“Yesterday’s” Comic> Star Blazers: The Magazine Of Space Battleship Yamato #6

“I shouldn’t have sent her to Space Ghost for space breathing training.”

Star Blazers: The Magazine Of Space Battleship Yamato #6

Argo Press (June, 1996)

“Icarus” part 1

WRITER/ARTIST: Bruce Lewis

COLORISTS/SPECIAL EFFECTS: Joh Ott & Bruce Lewis

COVER ART: Tim Eldred & Bruce Lewis

EDITOR: Tim Eldred

Time has passed since our previous story in this original tale. Sasha, the daughter of Alex and Starsha, grew at a faster rate than humans given her half-Iscardian heritage. Now the equivalent of a sixteen-year-old, Sasha looks forward to the day she can serve on the Yamato like her father and uncles. She was raised by Sandor when Alex mysteriously took off, begging Sandor to keep her near the ship, now housed in an artificial asteroid called “Icarus”, but to never let her on the bridge. Now she’s ready for college and Sandor feels he is about to be left alone again.

What they got right: It’s nice to see them do more than adapt the movies, which Argo Press’s parent company Voyager Entertainment was releasing on home video anyway, and do something original. I haven’t talked a lot about the articles because I review stories and this feature is called “Yesterday’s” Comic, but I did mention in passing that “Icarus”, a ship formed from a planetoid, was the first idea for what became Space Battleship Yamato and later dubbed as Star Blazers. Taking that idea and forming an original tale around it, plus going over the Comet Empire arc from the show, was a good idea.

What they got wrong: Although what we get is very light on action, focusing instead on Stasha growing up and Sandor recalling his past, some of which I don’t know wasn’t part of the original series but it’s not all that interesting unless you really know the character. Since he’s barely been a factor in the comic magazine thus far I kind of don’t. Also, why does Stasha not like Nova? She doesn’t have an uncle complex, does she? Derek is her biological uncle, Sandor her “adoptive” uncle.

What I think overall: It’s not a bad character study and the mystery of Alex’s sudden concern has potential but for the most part only the scenes with Stasha were of any interest, and even then only for how cute the scenes were.