Outlanders (manga)

Outlanders begins in modern day Tokyo with the arrival of a Biomech, a giant, organic starship that easily destroys several Japanese Self-Defense Force (JSDF) helicopters. News photographer Tetsuya Wakatsuki comes face-to-face with the craft's occupant Kahm, crown princess of the technologically advanced, interstellar Santovasku Empire. She charges him, he manages to fend her off, and she retreats without her sword. Kahm's father, Emperor Quevas, is informed that the Santovaskuan "sacred planet" is infested with humans while the JSDF supreme commander Togo prepares for an impending war with the alien invaders. Battia Bureitin Rou, a Santovasku fleet commander and Kahm's best friend, is sent to retrieve the princess when she returns to the city in search of her sword. During a skirmish with the humans, Battia's ship takes heavy damage, which triggers the Biomech's self-destruct mechanism. Having found her sword and Tetsuya in his apartment, Kahm receives a warning from Battia and evacuates with Tetsuya as the entire Japanese archipelago is vaporized. Meanwhile, Tetsuya's boss, Aki Okazawa, is taken to Siberia by the JSDF. There she meets Neo, Togo's superior and the leader of the secret world political organization known as the Shadow Cabinet. He exposits that millions of years earlier Earth was the seat of the Ra Empire, torn apart in a civil war between two belligerants: the Yoma Clan and the progenitors of the current Santovasku Empire. Neo, himself a surviving Yoma from this conflict, tells Aki that her body houses the spirit of the Yoma witch Jilehr Maruda and that he wishes to utilize her immense power to exact revenge on the Santovasku. Shortly thereafter, Quevas gives the order for all human life to be exterminated, resulting in large portions Europe being bombarded by the empire. Neo awakens Jilehr within Aki and the assaulting platoon is instantly obliterated by her magic.

Tetsuya hears of Japan's fate and forces Kahm to return him to Earth. The two crash land in Germany and meet scavenger Raisa Vogel. They evade capture by German troops and Raisa splits off on her own. Kahm and Tetsuya discuss marrying to create a diplomatic alliance between the humans and Santovasku. The couple rendezvous with Kahm's Nuba Tribe servants, use her crashed ship's communicator to call for extraction, and set a course for the Santovasku imperial home world. Battia joins them. Kahm tells her she is denouncing her father's intention of arranging her marriage to produce a royal heir and is strategically marrying Tetsuya to stop the war. Once arriving and making their case, an unconvinced Quevas has Tetsuya arrested and sentences him to death then puts Kahm under house arrest. With the aid of Battia and the Nuba, they manage to escape and head for Earth again in hopes of gaining support from its military to fight the empire instead. Realizing their affection for one another has grown, Kahm and Tetsuya still intend to wed. Upon reaching Earth's orbit, Kahm pleads with empire affiliate Geobaldi to join their efforts, which he does following a duel with Tetsuya. Neo continues to groom Jilehr in exacting vengeance on the Santovasku. Togo, now the head of Earth's global armed forces, plots against the Yoma so that humanity alone may ultimately triumph so that he can achieve his own ambitions of galactic conquest.

The rebels land on Earth, reunite with Raisa, and have brief diplomatic talks with Togo before leaving. Togo then has Neo gunned down and initiates Operation Phoenix. This unveils the Earth's moon as an enormous weapon called Dola, which was built by the Ra Empire eons ago. Raisa and Aki both join the rebels and take part in Kahm and Tetsuya's wedding. The festivities are cut short when an imperial army group is sent to their location by Quevas to demolish Earth for Kahm's continued defiance. A large battle between the Santovasku and rebel squadron ensues. Aki becomes Jilehr once more and takes control of the rebel vessels while Togo gives the command to have Dola strike the battlefield frontlines. A substantial percentage of the Santovasku fleet is vanquished, but as Togo's team celebrates they receive a taunting call from Jilehr. Realizing the sorceress survived the initial blast, Togo desperately demands another to eliminate her. However, the humans lose control of the ancient weapon to Jilehr as she sets it on a collision course with Earth. After madly proclaiming his aspirations to rule the galaxy, the selfish Togo is assassinated by one of his officers just as Dola and planet impact, wiping out humanity.

The protagonists find that they have warped to the outskirts of the Santovasku imperial planet. Jilehr shows herself again, this time surrounded by the vengeful ghosts of the Yoma Clan. Jilehr causes the rebel Biomechs to fire on the planet, prompting Quevas to engage with her in a fierce battle of magic. Before the Yoma spirits succumb to the emperor's overwhelming abilities, Aki breaks free of Jilehr's hold and dies. Quevas subsequently appears aboard Kahm's spacecraft. He reveals his initial plan to reclaim Earth was to ensure the Yoma's eradication. He then teleports with his daughter to the planet's imperial palace. With Jilehr gone, the rebels regain control of their warships and breach the planet's defenses to rescue Kahm once more. Battia, Geobaldi, and Raisa all sacrifice their lives so that Tetsuya can reach the palace. Tetsuya proceeds to the royal throne room and is confronted by a hostile Kahm. With no memory of her husband due to the influence of her father's mind control, she attacks Tetsuya only to come to her senses moments later. A final confrontation between Quevas and Kahm ends with the princess fatally wounding the emperor with a sword stab. His death brings with it the destruction of the imperial planet and the Santovasku Empire. Kahm and Tetsuya manage to depart with the Nuba just as the planet explodes. Three years later, they have happily settled on the peaceful planet Ekoda. Now with quintuplet daughters and one son, Kahm and Tetsuya receive a visit from the souls of their deceased friends during an annual festival.

Outlanders was written and illustrated by Johji Manabe. As early as junior high school, he was creating fantasy and science fiction art including beautiful girls with swords and large, highly detailed spaceships.[4] Outlanders began as a project while he was in vocational school.[5] During his attendance, Manabe submitted some of his manga work to Tokyo-based publisher Hakusensha. One of his stories was featured its Monthly ComiComi magazine's readers contest in 1984 and Outlanders began serialization in the same publication within a year.[4][5][6][7] Outlanders debuted in the January 1985 issue.[8]

Manabe felt he had been given ample time to conceptualize and frame the narrative. Outlanders was his first attempt at space opera, a genre of which he had long been a fan. The author took inspiration from numerous science fiction properties, specifically the original Star Wars Trilogy, the Lensman series, and Flash Gordon.[3][6] His editors requested "an action story full of monsters, mayhem, and destruction."[9] This is partly reflected in the manga's earlier chapters, which showcase considerable more violence than its remainder.[6] However, because Manabe was not very fond of monsters, he compromised by creating the living, Biomech warships.[9] He did not initially plan for the crafts to be biological organsims. For instance, one imperial battleship began as an altered Macross spacecraft before several redesigns gave it an increasingly organic appearance.[10] Manabe simplified writing the plot as a war between Earth and the Santovasku Empire that would end with one winner and one loser, but did have some difficulty with getting the conflicts within each faction to "mesh."[9] Regarding the characters, Manabe found it challenging to develop each one's complex personality, so he "pretty much let them do their own thing" and "decided they could play their own roles as they pleased."[9] Kahm was the first character Manabe proposed for the editors, basing her art design on a sketch from his design school days.[10] As he lacked experience in clothing design prior to Outlanders, he remarked that "getting the characters and the Santovasku Army suited up was a real nightmare."[9]

At some point during the serialization of Outlanders, Manabe moved to Tokyo, opened his own manga studio, and hired full-time assistants to focus more on its production. Throughout its run, he wrote several related stories set in the Outlanders universe.[6] A prequel chapter titled The Key of Graciale (グラシェールの鍵, Gurashēru no Kagi) was featured in the January 1986 issue of Monthly ComiComi.[11] Outlanders was adapted into an anime OVA by Tatsunoko Production for a December 1986 release.[12][13] It was directed by Katsuhisa Yamada; was written by Kenji Terada and Sukehiro Tomita; and featured music composed by Kei Wakakusa.[14][15] The anime condenses roughly the first half of the manga into a single 48-minute episode. Manabe detested the OVA, considered its staff incompetent, and felt the sexually explicit ecchi scenes were overused.[16] Manabe originally planned Outlanders to be about ten tankōbon volumes of collected chapters in length. He lost his motivation before this could occur, partially blaming the anime adaptation and claiming his relationship with the publisher deteriorated after the OVA's release.[5] Outlanders ended its serialization in the November 1987 issue of Monthly ComiComi.[17] Hakusensha's release of the manga's eighth volume would be its last. An agreement was reached to release an aizōban edition of the manga shortly thereafter and tensions between Manabe and Hakusensha eventually cooled.[5]

Although sales and print circulation numbers have not been made widely available, Outlanders enjoyed commercial success in Japan to a degree that author Johji Manabe was able to open his own studio and employ assistants during its publication.[6] Jason Thompson critiqued the series in Manga: The Complete Guide as "a star-spanning epic adventure that gradually morphs into a drippy love story." He was impressed with the creative choices Manabe made with its action and science fiction elements early in the manga, but disliked how the series became increasingly more centered on the evolving romantic subplot between its two main protagonists.[81]

The Outlanders VHS from Dark Image Entertainment was the third-best selling anime for the month of November 1993 according to Capital City Distribution.[82] Critical reception for the Outlanders OVA has been mixed. Reviewers saw the plot as a standard yet light-hearted science fiction epic with large amounts of fan service and casual use of graphic violence, though views on its execution varied. The Anime Encyclopedia authors Jonathan Clements and Helen McCarthy found the story presented "considerable charm despite a fairly high violence quotient."[15] Anime News Network contributor Theron Martin noted it as "quite a bit more sexy and violent than the norm" and "a fun romp which does not concern itself with weighty matters like originality, cohesiveness, or logic."[14] Animefringe writer Joseph Luscik praised the anime's comedy and entertainment variety despite its short length and that "it cannot be considered a masterpiece of the genre."[83] Samuel Arbogast of T.H.E.M. Anime Reviews was much more negative and noted, "There's not quite enough violence to appease carnage aficionados, there isn't any romance to appease the romantics, and there isn't anything beyond some rather pointless nudity to appease the perverts."[84] Both Martin and Arbogast objected to the condensed nature of the OVA's narrative and its fast pacing, stating that knowledge of the manga would be a prerequisite to enjoying or understanding it.[14][84] Martin summarized, "The lack of adequate explanation for several key story elements also suggests that it was made specifically for fans of the manga, as newcomers to the franchise will be left scratching their heads over certain events."[14] Arbogast claimed the plot of Outlanders to be a plagiarism of the manga and anime series Urusei Yatsura, which also centers around the romance between a lecherous, human male and a scantifly-clad, alien female that starts when the latter's race attempts to invade Earth.[84] Clements and McCarthy merely saw these similarities as "affectionate nods."[15] Arbogast called the characters "badly lacking" and was particularly critical of its two leads, Tetsuya and Kahm, who fall in love but "have nothing in common other than that they're both young and stupid."[84] Luscik saw the mutual attraction between the protagonists as refreshing when opposed to the one-sided affection found in some other anime.[83]

Opinions on the technical aspects of the Outlanders OVA were also mixed. While Martin saw the art style and character designs as typical for its release mid-1980s era, he found fault with its animation. He stated that its slow frame rate made many of the movements "clunky" and outlined, "The action is staged well enough that the visual effect is passable as long as one doesn't dwell on the details, but this isn't a title that's going to win any technical awards."[14] Arbogast complimented the background art as "nicely detailed", but viewed the animation as poor overall, particularly its fight sequences and scenes involving nudity, surmising that it would inexcusable had it been released only a few years later.[84] The reviewer was equally unimpressed with the sound design including its background music, ending vocal theme, and the voice acting for the L.A. Hero English dub.[84] Martin commented on the ending theme as a "guitar-heavy rock number typical of '80s musical trends" and its background musical score as sounding appropriately inspired by American science fiction media like Star Trek.[14] Both Martin and Luscik praised the talent and delivery of the CPM dub performers and recognized that the licensor's allowance of fans to elect voice actors by vote would likely curb most criticism of their casting.[83][14] However, Martin downgraded the dub portion of his review due to the newer script altering the meaning of certain lines of the Japanese dialogue and unnecessarily adding in others for comedic effect.[14] Luscik contrarily appreciated these changes, stating, "There will be zero complaints here, since you spend most of the movie laughing at the witty script."[83]

• Outlanders (manga) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• Outlanders (anime) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia