Gephyrophillia | Watch This Space #5

Originally Posted on 08/22/2002 by Jeff Harris

What would you do if you found a giant robot from an alternate future in your backyard? Would you blow up your high-school? Would you just soar in the skies above looking down on the world below? Or would you juice it up to unbelievable levels modifying it into a powerful hot-rod hellraising machine?

That's what slacker video-gamer Coop did when he found one in a garbage dump.

Little did he realize that this robot is actually a high-tech weapon of mass destruction. Instead of tearing it apart, Coop actually made it more powerful than ever! Now, the creator of the robot, Kiva, comes to the present to use the robot to save the world from an alien onslaught. She can't pilot it herself anymore thanks to the mods that Coop has done to it, so it's up to Kiva to teach Coop how to pilot the robot and save the world before wrestling comes on.

Low Brow is the first series pilot to come out of American studio Low Brow Studios, a studio founded by George Krstic and Chris Prynoski, some of the creators of the cult MTV animated series, Downtown. The series, created by Krstic and art director Jody Schaefer, will premiere this Friday as part of Cartoon Network's Cartoon Cartoon Weekend. Yeah, yeah, I know, these weekends are usually showcases for suburban-oriented premiere shorts, with the viewers picking up one to become a future series on the network. This year, instead of showing the shorts throughout the summer, Cartoon Network's premiering them all at once, and the stakes aren't all that huge this year. There will be no voting for a new series (at least not officially . . . Cartoon Orbit is seeing which one's the most popular courtesy of which series C-Toon is picked the most). Perhaps they're not letting fans pick a cartoon because, at least by preliminary peeks, aren't suburban-oriented (yeah, Low Brow is based in the Jersey 'burbs, but, it's not a bunch of snot-nosed kids).

Low Brow is a series that has the potential to be HUGE in the action-animation fan market. It not only has anime overtones, but it also has nods to the video games, wrestling, and hot-rod subculture. Low Brow's full of comedy and action, and not really your typical Cartoon Cartoon, which makes it PERFECT! The story and layouts were done in America at Low Brow Studios, but the brunt of the animation and coloring work was done at a very, very popular animation house, Japan's Madhouse Studios. You probably know the name Madhouse Studios from popular features like Ninja Scroll, Perfect Blue, Golgo 13: Queen Bee, and Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust as well as series like Todd McFarlane's Spawn, Card Captor Sakura, and the upcoming AniMatrix DVD, which is coming next year just before the first Matrix sequel, Matrix Reloaded is released. In addition to Madhouse, other major anime contributors are involved. A pair of Cowboy Bebop voice artists are the two main character voices in Low Brow. David Lucas (who also does voicework in the disguise of Steve Blum, the voice of Toonami's sardonic and ultracool host TOM), does the voice of Coop, and Wendee Lee, who voiced Faye Valentine on Bebop and scores of other characters as well as a voice director for several series, including Outlaw Star, is the voice of Kiva. They are joined by Mrs. Foley's baby boy, former WWF champion Mick Foley, who provides the voice of a villian. Low Brow is sure to spark a lot of talk in the fan community thanks to the countless in-jokes that any anime and video-gamer would find. Check it out this weekend on Cartoon Network.

While we're on the topic of big robots on Cartoon Network, Toonami's first Gundam series since War In The Pocket last fall, G Gundam, intrigues me. I have learned these last three years that not all Gundam series are alike. Whereas the main female protagonist, Releena Dorlan, is nothing more than a whiny brat, I find myself drawn to the lovely Rain, Domon's companion on this journey for self-discovery. She's smart, educated, and not an innocious brat. Rain's a mature character and as welcome as, well, a summer rain in a dry countryside.

G Gundam has the strangest premise for any Gundam series I've ever seen. Instead of fighting a tyrannical government or a rebel organization, the Gundams fight each other for control of the government. You have a myrad of unique Gundam designs in every episode representing every world nation (and that *shudder* Noble Gundam is coming in a few days). The only problem I see is that some Gundams and Gundam pilots you'll see periodically and some interesting characters you'll never see again. A darker storyline is about to take place pretty soon on G Gundam, and I have nothing but high hopes for it.

That's it for this edition of Watch This Space. I'll be back on this weekend with my impressions of Transformers: Armada, which is coming on this Friday at 4 PM. I'm also still fixing some broken links here and there, so thank you for your patience. Before I shut down personal transmission today, school is back in session in a few places and getting ready to begin in others (some are beginning Monday!). Hope you school and college kids have a good year in classes. Support the arts and have fun this last week(end) of freedom.

Until we are one, later.
Jeff Harris
CNX Creator/Webmaster
August 22, 2002