside the OR. Wait, I thought that Ken broke a glass just now to get into the OR. Oh well, another continuity error here."]
Ken tries unsuccessfully to break down the door, but almost immediately the man grabs the bomb in his lap and sends his chair speeding towards the door, shoving Ken aside with an "Out of my way!"
[Saturn: "The old man is furious that Gatchaman is taking all the spotlight and wants to be the hero of the day by using himself as a bomb detonator."]
Of course, the bomb detonates just as he reaches the door and blows the man up, but it also blows the door apart too, so his sacrifice is not in vain.
"Oh, Mister, why did you have to die?" asks the little girl, who I would think must really be traumatized now, "You just became my friend and you were so nice to me." Then, which is both sad and sort of awful too, she walks over and picks up the the only thing left of him -the pipe he'd been smoking when she first met him. Ken and Jun exchange of look of mutual dismay.
[Saturn: "The only thing left from the old man is his pipe (which is not scratched at all). Hmm, no body parts or the old man's clothing strew around? Only metal scraps? Now I have a suspicion that the old man is actually a robot "]
An alarm begins sounding, and Ken and Jun realize it's time to get moving. They run down a corridor, pulling the little girl along between them.
[Saturn: "Ken, Jun and the girl are leaving the base. Judging from the way Ken and Jun are holding the girl's hands, the girl will be lucky if she doesn't dislocate her elbows."]
Ken takes out a goon and sends Jun on ahead with the little girl as he pulls a hand grenade from the goon's pocket and hurls it at a bunch of goons running up behind them.
Now we see the cruise ship in the interior docking bay. Ken is instructing the ship's captain to get the passengers back on board the ship and get out "as quick as you can!" The captain is concerned about Ken and Jun, but Ken tells him "We'll be fine."
Jun is setting an explosive charge inside the base.
[Saturn: "It is Jun's turn now to leave a parting gift for Galactor."]
She finishes, dodges some gunfire, and gets away just as it detonates with a massive explosion. The entire base begins to collapse into rubble, debris and flames. We even see chunks of ceiling fall on two of the cars like Ken and Jun had been riding in, and they burst into flames too. Finally, the entire iceberg shatters and collapses into the sea, just as the cruise ship emerges to sail away safely. On a screen, Katse sees the cruise ship leaving, and he vows he "won't succumb to the Science Ninja Team this time! Not again!"
[Saturn: "The base explodes and the ocean liner escapes from the base."
Katse pushes a red button, and another iceberg opens up to reveal the walrus mecha, or the fearsome Ice-kander, I should say.
[Saturn: Not to be outdone, Katse come out with his latest mecha, the "Walrus" mecha, with paws instead of flippers, hehe!"]
The God Phoenix swoops by (reminding me that Joe, Ryu and Jinpei sure haven't had much to do yet this mission) and the Ice-kander is now in pursuit. It fires two missiles.
[Saturn: "The 'Walrus' mecha hits the God Phoenix by using missiles from its chest. Another proof of Tatsunoko's fascination with chests. "]
The missiles don't do the job, so now its paws detach, as bigger missiles, and fly at the God Phoenix -these hit the underbelly of the God Phoenix and we see everyone on the bridge (even Ken and Jun are now there) reacting to the blow, but the God Phoenix flies on.
"What is that thing?" asks Ryu, and Ken explains it's what's responsible for freezing the nuclear powered ships.
Now the Ice-kander is, as Jinpei notes with alarm, "Following us at really high speed!" It then wraps the God Phoenix in a half dozen "whiskers" that extend from its head. Ryu is eventually able to break the God Phoenix free, and as Ken notes that the mecha is "persistent," it comes after them again and tries to blast the God Phoenix with a spray of rainbow-colored laser beams. Ryu takes the God Phoenix into a dive, evading the beams, so now the Ice-kander blasts them with its icy breath, and the God Phoenix begins to coat with ice.
[Saturn: "The 'Walrus' mecha attacks again by wrapping the God Phoenix with its whiskers, firing a 'rainbow' beam, and finally blowing a blizzard that encases the God Phoenix in ice."]
On board, Ken and Joe concur that this is indeed a good time for the firebird technique. It not only melts off the ice, but the Ice-kander flies into them while they're in firebird mode (not a smart move there, Galactor!) and soon the Ice-kander is just flaming wreckage falling into the ocean.
[Saturn: "All of the above attacks are no match for the firebird technique, and Galactor loses again."]
Katse's escape pod surfaces, and on board he bangs his fist on the console and curses the Science Ninja Team, and vows he'll "create a even deadlier weapon and murder you all next time!" and then he chortles evilly.
The last scene is Ken and Jun, in birdstyle, waving good bye to the little girl, who is back on the cruise ship with the Captain, waving to them as she says things like "Bye bye, birdies!" and the cruise ship sails off into the sunset as seagulls fly overhead.
[Saturn: "In the ending scene, Ken and Jun are saying good by to the girl and the captain."]
The final shot is of the little girl, staring out to sea and thinking of "Mister," who sacrificed himself to save her, holding his pipe in her hands as tears well in her eyes.
[Saturn: "The girl later reminisces about the old man. Perhaps she is so caught up in emotion that she ties her ribbon on the right side of her head, instead of the usual position on the left side of her head."]
(Thank you, Saturn, for your screencaps and comments!)
This post has been edited 1 time(s), it was last edited by lborgia88 on 07-07-2010 at 05:22.
|
|
|
21-05-2009 16:28
|
|
lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
You know, that makes a heck of a lot more sense, to introduce the man in the wheelchair as a relative of the little girl. I mean, really, it's pretty callous to send a girl that young who's just lost her father on a ship alone! My parents sent my brother alone from Canada to Germany in the 1970s to spend the summer with the family of a scientist colleague of my father's, but he was 13, he went on a plane, and no one important to him had just died three days earlier!
I agree with you, Gogirl, that Jun could have done in that goon if she'd really needed to. The "find out more information" angle is, I think, better than the "let-Ken-feel-all-manly" angle, though! Yes, that's what she was doing...
Springie, I'm so proud of myself that yesterday I actually noticed Jun's pink-instead-of-white cowl -for once, I actuallly managed to notice a blooper!  (just luck from hitting "pause" at the right moment, though. I am pleased, too, that I got the BF interested enough in what I was watching that he sat through the most of the episode with me, and was entertained.)
|
|
|
22-05-2009 00:21
|
|
saturn
Boardie
I am a Swan.
Registration Date: 21-05-2008
Posts: 324
|
|
|
|
22-05-2009 08:47
|
|
Transmute Jun
Queen of the Bird Missiles
I am a Swan.
40 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 04-04-2007
Posts: 20978
|
|
|
|
22-05-2009 15:05
|
|
lborgia88
Gatchamaniac
I am a Condor.
0 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 27-06-2007
Posts: 5991
|
|
|
|
22-05-2009 15:46
|
|
Springie
Her Royal Fluffiness...Swan of Swans...
I am a Swan.
6 fics uploaded
Registration Date: 12-06-2006
Posts: 8028
|
|
Maddy...I always loved that Ken/ Jun scene, too...I always wanted them to be holding hands...they were standing close enough... 
And speaking of standing close...at the end of many episodes, they end with the team just standing and looking at the sunset, mountains, etc.
And in some eps,(like the Peacock one)...some members are standing together and the others hang behind...in that ep...and in many eps, Jun and Ken are standing close together, but they never hold hands (of course, sometimes his hand is on her shoulder).
It seems very "stiff" to me...is this a Japanese thing? Does the hand on the shoulder mean anything besides friendship?
(I'm thinking about an Inuyasha episode where this is mentioned...the lustful monk pats the demon slayer on the chest and she says, "Why can't he put his hand somewhere more romantic, like on my shoulder?")
__________________
There is no problem that cannot be solved with time, patience, and a judicious amount of high explosives.
|
|
|
19-03-2010 10:29
|
|
|
[1]
2
next »
-->
Members browsing this thread: none
|
Pages (2):
[1]
2
next »
|
|
|
|
|
and a 
