Grendizer : The Man Who Fell to Earth

 We are in 1975. The Mecha (abbreviation of Mechanics) are already installed (thanks to Astroboy and Tetsujin 28-Go) on television, Great Mazinger has been succeeding Mazinger Z for just a year, but a new one will come and prick her his Place on Fuji TV: Goldorak.

The story is simple: a peaceful planet by the name of Euphor is ravaged by an ugly vega extraterrestrial empire. The Prince of Euphor (Actarus) managed to escape the massacre by taking with him the Goldorak combat machine. Recovered by Professor Procyon, an altruistic scientist, he will try to live in an ordinary way until the Empire Vega attacks the earth. He will then become a defender of our blue planet.

If the work leaves some legacy in the popular culture of today, it is also serious to its creator: Go Nagai. Creator of cult licenses like Devilman, Bomber X or Mazinger Z, he succeeds in imposing himself in different styles, something now extremely rare among mangakas.

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If Goldorak met a great success during its Japanese broadcast, it is less regular than Great Mazinger and is therefore cataloged as a little success when in Europe (in Belgium France and Italy in particular), it is a phenomenal success! In France, Goldorak arrived in 1978 on Antenna 2 at a time when buying an episode of Japanese cartoon costs around 20,000 francs where a cartoon produced in France returns to 30,000 francs per minute.

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However, this success comes in a period when Japanese animation is seen with a bad eye by various associations, journalists and sociologists with cultural differences that confuse (a lot of mental manipulation and death) and a style deemed aggressive. In 1981 the sociologist Liliane Lurçat even released a book entitled "At five, alone with Goldorak: the young child and television", which if he targets television in a global way and offers interesting questions (the beauty of Goldorak, is Is he kind? Can we look at him without loving him?), puts the focus in a fairly critical way on the series of Go Nagai.

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Here is a small extract with the testimony of a 5 year old girl.

 

"He scares Goldorak?"

 

- Yes, I scare me on TV, I don't like it to shout too hard.

 

- Could he attack you?

 

Oh no, it is that on TV, he can't go out because there is a tile, if there was no tile, he could go out.

 

-What would he do if he could go out?

 

- Well he would go out, he would attack me, he would kick. He can even attack my Goldorak parents, it is the strongest. He scares me, it always makes me cry with my eyes. »»

The debate of Club Dorothée will follow a decade later, a debate which gave the presenter the nickname "Goldorothy".

However, Goldorak was able to get out of his small screen to conquer other environments. First of all in comics with the official Goldorak manga then various and varied appearances in Spirou and Fantasio (the awakening of the Z), Léonard, Pif Gadget or even in a nauseous album of Asterix (the sky falls on him the head).

 

 

 

 

In music (and besides the credits of Bernard Minet), it was also a source of inspiration whether it be parodically as in the Fatals Picards and their Goldorak is dead or in a more serious way as for the pocket of the Random Access Memories of the Daft Punk or the quote at the beginning of born under the same star of IAM ("My God, why can't I live as any human being? Why is my destiny not to be able to stop fighting?" ).

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Let's stay in music and pay tribute to Shunsuke Kikuchi, iconic composer of Goldorak, but also of Albator Dragon Ball, Doraemon. He left us on April 24 at the age of 89.

 

 

 

 

As for the concrete, Goldorak was entitled in the 1970s to an inflatable statue about ten meters high on the storefronts of Rallye supermarkets (for more information on this specific subject, an exciting article exists) here

1978 Still with Mattel who releases a 60 cm version, colossal success to the point of causing stock breaks!

More recent since in 2018, a wrought iron Goldorak and 7 meters high is installed on a roundabout in the town of Thiers by the "Iron or Retr" company.

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And then at the level of Toy design What does it give?

We can already evoke the various VCDs of Goldorak, but also the versions of Sofubi!

Let us also quote Bearbrick Chogokin, the 400% Goldorak, but also that of Duke Fleed/Actarus in 100%.

There is also the Riobot Goldorak and Spazer Sen-Tile set that sets your eyes full.

Let's finish this article with what is surely the most ambitious piece Goldorak never offered on the site (with the Goldorak By Eric So) Ultra articulated, 50 cm high, armored with details, delivered with its vessel this Goldorak by Evolution Toy is an inevitable for fans of this iconic hero.

Find it here