Talk:About the Series
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About the Series: Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers Written by Elizabeth Bales - [email protected] For Betamoutain.org - http://www.betamoutain.org Submitted and posted March 30, 2001 - [email protected] -=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=- [Page 01] About the Series: Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers By Elizabeth "fatima" Bales "In 2086, two peaceful aliens journeyed to Earth, seeking our help. In return, they gave us the plans for our first hyperdrive, allowing mankind to open the doors to the stars. We have assembled a team of unique individuals to protect Earth and our allies. Courageous pioneers committed to the highest ideals of justice and dedicated to preserving law and order across the new frontier. These are the Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers." Combining elements of Westerns, space opera, and even a touch of sword-and sorcery-style fantasy, "Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers" brought to television a unique and often tongue-in-cheek spin on the space Western subgenre. Aired in 1986, the half-hour cartoon lasted only one season. Its 65 episodes, which ran five days a week, starred four unusual law enforcement officers (their slogan: "No guts, no glory") working to bring law and order to the new frontier of space. Although the animation was done in Japan by Tokyo Movie Shinsa, "Galaxy Rangers" was one of the first anime-style shows to be created, scripted, storyboarded, voiced, and produced in the United States. "Galaxy Rangers," produced and created by Robert Mandell, director of <i>F/X</i> (1986) and the pilot episode of "The X-Files" (1993), offers a well-developed universe, strong characters, and stories that push the boundaries of children's programming. The show follows the exploits of Zachary Foxx, a by-the-book cop with extensive bionics; Walter "Doc" Hartford, a computer genius and hacker with a penchant for outmoded slang; Niko, a mysterious psychic archaeologist who's also an expert in tae kwon do and a crack shot with her energy shotgun; and Shane "Goose" Gooseman, the shape-changing final product of a government supersoldier program. Together these four Galaxy Rangers form the Series Five team, named for the experimental brain implants that enhance the rangers' special powers and abilities. As members of the law enforcement arm of the Bureau of Extraterrestrial Affairs (BETA), the Series Five rangers face situations as diverse as environmental disasters on low-tech planets, outlaw incursions on mining towns, and invasions--of one sort or another. Supporting characters include Waldo Zeptic of Andor and Zozo of Kirwin, the "two peaceful aliens" of the show's introduction; Princess Maya of the tech-shunning world Tarkon; the rangers' commanding officer, the gruff and forgiving Joseph Walsh; and the robotic ranger Buzzwang, who holds the dubious distinction of being the most disliked character on the entire show. The Series Five team faces a number of enemies. Perhaps chief among them is the Queen of the Crown, the evil ruler of a galaxy-spanning empire. To keep her empire from crumbling, the Queen has developed a technology based around psycho-crystals that allows her to use the psychic essence of captive beings to create slaver lords, ghostlike spies through which she can see and hear. In the pilot episode, the Queen captures Zachary's wife Eliza and uses her to create a slaver lord. Although the Series Five team rescues Eliza's body from the Queen's Psychocrypt, the Queen still holds Eliza's essence. Zachary's quest to rescue his wife forms one of the central threads of the series. Other notable enemies include Mogul, a four-armed sorcerer whose schemes frequently fail courtesy of his bumbling demon assistant Larry; Ryker Killbane, an insane, embittered survivor of the Supertrooper Project that also produced Shane Gooseman; the outlaw Black Hole Gang, led alternately by Macross, a swarthy alien, and red-haired Irish gunslinger Daisy O'Mega; the Scarecrow, a horrific being left over from wars of millennia past; and Lazarus Slade, a "Southern gentleman" mad scientist bent on world domination. [Page 02] Staying Power Much to the bemusement of former production staff members, GR (as it's known among fans) has sparked a loyal, almost cult following in the years since 1986. The show boasts a fairly tightly knit fan community that maintains two Internet mailing lists (although one generates very little traffic) and a number of Web sites. Writers produce fan fiction, or fanfic, that continues the rangers' stories and explores new ideas. List members meet regularly on IRC to chat about the show, discuss fan fiction, and just shoot the breeze. Some staff members are in touch with the fan community: two of the writers lurk on the mailing list, and others have been receptive to contacts by individual community members. Those fans who can manage it even meet in person at RangerCon, a small gathering (usually in Seattle, Washington) that, at its fourth year, is making a fair bid at becoming an annual event. A series of 13 videotapes was released while the show was running, but at $69.95 a pop, they were outside the price range of many fans at the time. Nowadays tapes are extremely hard to come by, though fans dub free copies for each other while hoping for an official rerelease. It's not uncommon to find GR tapes and memorabilia being hawked on eBay, either--one more sign that the show has a small but faithful following. Although the characters and the universe are probably the central draw, some fans also cite the show's refusal to take itself too seriously as a major attraction. Comedic stories abound, and the dialogue is liberally sprinkled with references to '80s culture, music videos, Westerns, and Japanese animation. Writers even gave Niko one line cribbed from the animated Beatles flick "Yellow Submarine." Catching the in-jokes can be half the fun. [Page 03] Atypical Writers, Characters, Stories That tongue-in-cheek quality isn't the show's only departure from standard cartoon fare. A glance at the credits reveals one major difference: the roll of "storypeople" reads like a guest list at a science fiction convention. Owen Lock, a senior editor at Del Rey Books at the time the show was made, and novelist Christopher Rowley were the series story editors. Lock and Rowley worked with series creator Mandell to map out the basics of the universe, but there was no series bible. Writers included the late Brian Daley, known for his <i>Star Wars</i> novels and for his collaborations--under the pen name Jack McKinney--with James Luceno, who also wrote for "Galaxy Rangers"; Tom De Haven, Mick Farren, and Josepha Sherman, all published novelists; Shelly Shapiro and Veronica Chapman, both editors at Del Rey ; and Daniel Fiorella and John Rawlins, who penned many of the series' comedic episodes. In a 1987 interview with <I>Starlog</I> magazine, Mandell said, "In addition to writers who had experience writing books, I also wanted to get new writers involved to infuse the stories with some new ideas and characterizations." Accordingly, Mandell skipped "accomplished" cartoon writers in favor of those new to the medium. Many fans say that the detailed universe and the well-rounded characters are the major strengths of the show. Among those characters, Niko, often pointed out as the antithesis of the token female, is very popular. "Niko has been kind of a special character for us because we wanted a female lead who would be able to handle herself as well as the men," said Mandell in his <I>Starlog</I> interview. Appearing as the rescuer as often as the rescuee, Niko can construct a psychic force shield, cut the rug at a diplomatic reception, and administer a boot to the head with equal aplomb. Equally well liked--and equally unusual--is Doc, the wisecracking computer expert. In the first few episodes, Doc used jive slang extensively, a mannerism that, combined with his more-than-passing resemblance to Billy Dee Williams, could have landed the character squarely in the Department of Tacky Racial Stereotypes. Instead, Doc developed into a witty, cultured graduate of Miss Abercrombie's Charm School, a leading expert in an intellectually demanding field, and perhaps the first hunky geek in an American cartoon. Perhaps the most "normal" of the four leads is Zachary, a married career ranger with two children--yet he, too, is fully developed, with his own quirks and defects. Not the sort of man to put his trust in machines and technology, at the end of the pilot Zachary finds himself seriously wounded and in the position of having to rely on technology to save his life. In the <I>Starlog</I> interview, Mandell explained, "Now, he has this internal conflict with how to deal with his own bionics." "We never really got a chance to explore that too much," added Mandell, "because along came Goose." With respect to fan fiction, Shane Gooseman is arguably the most written-about of the Series Five team. His approach to life (at the beginning of the series, he seems rather like Dirty Harry) and unusual background attract interest from a broad spectrum of fans--and, as in the series, allow for a wide range of story types. In its stories and subject matter, "Galaxy Rangers," unlike most other shows aimed mainly at children, tackles grey areas. A number of episodes introduce the low tech vs. high-tech debate--and high-tech doesn't always come out on top. The stories also raise issues of bioethics and environmental responsibility. The episodes that explore the Supertrooper Project are among the most notable results. After an illegal experiment conducted within the project, most of the Supertroopers go insane, and all but Gooseman revolt against the government and flee Earth as outlaws. Because of Gooseman's origins, the Board of World Leaders does not trust him, and he is allowed to become a ranger only on the condition that he hunt down all of the escapees. As Mandell noted in his interview with <I>Starlog</I>, the internal conflict he faces over his orders is a familiar theme in Westerns. Not so familiar, but equally compelling, is the question of the rights of genetically engineered life forms--more pertinent than ever in the wake of the 1997 cloning of a sheep from adult tissue and the 2000 cloning of a monkey through a technique called embryo splitting. The show is atypical, too, in that the good guys do not always win, or at least not hands down. Although Zachary and the Series Five team rescue Eliza Foxx's body from the Psychocrypt, the Queen still holds Eliza's psycho-crystal, a story thread that is never resolved in the series' 65 episodes. At times villains escape, although it's usually in the wake of a larger triumph. Still, the ambiguity that makes GR so popular with an adult audience was undoubtedly a factor in the demise of the show. [Page 04] The Animated TV Series As Financial Disaster In the guest book of a GR Web site, eleven years after the series ended, Mandell wrote, "The making of the series was a labor of love, which means it was a financial disaster." When Mandell started work on "Galaxy Rangers," Transcom Media had no toy deal for the series, an exception in the licensing-crazy cartoon industry. Transcom, in association with Gaylord Production, made a deal for toys only after the series went into production. In the U.S., Galoob made a line of action figures, including prototypes for figures that never went into production; in France, the toys were sold under the Ideal label. Fans have also reported seeing lunch boxes, Golden Books, and even a dart board, and Roy Rogers featured boxed "Galaxy Rangers" children's meals. However, the toy deal failed, and with it financing for a second season. "The critical thing, as I recall it," relates story editor Christopher Rowley, "was that to nail down a toy deal, the show had to get solid ratings first. But with the strong disagreement between Robert and Battista, the TV syndication distributor, about the order of eps--which led to 'Tortuna' being shown first--the show got off to a confusing start, which only got worse since GR was not tightly scripted like say, [Thundercats], to concentrate on a few easily understood themes for younger viewers. Once the show's ratings demonstrated that it was not a big hit, the toy deals evaporated. Then, without toys, the whole process of building the 'brand' amongst 6- and 7-year-old boys--the key market group for these shows--failed. They watched T-cats, and a much smaller group of kids watched GR." Asked in 2000 about his involvement, series writer John Rawlins noted, "Actually, I'm just very grateful for the chance to have done it.... If the toy company hadn't walked out on us, and if the TV markets hadn't bounced us from one time slot to the next, I think Transcom could have made some real money "But really, nobody was there for the money," Rawlins concluded. "You can be sure of that, because there wasn't any money. We just all wanted to do a really cool TV show." Note: Mandell is currently exploring options for bringing "Galaxy Rangers" back to its audience in the U.S. Although the show has played in syndication in a number of markets abroad, distribution rights in the U.S. have been tied up for years. Hearst Entertainment acquired rights to air the series in 1998, but nothing seems to have been done with those rights. Mandell may also be considering negotiating the rights for release of a video or DVD boxed set.