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A syndicated series that showed five anime programs once a week, Force Five was dubbed into English from the original Japanese. It was broadcast mostly in New England during the early 1980s with the following schedule - Danguard Ace on Mondays, Starvengers on Tuesdays, Spaceketeers on Wednesdays, Grandizer on Thursdays and Gaiking on Fridays.

 

Danguard Ace or “Planetary Robot” was about a new planet called Promete that was just discovered by Earthlings. Because of overpopulation and dwindling natural resources, Earth has become virtually uninhabitable. An Earth ship is sent out to explore Promete, which is similar to Earth but unspoiled. But evil scientist Komisar Krell is also planning to put his own people on Promete, and attacks the Earth ships that are attempting to land there. In retaliation, the humans build Danguard Ace to protect from Krell. In a theme lifted from Star Wars, the series includes a good son/bad father scenario. Hero Lieutenant Winstar is the son of a famous pilot who it is believed dead. In actuality, his father was a prisoner of Krell and was controlled by him through a mask. He hid his true identity as a Winstar by calling himself Captain Mask.

Another robot show, Starvengers, starred three robots - Star Dragon, Star Arrow and Star Poseidon – who are created to fight the Pandemonium Empire, who plan to take over the Earth. The robots battle Colonel Fuerer, who was a caricature of Adolf Hitler with a German accent and a Nazi uniform. Unlike Hitler, Colonel Fuerer also had two horns coming out of his head.

 

Princess Aurora was the star of Spaceketeers. She and her team of spaceketeers are on a mission for the Empress to find and destroy an evil energy source emanating from the Dekos star system. The energy is turning the peaceful creatures of the universe into evil mutants. The spaceketeers were husky Porkos and smart Arimos (based on Porthos and Aramis from The Three Musketeers), as well as the powerful but arrogant Jesse Dart.

In Grandizer, Johnny Bryant, also known as Orion Quest, is the only survivor from the planet Antares. Antares has been destroyed by a squad of flying saucers led by Vega the Strong, who has stolen papers from Antares that will show him how to build Grandizer, a powerful battle robot. Vega wants to use Grandizer to take over the universe, but Orion has stolen him back, takes it with him to Earth, and hides him away after while pretending that he himself was human. Orion was one of the most popular characters in the Force Five series. His alien roots gave him Superman-like powers on Earth, and he helped save people from Vega as well.

 

Gaiking was about an impending invasion of Earth by the planet Zala. Zala was about to be destroyed by a black hole, and the inhabitants plan to take over Earth to keep themselves alive. Earthlings fight back and build a robot named the Gaiking Super Dragon. The robot is piloted by Ares Astronopolis, a former baseball pitcher with telekinetic powers.

In 1978, Mattel had introduced a series of toys called “Shogun Warriors,” based on the characters from these cartoons. However, this was before the cartoon aired in the U.S., and by the time Jim Terry Productions created the package for American audiences, Mattel no longer had the rights to the characters. Therefore, there were no toy tie-ins during the airing of Force Five. The show did increase an interest in giant robot cartoons, and would soon be followed by other shows such as Voltron, Transformers and Gobots.