Techno Police 21c
Encyclopedia
is a Japan
ese anime
made by Toho Productions and released to the theatrical screen in 1982. It was dubbed into English by Hong Kong
voice actors.
This is an early anime presentation for a slightly older audience than that of children's cartoons, at a time when there wasn't much competition and before the cliché
s were established for this genre of action.
The anime was made during the Cold War
, and so the tank was hijacked from a cargo plane resembling the B-2
bomber, and was designed to withstand the neutron bomb
, even if its crew would be killed by that weapon, for the tank was computerized to continue to fight on its own. When out of ammunition, the tank would automatically explode.
One point which marks the animation studio of this film is that to save money there are many scenes which are monochromatic. When the hijackers are in the vehicle they stole, everything on screen is blue; when Eleanor starts to drive it back, everything on screen is red. Another scene towards the beginning has the Techno Police headquarters in blue.
man in what is presumably the American Southwest, who is called to join the police force in Centinel City (the name comes from centennial, not sentinel), where he is only expected to last six months. He can be described as flighty, although as the movie progresses, he gets more serious. He is also known to wreck his motorcycles frequently in pursuit of criminals; he is shown in the beginning of the movie leaping from one onto a truck, and as the movie proper opens, his cycle is yet again trashed, barely making it to the station. An African American partner eyes the bike, and inquires "how many that is." Ken shrugs, and replies that it might be the sixth that month.
Ken's team consists of a woman named Eleanor and a husky male named Gora Kosaka (whom, to the Japanese audience, has a feminine name) and who grows flowers. Each has a robot to direct for police work—not a Giant Robot that they would control from inside, but a robot that is crudely presented as stupid, as a computer has to be trained to do everything. Ken's, Blader, is blue and white and equipped with a projectile handcuff, much like C.O.P.S.' LongArm
. Eleanor's, Scanny, is red and has a female figure, but whose face is composed entirely of blinking LEDs, and which has two cables streaming from the neck, and which plug into computer sockets. Gora's robot, Vigobus, is bigger, and is stronger than the other two (at one point in the movie, it lifts the tank that the anime is built around, and keeps it immobile for several minutes with some strain; it lets go only when the tank becomes active again). These robots ride in the back of a large, six-wheeled, roofless police car which is red and white. A trailer is attached to pull along Gora's robot. Ken sits in the middle to drive it; Eleanor on his right and his other partner on his left.
, designed by the United States Air Force
. The hijackers, who appear inside the tank after getting away from a recently-committed bank robbery, were hired by a shadowy group backed by a foreign nation seeking an edge in their military. The tank carries six ATGM launchers, three to each side of the turret, and a laser-based machine-gun-esque installment, in addition to its rifled main gun. The tank's treads are dual-mounted (the tread is split in half, making four sets of treads for the tank).
Another tank involved is the MBT-90D, which are dispatched by the Army to take out the tank. Despite having at least a platoon
of these, the MBT-99 still evades capture. The M-90Ds are armed with a three-barreled autocannon, three ATGM missile launchers and its main cannon, mounted on the front instead of on a turret.
The MBT-99's hijackers are forced out by Ken and his team. Eleanor then enters to study the tank, and it starts up on its own, having been programmed by the hijackers to head for a pier and drive off its end so as to rendezvous with an enemy submarine. The rest of the movie is made up of the chase through the city, resulting in the destruction of another bank
and various collateral damage.
Unfortunately, the project hit problems. After 4 years in development there was only enough animation produced for a single episode. The series was scrapped and, in order to recover some of the costs, the existing footage was compiled into a 80 minute movie and distributed by Toho.
Set in a futuristic 2001 in the Hi-Tech yet violent and crime filled metropolis of Centinel City. A reckless young traffic officer Kyosuke (Ken) is hand picked by for a special assignment far from his countryside home. He was chosen to become one of the first officers of a newly created arm of the SCPD, one which uses robotic assistants, known as Technoids, to give them an edge over the criminals. Together with his robot Blader and fellow Technopolice members Kosuga (Gora) (accompanied by the super strong Technoid Vigorus) and Eleanor (with the computer hacking female robot Scanny) Kyosuke take on the well equipped criminals that plague the city, including a runaway, prototype military tank.
Of the staff that worked on the aborted TV show two are most notable. The first is Joe Hisaishi
, who provides the synth-jazz score and is well known in the west for having created the score for nearly all Hayao Miyazaki
and 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano's
movies including Spirited Away
, Princess Mononoke
and Nausicaa (Miyazaki) and Sonatine, Hana-bi, Brother (Beat Takeshi). Working as part of the animation staff is Shoji Kawamori
who is now famous for his mecha designs particularly on the seminal Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
Scale model kit company Hoshima, in anticipation of the proposed TV show, had produced a number of tie-in plastic kits of Technopolice's vehicles and robots, including a good number of designs which never animated. These were still released, in hopes to make money from the movie instead. As well as 1/16 scale kits of the Techroids etc other items of merchandising included a soundtrack, on LP and cassette and the eventual release of the movie on both VHS and Laserdisc.
Undeterred by Technopolice's failure Toshimichi Suzuki returned to his original idea, some years later reworking it as the OAV series Bubblegum Crisis
, which faired slightly better but in the end suffered a similar fate.
In 1983 Technopolice 21c was dubbed by those ubiquitous Hong Kong Kung Fu voice actors (see also Battle For Moon Station Dallos & Locke the Superpower). The company responsible for the commissioning this new English track is unknown, they also made a few changes to the movie, moving the title card to the very start and pausing the individual shots of the opening credits to remove the Japanese text without shortening the running time or messing with the music. Also the end credits are missing entirely but otherwise the content of the movie itself is unchanged.
This English language version was released on video in the UK by Mountain Video (Frankenstein
, Dracula
, Mazinger Z
) under the slightly shorter title Techno Police. With the advent of the 1984 Video Recordings Act the video was withdrawn from shelves and disappeared into obscurity never to be re-released.
Re-edited and redubbed scenes from Techno Police also appeared in Mountain Video's obscure Flash! No.1 'Video Comic' and it's spin-off Flash! Robot Issue. These two tapes, released on VHS, Betamax and V-2000, were intended to advertise their collection of childrens by collecting short clips of them together in a mock comic-book-on-video format. Both issues were released in 1983.
The American market wouldn't get to see Blader (now known as just Blade) in action until 1987 when Techno Police found the shelves thanks to Celebrity's Just For Kids (Battle for Earth Station S/1, Revenge of the Ninja Warrior) , and later from Best Film and Video. All three versions are the same.
Outside of the English speaking world unedited video versions of Technopolice 21c were seen in France, Germany and Spain with a theatrical run in Cuba.
, Dangaioh
, Patlabor
, AD Police, Armatage 3 and Cyber City Oedo 808
Release Date: April 15, 1995
Run Time: 80 minutes
ASIN: 6303388019
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese anime
Anime
is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....
made by Toho Productions and released to the theatrical screen in 1982. It was dubbed into English by Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
voice actors.
This is an early anime presentation for a slightly older audience than that of children's cartoons, at a time when there wasn't much competition and before the cliché
Cliché
A cliché or cliche is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel. In phraseology, the term has taken on a more technical meaning,...
s were established for this genre of action.
The anime was made during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
, and so the tank was hijacked from a cargo plane resembling the B-2
B-2 Spirit
The Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit is an American heavy bomber with low observable stealth technology designed to penetrate dense anti-aircraft defenses and deploy both conventional and nuclear weapons. The bomber has a crew of two and can drop up to eighty -class JDAM GPS-guided bombs, or sixteen ...
bomber, and was designed to withstand the neutron bomb
Neutron bomb
A neutron bomb or enhanced radiation weapon or weapon of reinforced radiation is a type of thermonuclear weapon designed specifically to release a large portion of its energy as energetic neutron radiation rather than explosive energy...
, even if its crew would be killed by that weapon, for the tank was computerized to continue to fight on its own. When out of ammunition, the tank would automatically explode.
One point which marks the animation studio of this film is that to save money there are many scenes which are monochromatic. When the hijackers are in the vehicle they stole, everything on screen is blue; when Eleanor starts to drive it back, everything on screen is red. Another scene towards the beginning has the Techno Police headquarters in blue.
Characters
Set at the start of the 21st century, its main character is Ken, a motorcycle-mounted highway patrolHighway patrol
A highway patrol is either a police unit created primarily for the purpose of overseeing and enforcing traffic safety compliance on roads and highways, or a detail within an existing local or regional police agency that is primarily concerned with such duties.Duties of highway patrols or traffic...
man in what is presumably the American Southwest, who is called to join the police force in Centinel City (the name comes from centennial, not sentinel), where he is only expected to last six months. He can be described as flighty, although as the movie progresses, he gets more serious. He is also known to wreck his motorcycles frequently in pursuit of criminals; he is shown in the beginning of the movie leaping from one onto a truck, and as the movie proper opens, his cycle is yet again trashed, barely making it to the station. An African American partner eyes the bike, and inquires "how many that is." Ken shrugs, and replies that it might be the sixth that month.
Ken's team consists of a woman named Eleanor and a husky male named Gora Kosaka (whom, to the Japanese audience, has a feminine name) and who grows flowers. Each has a robot to direct for police work—not a Giant Robot that they would control from inside, but a robot that is crudely presented as stupid, as a computer has to be trained to do everything. Ken's, Blader, is blue and white and equipped with a projectile handcuff, much like C.O.P.S.' LongArm
Longarm
The Longarm books are a series of western novels featuring the character of Custis Long, who is nicknamed Longarm, a U.S. Deputy Marshal based in Denver, Colorado in the 1880s. The series is written by "Tabor Evans", a house pseudonym used by a number of authors. Lou Cameron helped create the...
. Eleanor's, Scanny, is red and has a female figure, but whose face is composed entirely of blinking LEDs, and which has two cables streaming from the neck, and which plug into computer sockets. Gora's robot, Vigobus, is bigger, and is stronger than the other two (at one point in the movie, it lifts the tank that the anime is built around, and keeps it immobile for several minutes with some strain; it lets go only when the tank becomes active again). These robots ride in the back of a large, six-wheeled, roofless police car which is red and white. A trailer is attached to pull along Gora's robot. Ken sits in the middle to drive it; Eleanor on his right and his other partner on his left.
Plot synopsis
The plot consists of a chase of a hijacked MBT-99A tankTank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...
, designed by the United States Air Force
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
. The hijackers, who appear inside the tank after getting away from a recently-committed bank robbery, were hired by a shadowy group backed by a foreign nation seeking an edge in their military. The tank carries six ATGM launchers, three to each side of the turret, and a laser-based machine-gun-esque installment, in addition to its rifled main gun. The tank's treads are dual-mounted (the tread is split in half, making four sets of treads for the tank).
Another tank involved is the MBT-90D, which are dispatched by the Army to take out the tank. Despite having at least a platoon
Platoon
A platoon is a military unit typically composed of two to four sections or squads and containing 16 to 50 soldiers. Platoons are organized into a company, which typically consists of three, four or five platoons. A platoon is typically the smallest military unit led by a commissioned officer—the...
of these, the MBT-99 still evades capture. The M-90Ds are armed with a three-barreled autocannon, three ATGM missile launchers and its main cannon, mounted on the front instead of on a turret.
The MBT-99's hijackers are forced out by Ken and his team. Eleanor then enters to study the tank, and it starts up on its own, having been programmed by the hijackers to head for a pier and drive off its end so as to rendezvous with an enemy submarine. The rest of the movie is made up of the chase through the city, resulting in the destruction of another bank
Bank
A bank is a financial institution that serves as a financial intermediary. The term "bank" may refer to one of several related types of entities:...
and various collateral damage.
Development
Techno Police 21c started out life in 1978 as an idea from Artmic Studio founder Toshimichi Suzuki. Work began on developing the idea into a TV series as a co-production between Artmic and Studio Nue. The technology to be featured in the series was heavily researched with the intention of making the future as believable as possible.Unfortunately, the project hit problems. After 4 years in development there was only enough animation produced for a single episode. The series was scrapped and, in order to recover some of the costs, the existing footage was compiled into a 80 minute movie and distributed by Toho.
Set in a futuristic 2001 in the Hi-Tech yet violent and crime filled metropolis of Centinel City. A reckless young traffic officer Kyosuke (Ken) is hand picked by for a special assignment far from his countryside home. He was chosen to become one of the first officers of a newly created arm of the SCPD, one which uses robotic assistants, known as Technoids, to give them an edge over the criminals. Together with his robot Blader and fellow Technopolice members Kosuga (Gora) (accompanied by the super strong Technoid Vigorus) and Eleanor (with the computer hacking female robot Scanny) Kyosuke take on the well equipped criminals that plague the city, including a runaway, prototype military tank.
Of the staff that worked on the aborted TV show two are most notable. The first is Joe Hisaishi
Joe Hisaishi
, known professionally as , is a composer and director known for over 100 film scores and solo albums dating back to 1981.While possessing a stylistically distinct sound, Hisaishi's music has been known to explore and incorporate different genres, including minimalist, experimental electronic,...
, who provides the synth-jazz score and is well known in the west for having created the score for nearly all Hayao Miyazaki
Hayao Miyazaki
is a Japanese manga artist and prominent film director and animator of many popular anime feature films. Through a career that has spanned nearly fifty years, Miyazaki has attained international acclaim as a maker of animated feature films and, along with Isao Takahata, co-founded Studio Ghibli,...
and 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano's
Takeshi Kitano
is a Japanese filmmaker, comedian, singer, actor, film editor, presenter, screenwriter, author, poet, painter, and one-time video game designer who has received critical acclaim, both in his native Japan and abroad, for his highly idiosyncratic cinematic work. The famed Japanese film critic...
movies including Spirited Away
Spirited Away
is a 2001 Japanese animated fantasy-adventure film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki and produced by Studio Ghibli. The film tells the story of Chihiro Ogino, a sullen ten-year-old girl who, while moving to a new neighborhood and after her parents are transformed into pigs by the witch Yubaba,...
, Princess Mononoke
Princess Mononoke
is a 1997 epic Japanese animated historical fantasy feature film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki of Studio Ghibli. is not a name, but a general term in the Japanese language for a spirit or monster...
and Nausicaa (Miyazaki) and Sonatine, Hana-bi, Brother (Beat Takeshi). Working as part of the animation staff is Shoji Kawamori
Shoji Kawamori
is a Japanese anime creator, screenwriter and mechanical designer, having created or co-created such notable series as The Super Dimension Fortress Macross, The Vision of Escaflowne, Earth Maiden Arjuna, Genesis of Aquarion, Macross 7, and Macross Frontier. He is currently executive director at the...
who is now famous for his mecha designs particularly on the seminal Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
Scale model kit company Hoshima, in anticipation of the proposed TV show, had produced a number of tie-in plastic kits of Technopolice's vehicles and robots, including a good number of designs which never animated. These were still released, in hopes to make money from the movie instead. As well as 1/16 scale kits of the Techroids etc other items of merchandising included a soundtrack, on LP and cassette and the eventual release of the movie on both VHS and Laserdisc.
Undeterred by Technopolice's failure Toshimichi Suzuki returned to his original idea, some years later reworking it as the OAV series Bubblegum Crisis
Bubblegum Crisis
is a Japanese cyberpunk direct-to-video animated series. It displays strong influences from Blade Runner, also making occasional references to it.- Setting :...
, which faired slightly better but in the end suffered a similar fate.
In 1983 Technopolice 21c was dubbed by those ubiquitous Hong Kong Kung Fu voice actors (see also Battle For Moon Station Dallos & Locke the Superpower). The company responsible for the commissioning this new English track is unknown, they also made a few changes to the movie, moving the title card to the very start and pausing the individual shots of the opening credits to remove the Japanese text without shortening the running time or messing with the music. Also the end credits are missing entirely but otherwise the content of the movie itself is unchanged.
This English language version was released on video in the UK by Mountain Video (Frankenstein
Frankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...
, Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...
, Mazinger Z
Mazinger Z
, known briefly as Tranzor Z in United States, is a Super Robot manga and anime series created by Go Nagai. The first manga version was serialized in Shueisha Weekly Shōnen Jump from October 1972 to August 1973, and it later continued in Kodansha TV Magazine from October 1973 to September 1974. In...
) under the slightly shorter title Techno Police. With the advent of the 1984 Video Recordings Act the video was withdrawn from shelves and disappeared into obscurity never to be re-released.
Re-edited and redubbed scenes from Techno Police also appeared in Mountain Video's obscure Flash! No.1 'Video Comic' and it's spin-off Flash! Robot Issue. These two tapes, released on VHS, Betamax and V-2000, were intended to advertise their collection of childrens by collecting short clips of them together in a mock comic-book-on-video format. Both issues were released in 1983.
The American market wouldn't get to see Blader (now known as just Blade) in action until 1987 when Techno Police found the shelves thanks to Celebrity's Just For Kids (Battle for Earth Station S/1, Revenge of the Ninja Warrior) , and later from Best Film and Video. All three versions are the same.
Outside of the English speaking world unedited video versions of Technopolice 21c were seen in France, Germany and Spain with a theatrical run in Cuba.
Rerelease
In 1994/5 Techno Police was rereleased by Best Film & Video Co on NTSC VHS to cash in on the popular rise in anime and cyber punk with OAV's such as Bubblegum Crisis, AppleseedAppleseed (OVA)
is a cyberpunk-style anime OVA that takes place in the future. The anime, produced by Bandai Visual in 1988, is an adaptation of the manga, Appleseed created by Masamune Shirow. The anime departs from the manga's storyline and primarily has only the setting and characters in common...
, Dangaioh
Dangaioh
is an anime OVA series produced by Anime International Company studios and released in Japan in 1987. Dangaioh featured character designs by creator Toshiki Hirano, mechanical designs by Shoji Kawamori, and animation direction by Masami Ōbari.-Plot:...
, Patlabor
Patlabor
Patlabor also known as , is an anime and manga franchise created by Headgear, a group consisting of director Mamoru Oshii, writer Kazunori Itō, mecha designer Yutaka Izubuchi, character designer Akemi Takada, and manga artist Masami Yūki.The popular franchise included a manga, a TV series, two OVA...
, AD Police, Armatage 3 and Cyber City Oedo 808
Cyber City Oedo 808
is a seminal Cyberpunk anime set in the year 2808 in the megalopolis of Oedo . It was directed by Yoshiaki Kawajiri.- Plot :To combat computerised crime more effectively, the Cyber Police unit of the future Japanese city of Oedo has restarted the feudal practice of hōmen , employing hardened...
Release Date: April 15, 1995
Run Time: 80 minutes
ASIN: 6303388019
Credits
- Director: Masashi Matsumoto
- Writer: Yoshimitsu BannoYoshimitsu Bannois a Japanese director, best known for the cult-classic Godzilla vs. Hedorah, which he directed and co-wrote. Banno was a special guest at G-Fest XII in 2005. He is currently co-producing a new Godzilla film with Legendary Pictures.-Directing Credits:...
- Composer: Joe HisaishiJoe Hisaishi, known professionally as , is a composer and director known for over 100 film scores and solo albums dating back to 1981.While possessing a stylistically distinct sound, Hisaishi's music has been known to explore and incorporate different genres, including minimalist, experimental electronic,...