On mecha and tokusatsu fansubbing
I first got involved into mecha as a whole back in 2005 when I discovered Super Robot Wars and torrents for the first time. I remember downloading all four of the unreleased-in-the-US Gundam shows to finally see what I’ve been missing all this time. It was great.
But once I started getting into the SRW 4Komas, I wanted to know more. I knew of robots named “Mazinger” and “Getter Robo”, but I knew NOTHING about them. I set out to see if I could them, too, but I had no luck–they were nowhere to be found.
Back in 2005, there was so very little that could be found online. At this point, fansubs for Ideon just started, no Brave shows except GaoGaiGar were fully-subbed, and the only shows from the 70’s that were readily available were Combattler and Voltes, but trying to get those was nigh-impossible.
I remember fansubs for Getter Robo G getting posted one at a time, but those ended (though it seems they can be found now).
As 2006 went on, things started to look up. GaoGaiGar got LICENSED and Super Robot Wars Original Generation was getting a US release! Holy crap! But these were still things that were readily available… nothing too big, besides the fact that we could actually buy them.
Towards the end of the year, someone uploaded all of Mazinger Z HK subs, and someone else ripped all of the VHS subs for Dancouga!! Of course, I quickly learned that Mazinger Z was boring (especially with those godawful subs) and that Dancouga sucked, but it was MORE. Also at about this time, the subs for Ideon concluded, putting to rest all those stupid rumors about the show’s ending.
For awhile, I don’t recall there being any more new-old stuff. Some groups would pick up projects and not finish them, and whathaveyou. In 2007 I was getting into tokusatsu, and that was a similar case: lots of new stuff, almost no old stuff.
What I’m trying to get at is… remember those days? Remember when the mecha genre was such an unexplored frontier of content? It’s amazing how far we’ve come. Now you can find torrents for three other complete Brave shows, Zambot and Daitarn, Xabungle, some old Force Five tapes, Dragonar, ALL of the original Getter Robo, Dougram, a few Showa-Era Rider shows, the ENTIRE Heisei Rider era, domestic releases of GOLION AND DAIRUGGER… Is it everything? Not even close. But we’re getting there.
I’m so happy that we can finally see all of these shows and decide for ourselves what’s good and what’s crap, without having to go by third-hand information or just guessing what happens based on SRW games. But someday, we may just have it all… and maybe I’ll miss all that mystery.
eh fuck it, let’s watch some goddamn robot anime.
