1987 Color 90min
Starring: Uhh, nobody.
Directed by: Kenneth J. Halls
Based on a true story…
Let's face it, I'm a $1 DVD junkie. I can't help it. I see the rack at any discount or dollar store and I have to look. I know that the selection will inevitably suck. I know that the DVD will generally have the worst possible print of the movie that could possibly be found. I know all of this, and yet, like a moth to flame, I am drawn to them. Compelled to search through every single stinkin' DVD that they have, in the hopes of finding something great for my one dollar. Every now and then, I will strike gold. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that I have struck gold in Defenders of Space…
Defenders of Space is a weird little piece of animation from our friends in Korea (I originally thought that it was Japanese, but it turns out it just heavily rips off several Japanese anime, but more on that later). It is probably best described as Transformers meets Scooby-Doo, in space. Add to that the atrocious dubbing (Which may be either British or Australian, I can’t decide) and you’ve got yourself quite a cinematic experience.
Defenders of Space begins, after a very confusing scene where a phoenix plummets from space and turns to stone, with an invasion force nearing the city of Aurora (Although, on the screen wesee an entire planet…oh well). The invasion force is commanded by Nick, the evil ruler of an equally evil empire. His 2 top generals, Mike and Saga(???) are arguing over who should lead the attack on Aurora. Nick (Yes, that’s right, Evil Emperor…Nick) decides that General Saga will lead one wing of the attack with the help of the robot Super Zarius. Meanwhile, General Mike (Yes, the great General…Mike…*sigh*) will lead his force with the help of the robot Super Scorpio. The two generals take command with the stipulation that the general who takes the city will inherit Emperor Nick’s wealth and kingdom. Oh yeah, and his daughter, Medusa’s, hand in marriage…Pretty sweet deal, huh? Now that I think about it, I believe that Franklin Roosevelt had the same kind of deal worked out with Eisenhower and McArthur…It’s true.
Ladies and gentlemen, the great General Mike.
So with the rules laid out for the generals, the attack begins. The invading force, with
the help of their robots and much recycled animation, quickly overwhelm the defenders and
destroy the city/planet. During the invasion, the two generals motivate their men by saying
how they mustn’t let the other general win. “We must keep attacking at all costs. We can’t
give General Mike the chance to win the battle!!!,” says General Saga. It might just be me, but
I don’t think that the soldiers would be too keen on sacrificing their lives just so these guys
can get a little booty from the Emperor’s daughter.
After the attack, we jump to Mars, where a group of kids are playing baseball. This is
where we meet our hero, Henry, and his girlfriend (I guess) Mary. In the middle of the game Mary
finds a necklace with a phoenix. If you were paying attention to the opening, you know that this
will more than likely come into play later in the film. For good measure, the music
goes, “bump, bump, bummm!!!,” just in case you didn’t pay attention during the opening. After the
game ends, Henry, Mary, and rest of the team speed back to their spaceship in their rocket-car, with
their robot pal, Robbie, at the wheel (Wish I had a robot pal…).
Bad touch, Henry. Bad touch.
They board their ship and head for Aurora, unaware that it had been obliterated moments earlier.
As they approach their home, Robbie receives a transmission from Aurora. It states that Aurora has
been destroyed. The group lands and inspects the devastation. Finding no survivors, they bury the dead
and erect several crosses in their honor. We are treated to the high point of the film artistically, as
they are standing next to the graves while the sun sets in the background. I was actually a little
surprised to see such a good shot in this thing. Too bad that it’s the only respectable shot in the
film, and that there is about an hour left in this thing.
This is it folks, the high point of the film…Better settle in. It’s goin’ to be a long ride.
Shortly after the group pays their respects , Robbie stumbles upon Dr. Han’s hideout.
Dr. Han was the man that created Robbie. He explains the dire situation to the children.
He goes on to tell them that he has heard of the immortal phoenix that he believes is the
only way to combat Nick and his forces. Now, I would have a few questions for Dr. Han, such
as, ”How in the Hell is a bird going to help us?”, and “What have you been smoking, Dr, Han?”
The children, however, do not have any problem with the situation and decide to go searching
for the phoenix.
Back on the Emperor’s ship, Nick is furious that there are survivors on the planet. He orders General Saga to find and kill the remaining humans at all cost.
While General Saga is trying to snuff out the kids, Dr. Han notices Mary’s phoenix necklace.
After much analysis, he concludes that it is, in fact, a necklace…No, I’m sorry. He discovers
that the necklace is the key to unleashing The Phoenix King. He tells them that The Phoenix King
is located on Earth. Just then, the soldiers discover their hideout. Luckily, the soldiers are met
by a band of guerrillas who are serving as a resistance force to Emperor Nick’s invasion. The Rebel
leader, Fred, tells them to return to their hideout, but Henry refuses, and he bashes Fred upside
the head and takes off for Earth to seek out The Phoenix King. That’s gratitude, for ya.
The infamous rebel leader…Fred.
Back on the invading ship, General Saga is being berated by Emperor Nick and his daughter.
He is relieved of his command and it is given to General Mike. Mike wastes no time tracking
down the children. He discovers that they are headed for Earth and he tails them until they
are in range of his rockets. What happens next has become one of my all-time favorite moments
in any B-movie. With the rocket gaining quickly on their spaceship, Henry rushes to the nearest
window. He then proceeds to open the window, take aim, and blast the rocket with his laser gun.
Now, if you graduated the first grade, you should see at least one problem with this situation.
He opens a window in space!!!
There is no air in space.
HE OPENED A WINDOW IN SPACE!!!
Conclusion: Not only would it be impossible to open that window due to the
enormous pressure keeping it vacuumed shut, but if he somehow managed
to open the thing he would’ve been sucked out of that hole in a very painful manner.
Result: I have a headache.
Ya know, this movie has certain flaws...
With the rocket taken care of, and scientists everywhere gently weeping, the two children make it
safely to Earth. They quickly find The Great Eagle’s Mountain (Shouldn't it be the Great Phoenix mountain?…) and begin
exploring. Sadly, they do not run into any Balrogs or goblins, but they do find a whole bunch of bats.
Henry, being the intelligent guy that he is, decides to shoot at them with his laser gun. Well, it turns
out that bats don’t care for being shot at any more than humans do. The pissed off bats rush out of
the cave which causes a rockslide inside the cavern (I don’t know how that works, but with all of the
logic and scientific problems in this movie, I think I need to pick my battles, or this review is going
to be 20,000 words long). Somehow Henry and Mary manage to escape and make it safely to the top of the
mountain. Up there, they find a rock with a phoenix shaped indentation on it’s side. After taking way
too long to figure it out, they place the phoenix necklace into the rock. It begins to glow and shoots
a beam of light into the sky, which forms into a phoenix. Now, silly me, I thought that this was The
Phoenix King. I was wrong. The bird fires a beam at the mountain, freeing a giant robot (Who looks
suspiciously like the Transformer, Inferno). The Phoenix King is so happy to be free that he flies
around like a moron for a few minutes, firing his laser cannon and stuff. Mary then makes the stunning
realization that they could use the Phoenix King to attack Emperor Nick and take back Aurora…Good thing
that Mary is here, huh? So with that figured out, our two heroes hop in Phoenix King and take off for Aurora.
Cool, it's Inferno!!! Uh, I mean, Phoenix King...sorry.
Back on Aurora, Fred and his band of soldiers are in the middle of a firefight with Nick’s forces.
Things are going well until General Mike’s robot, Super Scorpio, joins the fray. The robot takes
a direct hit from Fred’s grenade launcher, but is unaffected. Fred quickly orders the retreat of his
forces, but Scorpio makes short work of them. Scorpio is about to crush Fred when a laser blast comes
from out of nowhere and knocks Scorpio on his robo-butt. “Where did the laser come from?,” you ask?
Well from our giant robot friend, Phoenix King, of course.
The two robots begin a fierce battle and Phoenix King quickly gains the upper hand. General Mike,
being the military mastermind that he is, begins shouting brilliant orders to Super Scorpio. Orders
like, “Get up, you stupid thing!”, and “You must kill him! Blow him up! Shoot him! Do anything!” How
could he possibly lose, right? Unfortunately for the good general, his brilliant strategies do little
to slow The Phoenix King’s attack as he quickly drives Scorpio back into space.
Emperor Nick is furious with General Mike’s defeat. In fact, he’s so angry that he orders
General Saga to kill him. General Saga vows that he will destroy the resistance or suffer the same
fate as General Mike. He quickly rounds up the remaining force and begins his assault on The Phoenix
King. To make sure that things go his way, he arms Super Zarius with The Iron Ball (Which is basically
a big spiked ball on a chain), and arms Super Scorpio (Which is now under his command, as well) with
The Thunder Axe (Which is, as you probably guessed, a big axe).
Robot Beatdown Extravaganza!!!
Before the attack begins, the Earth Defense Troop joins the battle, but General Saga decides to
leave them to Emperor Nick and his forces. They find The Phoenix King and the battle begins.
Phoenix King catches the Iron Ball and manages to wrap Super Zarius up in it’s chain. He then bashes
the snot outta Super Scorpio.
Back on the Emperor’s ship, the Earth Defense Troop has come into range. Nick’s daughter,
Medusa, is commanding the attack (On a funny side note, one of her soldiers refers to her as “Sir”
and she never corrects him). She orders the midget ships (They prefer to be called “Differently-sized
but still just as capable” ships) to attack, and they swarm out of their mother-ships. The EDT responds
by launching a massive barrage on the midget ships, but they prove to be too much for them.
Meanwhile, The Phoenix King is still battling with Super Scorpio and Super Zarius. He takes
Super Scorpio and throws him into Super Zarius, who he tied up earlier. This gets a cheer from
Dr. Han and the children, which begs the question, “How in the Hell do they know what is going
on?!?” The battle is clearly taking place in space, and Dr. Han and everyone are still on Aurora.
There must be a T.V. somewhere. That or this is just a really sloppy production…Yeah, you're right, there must
be a T.V. somewhere.
One of these characters is a girl...I defy you to tell me which one.
Anyway, with the two robots right where he wants them, Phoenix King ties them together with the
chain from The Iron Ball. He then grabs the ball and hurls the two robots to Aurora where they explode
on contact. General Saga informs Medusa that The Phoenix King is too strong and that he can’t be
defeated. Medusa, being the very understanding person that she is, proceeds to shoot him.
With the robots defeated, Phoenix King comes to the aid of the EDT. Using his rocket punch,
he destroys a bunch of midget ships and causes Medusa to retreat (Didn’t she just kill two guys for
the same thing?). She puts up a massive force field around the mothership, but Phoenix King manages
to blast right through it (Didn’t see that coming, did ya?). This causes the entire ship to plummet
onto the surface of Aurora, causing a massive fire.
Now, until this point, I have been able to forgive The Phoenix King’s resemblance to the
Transformer, Inferno. I mean, at least Phoenix King didn’t turn into a fire truck or anything,
right? Well, as you probably already guessed, Phoenix King quickly transforms into a fire truck
(Complete with siren and all) and douses the fire. Robbie is so impressed, that he wants to be able
to transform into a robot, too.
With the invaders defeated, the Commander of the Earth Defense Troop thanks Henry and Mary for their
help with, as he puts it, their “illegal immigrant problem.” Everyone decides to lay down their arms
and live in harmony forever, with the protection of the Phoenix King. And with a funky theme song,
and A LOT of recycled animation, we come to the end…I need a beer.
Conclusion
Well, that was delightfully insane, wasn’t it? I’m
not really sure where to begin. Maybe the blatant copyright
infringement. Or the atrocious dubbing, perhaps? I don’t know. There
certainly are a lot of errors in this movie from top to bottom. Things
colored improperly (Skin-toned hair, for example), odd edits, and
numerous plot holes can be found all throughout this thing. Things also
have a tendency to appear and disappear onscreen constantly. Take these
shots, for example.
We have Henry and Mary boarding Phoenix King. In the first shot, you can see that only Mary
is aboard the lift to the cockpit of Phoenix King. But, in the second shot, you can see that
both of them are now aboard the lift. Neat, huh?
Here's another example. Look at these 2 shots of The Phoenix King...
♫♫One of these things is not like the other.
One of these things just doesn't belong...♫♫
Notice anything different is these 2 pics? The most obvious difference should be the phoenix. But look closer.
How many differences can you find? I was able to find at least 5 inconsistencies between the two shots, and I only
looked for a few minutes. Now you try...It's fun!!!
Well I suppose that's enough nitpicking from me. All in all, this is a very wacky movie. Not bad
for my 1 dollar investment. I think that I received at least 10 dollars worth of enjoyment out of it.
That's a 10 to 1 return on my investment. Hmm, maybe I should consider playing the stock market.
I still do have several questions that I would like answered, however.
Questions like:
Why were the bad guys blue?
Why isn't Emperor Nick's daughter blue?
Exactly how many copyrights were infringed upon?
I'm sure that I could think of more, but I really need to get some sleep. But before
I go, I will leave you with this screenshot...
Come up with your own caption. I can't bring myself to pick just one out of the cornucopia of captions which that
screenshot induces.
♫♫One of these things is not like the other.
One of these things just doesn't belong...♫♫
