Knights of the Zodiac, Vol. 1: Battle of the Bronze Knights (1986)
Review by Dindrane
Film:
DVD:

Written by Masami Kurumada and Takao Koyama
Directed by Kozo Morishita

Features:

• Collectible card
  
• Trailers for other titles
  

Dindrane's Anime Warnings:

• Silly editing for children
• Pink armor
• No exposition
• Mouthy butler
• Leg warmers on heroic fighters
• Creepy mother fetish

Released by: ADV
Region: 1
Rating: NR, safe for all audiences
Anamorphic: N/A; appears in its original 1.33:1 format.

My Advice:

Once you hear the opening strains of the rather unusual choice of theme songs--"I Ran," covered by Bowling for Soup--you know you're in for a weird ride. Knights of the Zodiac is your average ensemble fighting-guys show with all the usual trappings: magical armor, tournaments, and mystical villains. Our Hero is young Seiya, who was sent abroad to Greece from Japan to learn how to fight with legendary Greek warriors and to earn the celebrated Bronze Armor of Pegasus. Now Seiya has returned to Japan and has been "invited" to participate in another tournament; he hopes his lost sister will see him and return home, and he also hopes to win one of the sets of Gold Armor, even more powerful than his own Bronze armor. Along the way, we also meet friends and rivals of Seiya, such as the Cygnus Knight, and the enigmatic Princess.

This first disc includes four episodes, and as such, we barely get to know Seiya or meet any of the characters that will become important as time passes. There is, as yet, no hint of an overarching menace; we know only that the Princess has promised her grandfather that she will conduct this tournament to find heroes, but we don't know why or why it is so important to her that Seiya be a contestant. We do get to see the Cygnus Knight gain his icy armor in Siberia; it's kind of interesting to see that the Knights will all come from different cultures and have their own special attacks and personalities, especially considering the Amazon trainers. It could be an interesting ensemble cast when all is said and done.

Unfortunately, the show just doesn't quite live up to its promise. We can hope this will improve in future volumes, but as of yet, all we get is an excuse to have quick battle after battle. We get little in the way of character development, and with a show built around the idea of a team, that's a must. We also don't get much in the way of exposition, turning what could be a cool series into a rather mediocre one.

There are no features as such on the disc, but they do come with a collector card. Mine was a metallic card showing Seiya in the gold Sagittarius armor. The audio and video quality are good enough, but there are no options. This is the cut of the show as seen on American TV, and as such, there is only the choice of an English dub and no subtitles. Another artifact of the American release was the fact that we are treated to blue "blood"--never any red stuff. This will remind many viewers of the way Sailor Moon was hacked up to make it less violent and more palatable to American parents who would rather let the TV babysit their children than actually talk to them about violence. Luckily, American producers of anime are slowly learning that children already get more violence in your average news broadcast than in original anime, and uncut shows sell much, much better and are much more likely to be well-received; it's hard to expect a show to make sense when you cut out all the plot climaxes.

In short, if you're a fan of senshi shows or just like ensemble action, then Knights of the Zodiac is an inoffensive, if not exemplary, example of the genre. Fans of shows like Ronin Warriors or Medabots will most likely like this one as well.