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HIKARU MAKIBA: THE JAPANESE AUDIENCE ISSUE
27th June 1976: episode 39 is broadcasted in Japan. Go Nagai & Toshio Katsuta are developing Ufo Robot Grendizer coherently, following their own vision of what this anime should have been. Yes, they are paid by Toei to develop the third chapter of Mazinger, but their aim is clearly different, considering how the story has transformed itself since ep1. In particular, they are continuously developing this revolutionary female character named Hikaru Makiba with such a passion to even darken in the end Daisuke Umon, without talking about Koji Kabuto. And this is their big mistake.
The anime ratings have been declining since episode 25 (Naida's episode, what a coincidence, right?), but, anyway, the rating values are not a disaster and, probably, Katsuta thinks he could still handle the situation. What he and Nagai unfortunately totally underestimate is Japanese male audience reaction to the change of role of Hikaru Makiba.
 
I have to make an important premise: in Japan, robotic animes have always been (and they still are!) considered a “boy’s thing”, in the meaning that girls have never been allowed by families to watch them. When I asked my stepsister what robotic animes she watched in her childhood, she looked at me astonished and answered “zero”, then explained me that, from a social and cultural point of view, a Japanese girl is not allowed to watch a robotic anime. The boundary between “Shojo” (for girls) and “Shonen” (for boys) is not only applied to manga, but to animes too. So, the only audience Ufo Robot Grendizer had in Japan consisted exclusively of boys, educated according to Japanese social rules existing at beginning of the ‘70s. And while in the western world, in the meantime, women were fighting for their rights and reached some very important social conquers, in Japan something similar was still to happen at that time.
What I am going to describe below is not a personal hypothesis, but what Toshio Katsuta and Go Nagai confess in their interviews included in the Roman Album (you can read the complete transcription here). After episodes 37-38-39, Katsuta received hundreds of letters from viewers complaining for the plot of this girl from the countryside becoming a fighter, for more with an equal role respect to their beloved hero Koji Kabuto. The audience had enough difficulties up to that moment in tolerating that the main character of the anime was that blue-eyed alien named Daisuke Umon, but Hikaru Makiba becoming a spacer driver was really too much. The boys wanted absolutely her to come back to the farm and to stay there quietly working the hay without disturbing the two heroes with her strange attitude. The letters were really harsh: how could the Authors have possibly thought to that girl as a fighter? Girls from the countryside must remain what they are, it’s impossible to think to a woman as a serious fighter, they cannot escape their social role. Katsuta jokes in the interview saying that he feared even for his own life. Katsuta and Nagai tried to “resist” to the audience complains for a couple of episodes, but facing the terrible feedback against Hikaru continuing to go on, in the end (I think after the disaster of episode 42, which had the lowest rate of the whole broadcast) they decided to introduce a new female character in the anime, whose presentation could be more acceptable for the Japanese boys.
This is the content of the interviews in the Roman Album and I can tell you, if this is what is explicitly written, it means that the situation backstage should have been even more critical, because Japanese people (and especially managers) are not keen to talk about their failures in public and always try to lower the description of possible issues. The fact that Katsuta and Nagai admit to have faced such a massive bad reaction towards Hikaru’s change of role and to have been forced to change storyline perspective to the anime, it means to me that more and more should have happened in reality backstage.
I would like to underline that I was not aware of the content of the Roman Album interview when I wrote my MM ("Monstrogoth Message": it means a looong analysis) about Maria-Grace introduction story months ago. Actually, now I believe that really Sayaka Yumi was discussed and maybe supported by Toei as the new female character to be introduced in the anime.
If the aim of the operation was to resurrect Koji Kabuto as a lead character, Sayaka should have been a logical choice. Instead – this is my personal opinion - Katsuta and Nagai wanted to save the anime, but keeping their beloved Hikaru in her new role. In satisfying audience, they could have killed her in a battle or found an excuse to let her go back to her previous life at the farm. Instead, Hkaru remained alive and kept also the role of Marine Spacer driver. This means, to me, that Nagai and Katsuta loved very much the character and wanted to find a way to save their creature at all costs. Of course, they were forced to divert the stage lights from Hikaru, but without changing the true nature of the story. Thanks to Shingo Araki’s imagination, Maria Grace Fleed will avoid the risk to transform for real Ufo Robot Grendizer in a sequel of Mazinger and will allow to continue someway to develop the anime in the original direction.
And, for more, she will allow also to silently implement the “two-couples” scenario. Some plot holes will be the price to pay for the operation, but, after all, they can be considered as the minor damage. It will require some time, but in the end the story of Duke Fleed will reach anyway its end as originally devised.
Edited by joe 7 - 19/11/2019, 18:45
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