Blue Comet SPT Layzner

[Kaioshin Sama]

Sometimes referred to as the best mecha series that never got a fair shot, SPT Layzner bucks a lot of trends of mecha.

Our main hero Albatro Null/Eiji Asuka (Albatro Null is his Gradosian name and Eiji is his human name) doesn't even show up until the end of the first episode and then it's up to him to explain what's going on, not the usual way of the main character being a blumbering idiot (He's also well into his twenties so don't worry about another angsty teen pilot). SPT Layzner takes place in an alternate future where the Cold War is still ongoing. Now mankind has started branching out into space and a select crew of young cadets from both Nato and The Warsaw Pact has just landed on Mars as part of an educational program sponsored by both groups in the hopes of fostering good will between the two. They don't know that an alien civilization called Grados has already ordered the destruction of humanity and with the Grados attack force is non other than our Hero Eiji. Doubting the decision of Grados, Eiji steals the Super Powered Tracer Layzner and tries to warn the humans on Mars of the imminent attack. This is just the beginning and like any Sunrise series, plot twists follow throughout and create an intriguing and ever evolving story that uses it's characters very well.

Unfortunately the series was cancelled prematurely and the ending is very haphazard, this is remedied by an OVA that completes the final arc of the story as it was meant to be told.

Episodes 1-3 Have just been released by a group called Anime Classic Reviews, and I suggest checking them out.

[Terrestrial Dream]

I remember them from SRW J, the story seems pretty interesting. I am thinking of watching it when it has about 10episode subbed.

[Shinji103]

I got the single-DVD OVA summarization movie of this, and that was dang good enough alone. It's about time somebody started to fansub more episodes of the TV series. Episode 1 has been out for years.

[Area88]

Hey guys, it's Area 88 from Anime Classic Reviews. Nice to see other fans of Spt Layzner on the animesuki forums, this is by far my favourite mech show of all time and I feel it's been left in the dark for too long. Please note episode 1 is not our own work and in fact belongs to Shin Getter. The other person in our fansub group accidently included it in the torrent. We will be releasing our own, higher quality version of episode 1 today or tomorrow. Episode 4 will hopefully be out in the next couple of days.

The video quality is good but not at the same standard as the remastered dvd release in Japan. The sources we are using are laserdisc based taken from the HK boxset. At least this gives people an incentive to buy the show should it eventually get licensed and released on dvd in the US. Anyone still doubtful about the quality of this show should check out the animeondvd's review of Spt Layzner dvd boxset 1.

Considering we are a new fansub group consisting of only 2 people at this point, any feedback at all would be really helpfull.

[xris]

I assume the new v2 torrent you guys just released includes your release of episode 1

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Area88

Hey guys, it's Area 88 from Anime Classic Reviews. Nice to see other fans of Spt Layzner on the animesuki forums, this is by far my favourite mech show of all time and I feel it's been left in the dark for too long. Please note episode 1 is not our own work and in fact belongs to Shin Getter. The other person in our fansub group accidently included it in the torrent. We will be releasing our own, higher quality version of episode 1 today or tomorrow. Episode 4 will hopefully be out in the next couple of days.

The video quality is good but not at the same standard as the remastered dvd release in Japan. The sources we are using are laserdisc based taken from the HK boxset. At least this gives people an incentive to buy the show should it eventually get licensed and released on dvd in the US. Anyone still doubtful about the quality of this show should check out the animeondvd's review of Spt Layzner dvd boxset 1.

Considering we are a new fansub group consisting of only 2 people at this point, any feedback at all would be really helpfull.

In other words its the boxset I own. Hmmmm, You folks will be fixing up the subs so Rei (the Lazyner AI) isn't called Rick and such right?

Oh and just as an aside, no matter what people might read, Aya Hirano is not in this series (She wasn't even born when it aired), the person is Fumi Hirano as Simone Reflan.

[Area88]

Originally Posted by xris

I assume the new v2 torrent you guys just released includes your release of episode 1

Yeah thats right! Our own higher quality version of episode 1 is now in the torrent.

Originally Posted by Kaioshin_Sama

In other words its the boxset I own. Hmmmm, You folks will be fixing up the subs so Rei (the Lazyner AI) isn't called Rick and such right?.

We are only using the boxset to source the video from. The HK subtitles are very poor and so we pretty much threw them away. We are proving our own subtitles with the much appreciated aid of the Lupin Gang scripts.

Here is a rough comparison/estimate between the HK subs, our subs and if a professional company like ADV were to do it:

HK subs - 3/10
ACR subs - 7/10
Pro subs - 9/10

[HeroicWage]

Hey gang, THANKS for releasing this one. Layzner is one of my all-time favorites animes and it definitely deserves a shot at fame.

The combat on Mars -with the jazz BGM- in the first couple of episodes stands out in my memory as one of the most skillful mecha battles I've ever seen. It's completely subtle and humble, totally the opposite of most mecha shows where they'd have gone with screaming guitars and rock anthems. NOT this show.

The jazzy way they did Layzner just oozes sexy.

Those of you who have the Layzner BGM CDs, see for example CD 1 track 5. THAT track makes me which I was female just so I could experience having music take my clothes off. And Layzner used it for a combat BGM and it works. It's genius. It's daring. It's just awesome.

The sound effects are the other superb element. Nothing special for an 80's robot show, I know, but it so totally fits. The acting is good too.

I know the writing goes off into lalaland later on and the kids are annoying but this is one show that makes it SO easy to overlook the faults and just grin like a fool. Yeah I like the show. Sorry.

[Rah-Rah]

Been wanting to watch this for about 2 years now (Same with L.Gaim, thanks Shin-Getter ), and I'm finally glad I can. And it's just as good as it looked! Damn shame it got cancelled before it finished it's run though (Kinda like Ayakashi Ayashi...and a lot of shows from the 80s it seems), but hopefully the OVAs are good. Between this, Legend of Galactic Heroes, and L.Gaim, seems to be a lot of 80s goodness going along. Now if only someone would realese the rest of Getter Robo...

[Potatochobit]

Layzner is one of the most horrible anime's ever produced. Sometimes I think classic anime fans like concepts far more than actual production.

It has some good points:
Realistic physics and environment setting
Contemporary setting
Above average character and mech design
Good opening song

And it has glaring bad points:
Horrible story development. It was so bad they had to shorten it half way through the series since the impending doom of cancelation was looming overhead.
Cliche circumstances. always start out with the children and loli characters, right?

I've only seen the TV series though, not sure if I saw the OVA, maybe I did.
Thanx to anime classics for releasing it so others can try this.
the best part of layzner is since the whole series was compressed at the end, it made great SRW filler stories, which you could say are even better than the real thing

[Area88]

I love the music too HeroicWage, Layzer has really great soundtrack. Surpisingly for a mecha show alot of happens to be Jazz which gives it a unique and nice flavour to it.

Rah-Rah, I've been in the same boat as you, after seeing the fansub for this almost 3 years ago, I've wanted to watch this show desperately. Luckily I got hold of most of it and I'm now releasing it online for others to enjoy too. Hopefully we can expand the fanbase in the US and get others to appreciate more 80's goodness since too many fansub groups are geared to only releasing the newer, contemporary stuff of today.

Anyway episodes 4-6 should hopefully released in a torrent within the next 24 hours.

[Rah-Rah]

Originally Posted by Potatochobit

And it has glaring bad points:
Horrible story development. It was so bad they had to shorten it half way through the series since the impending doom of cancelation was looming overhead.

Hahaha, what? That's not what happened at all. It just got ignored in the rush of the other high profile mecha series at the time (Zeta Gundam and ZZ Gundam in particular), so since the ratings were bad, it got cut short from it's original established run (Like a lot of shows during this time period, as well as Gundam X and as of recently, Ayakashi Ayashi). It's not a bad series (Or HORRIBLE as you put it) by any means. It's one of the most ambitious mecha series of the 80s, and it deserves a lot of credit for that. As for cliche curcumstances, see Kaioshin_Sama's first post, and it's a good plot tool to have naive kids see the grim reality of warfare first hand. Makes for some epic moments later. And for "horrible production", for an 80s anime, the animation is actually excellent, maybe even Zeta Gundam level. Sounds like someone is spoiled by the high production values of a lot of recent shows.

Originally Posted by Area88

Rah-Rah, I've been in the same boat as you, after seeing the fansub for this almost 3 years ago, I've wanted to watch this show desperately. Luckily I got hold of most of it and I'm now releasing it online for others to enjoy too. Hopefully we can expand the fanbase in the US and get others to appreciate more 80's goodness since too many fansub groups are geared to only releasing the newer, contemporary stuff of today.

Actually, it was Another Century Episode 2 that made me curious of Layzer (That and looking around youtube for L.Gaim videos and stumbling upon the opening), since the mecha desgins looked kinda familer and Ryousuke Takahashi is one of my all time favorite directors (Loved his work on Votoms and Gasaraki, as well as his recent series, Bakumatsu Kikansetsu Irohanihoheto). Can't be helped though that most fansubbers are doing the newer stuff, since there is a lot more being produced nowadays, so it's hard enough to keep track of it all, with a lot of shows being good (Particually last season), and a lot being bad. But that's the case with everything, I suppose. I too hope you expand your fanbase, as there are a lot of 80s shows I'd love to check out (You hear that, Shin Getter? I want more L.Gaim damn it!).

[Area88]

Just to give you an update guys. Episode 7 is coming out in the next couple of days.

The reason it's taken longer is because I had to time everything from scratch which is quite time consuming. On top of that there's the usual tweaking in the spelling, grammer and dialogue, here and there. Anyway the advantage is this episode's translation should be the best out of the bunch yet. It shouldl set the benchmark for later episodes.

Episodes will be released one at a time from now on in order to meet the extra workload. At least this way, the 1 episode a week is an achieveable goal.

[Kamen Rider H]

Is it just me or does David Rutherford kind of look like Conan O'Brien?

[PEDOS_GRANDE]

So...whatever happened to this? Episodes 1-6 were so intense...and then......ACR died, it seems.

[Area88]

We do plan to get episodes 7 and 8 out. Both were almost finished but then our hard drive crashed and we lost our precious work. That was 6 months ago and then a total lack of free time has meant we've been unable to catch up again.

However we've got Nineteen 19 ready to be torrented (next few days) and the first episode of Dream Dimensional Hunter Fandora currently being translated. Spt Layzner will hopefully be back within the next month.

April is the month ACR makes a decent comeback.

[Levon]

I can't wait for more Layzner, thanks Area88!

You should backup your editing on another hard drive Thats what I do when editing stuff(like avatars), save/copy it twice just to be safe.

[Spirit Chicken!]

Good deal Area88...can't wait to see ACR's revival happen this month and show up on asuki's main page.

[ragnarokr]

Originally Posted by Area88

We do plan to get episodes 7 and 8 out. Both were almost finished but then our hard drive crashed and we lost our precious work. That was 6 months ago and then a total lack of free time has meant we've been unable to catch up again.

However we've got Nineteen 19 ready to be torrented (next few days) and the first episode of Dream Dimensional Hunter Fandora currently being translated. Spt Layzner will hopefully be back within the next month.

April is the month ACR makes a decent comeback.

Great news man. I dig your projects and your site. keep the good work .

[Area88]

Episodes 7 and 8 released today!

Hope everyone enjoys these new episodes, sorry for all the delays.

Feedback on our releases, and discussion on the series, is welcome as always.