I’m a little embarrassed to admit that my first encounter with the SAINT SEIYA franchise came when Louis Leterrier admitted that he modelled the armors in the CLASH OF THE TITANS remake after those in the original series. As some of you may remember, he subsequently invited the creator, Masami Kurumada, to draw variant posts for the movie as a bit creative payback.
(We probably ought to do feature one of these days about Hollywood blockbusters which have drawn inspiration from anime and manga. You’ve got some EVANGELION in PACIFIC RIM, of course. Last year, we had a bit of AKIRA in CHRONICLE and LOOPER. Go back before that, and you can see a bit of VAMPIRE HUNTER D incorporated into BLADE II. And so on, and so on).
Anyway, watching this makes me want to check out the original series - - but not in the way that was most likely intended. Both this and CASSHERN SINS have opted to retain the dated, kitschy costumes of their franchise predecessors. However, while SINS felt like it had a more mature take that more-or-less supplanted the source material, this feels like the watered-down leftovers of the fuller, more substantial meal that was originally served in the 80’s. It’s like they didn’t bother even considering how they could update the mythos.
Speaking of the mythos, it’s pretty amusing how this ties together so many disparate traditions in a fashion that seems more like cultural mistranslation than creative license. Yeah yeah yeah… “saint” can mean whatever you want it to mean when it comes to fiction. It’s still amusing to see it thrown around like it's always factored in to the Greco-Roman cosmology.
I wish I had more to say - - some clever pun about my “cosmo” level and whether that might be commiserate to how much I’ve feathered my hair - - but this is another property I just want to shrug off. At least, this time, I want to seek out the original after that shrug, though.
Watch this episode, "The Life Seiya Saved! The Legend of the Saints Returns!" here and decide for yourself.
Tom Pinchuk’s a writer and personality with a large number of comics, videos and features like this to his credit. Visit his website - - tompinchuk.com - - and follow his Twitter: @tompinchuk
Really, no one comment on this (I thought we have some Saint Seiya fans on here)
Anyway, I'll comment. The only version of Saint Seiya I saw was the English dub one, didn't really impress me
The version I saw was a french dub, way back when I was a child.
did this show start that "shiny gold angel armor" trend that never quite went away in anime?