About the Series:Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers

About the Series: Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers by Elizabeth 'Fatima' Bales

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• About the Series:Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers
• Staying Power
• Atypical Writers, Characters, Stories
• The Animated TV Series Was Financial Disaster

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"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 st-style fantasy, "Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers" brought to television a unique and often tongue-in-cheek spin on the space Western sub-genre. 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, story-boarded, voiced, and produced in the United States.

"Galaxy Rangers," produced and created by Robert Mandell, 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 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 psychocrystals 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.

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Next: Staying Power