Space Adventure: Cobra

This was another favorite show of mine from the early 80s. Based on the comics by Buichi Terasawa (who I later got to know and have dinner with a couple of times), it’s about a space adventurer who often butts heads with the Space Pirates Guild. Assisted by his android pal, Lady, Cobra has a gun grafted to his missing right forearm, called the “Psycho-Gun”. It is fueled by psychic energy and is very powerful. He is able to hide with with a fully functioning realistic arm sleeve.

The music was also by Yuji Ohno, who did that great Lupin III jazz score. I have the original soundtracks on vinyl also.

It was a very cool series but didn’t last too long, unfortunately. Terasawa’s art and storytelling were really excellent. I heard a year or so ago that he had suffered a brain tumor so I don’t know how he’s doing. They did operate on it.

I still have all the episodes on VHS in Japanese. And the movie. 

COBRA was awesome!  The animation and designs in that show were mindblowing for an anime TV series!  (I could expect no less from Tokyo Movie Shinsha at that time.) Arnold Schwarzenegger’s TOTAL RECALL was inspired in plot by this series!  You could say, in some way, that it was a remake.

Yuuji Oono’s score is awesome.  He also did the score for MIGHTY ORBOTS (also by TMS), my all-time favorite US-coproduced anime ever!

Posted by John Cassidy  on  11/27  at  12:43 PM

Actually, Total Recall is a movie version of the story “We can Remember it for you Wholesale” by Phillip K Dick. That story was the inspiration for Cobra, which came out a few years ahead of TR.

Terasawa was influenced a lot by American comics artists and fiction. He was a big fan of PKD.

Posted by  on  11/27  at  01:08 PM

Gotta admit, that animation still holds up today when you compare it to the minimalistic crap we see in today’s saturday morning toons and even some of today’s anime.

I thought the music sounded familiar, very much like Lupin’s early 80s style intro music.

Posted by  on  11/27  at  02:02 PM

I really dislike a lot of those cheap ass over stylized cartoons we have now. That whole Powerpuff girl/Johnny Bravo style which is so over used now.

I’m more into animation like this. Always have been.

Posted by  on  11/27  at  02:12 PM

Remember when Matthew Sweet’s video for “Girlfriend” came out, featuring footage from the Cobra movie?  It was awesome to see anime getting big coverage on MTV...this was long before it started showing up anywhere else on American TV (other than the old stuff like Gigantor).  He also used Urusei Yatsura clips for “I’ve Been Waiting.”

Posted by  on  11/27  at  04:10 PM

Like comics fans, you can find anime fans in the most unusual places. A lot of celebs dig this stuff.

I have to admit, I miss the good old days of anime. I find it hard to get enthused about new stuff. The occasional thing comes along that I like, but I just don’t follow it like I used to.

Posted by  on  11/27  at  04:27 PM
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