The Original GoLion Pulled No Punches

I mentioned the original GoLion series the other day. Guess what? The official Voltron channel at YouTube has a playlist. Only 10 episodes are visible, but that's enough to get a good sense for how different the original series was from the Voltron series we got in the West. Don't have small or over-sensitive kids around. Here's the pitch:

In the future, Earth has been ravaged by nuclear war. Survivors are captured by an evil alien race of the Galran Empire led by the ruthless King Daibazaal to work as slaves or fight in a deadly arena. Five captured Earthlings: the fearless Captain Akira "Chief" Kogane, the silent Takashi "Quiet" Shirogane, the strong Tsuyoshi "Hothead" Seidou, the reckless Isamu "Moody" Kurogane and the small but crafty Hiroshi "Shorty" Suzuishi, will attempt to escape the dungeons of Castle Galra before they are again forced to fight in the arena or worse, turned into massive Beastmen monsters.

Given the time of the series' production and airing, you can argue that the violence--both what is done and how it's handled--is a reflection of the cultural malaise within Japan at the time, especially among animation professionals (this is the heyday of "Kill 'Em All" Tomino), but you risk doing a disservice to the audience.

Don't lie to them; Principles Are Expensive. (Thank you, Oliver Campbell, for that one.) Doing Good isn't free or easy, and innocent people can and do get hurt in the process. It sucks, hard, but no one said that doing Good would be- and sometimes you don't have enough to cover the bill, so to speak, so you don't survive the doing. Not all heroes get their happy endings, and that's the case here. That's a degree of honesty I appreciated as a child, cherish as a grown man, and wish to pass on to succeeding generations.

That's anathema to the SJWs infesting our culture at all levels. They live for the lie, and die without it. Respect to the GoLion team for not lying to the audience. More big productions should be so honest. For that matter, GoLion should be readily available in its entirety in the West.