Samurai Pizza Cats

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Samurai Pizza Cats

Cover art of the American DVD box set
Genre Comedy, mecha
Anime television series
Produced by Andy Thomas (producer)
Winston Richard (executive producer)
Music by Shuky Levi & Haim Saban
Studio Tatsunoko Productions
Sotsu Agency
Saban
Licensed by Saban (1991-2002)
Discotek Media (2012-present)
English network
Syndication
Episodes 52

Samurai Pizza Cats is a cartoon series produced by Saban as an English adaption of the anime series Kyatto Ninden Teyandee (Cat Ninja Legend Teyandee), produced by Tatsunoko Productions and Sotsu Agency. Saban picking up the North American rights to the series, which originally aired in Japan on TV Tokyo from 1 February 1990 to 12 February 1991 for a total of 54 episodes, in 1991, and produced an English adaption for a total of 52 episodes. Saban's rights to the series expired in 2002. Discotek Media currently holds the North American home video license to the series.

Plot

See also: List of Samurai Pizza Cats episodes

The series is set in the mechanical city of Little Tokyo, a mechanical city which fuses feudal Japanese culture with contemporary culture, and is populated by cybernetic anthropomorphic animals. The city is notionally led by Emperor Fred, a doddering eccentric. The city's actual leadership lies in the hands of his daughter Princess Violet and a city council. The council is headed by the ambitious prime minister Seymour "The Big Cheese", a rat, who constantly plots to overthrow the Emperor. He is aided by his inept minions: trusted adviser Jerry Atric and Bad Bird, the leader of an army of ninja crows.

Unknown to the prime minister, council member "Big Al" Dente, the commander of the Palace Guard, learns of his designs on leadership, but is unable to prosecute him for treason because of the plausible deniability he maintains. Instead, Al Dente enlists the services of Speedy Ceviche, Polly Esther, and Guido Anchovy, three cyborg cat samurai who work in the city's pizzeria, along with their operator Francine. Known collectively as the Samurai Pizza Cats, they are assigned to stop Big Cheese and his evil henchmen's plans to take over Little Tokyo.[1]

Characters

See also: List of Samurai Pizza Cats characters

Production

When Saban Entertainment licensed Kyatto Ninden Teyandee, proper translations of the original Japanese episodes were either of poor quality or non-existent, so it was decided to write completely original dialogue for the English dub, playing the show as a wacky, Animaniacs-esque comedy in contrast to the less farcical original version.[2] The protagonists were changed from ninja into samurai. Of the 54 episodes that were originally produced in Japan, 52 were translated into English. The two untranslated episodes were clip shows that did little to further the series' plot. Some episodes of the dubbed version were never aired in the United States for censorship reasons.

The music in the English dub (replacing the original Japanese music) was done by Shuki Levy and Haim Saban. The theme song for the English dub naturally differs from the original, a common practice for dubbing at the time. In keeping with the parodic nature of the show, the lyrics of the new theme song make a number of references to American pop culture.[3] Michael Airington, a writer for the series, also sang the theme song (in an impersonated Paul Lynde voice), being credited as "Singing Sensation: Googie Gomez". According to the producer Andy Thomas, Airington had a few drinks before the recording session for the song started, and as a result, accidentally stuttered on one line ("this cat gets down down with a love hangover"); that mistake was left in the final version of the theme.

Release

Samurai Pizza Cats has been broadcast in Australia and New Zealand, as well as various countries in Africa, Europe, Asia and Americas. The series has aired in the United Kingdom, India, Spain, Finland, France, Italy, Poland, Greece, the Netherlands, Germany, Canada, Chile, Peru, Panama, Hong Kong, Thailand, Mexico, Brazil, Israel, Kenya, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Sweden, Armenia, and the United States, from 1991 onwards.

Discotek Media released the Japanese original under the name Kyatto Ninden Teyandee on 30 April 2013 and the Saban dub on 30 July 2013.[4] The Kyatto-Ninden Teyandee set includes all of the 54 original episodes (including the two clip-show episodes that were never dubbed into English) while the Samurai Pizza Cats set includes all 52 English-dubbed episodes.[5][6] A French-language version titled Samouraï Pizza Cats featuring a French dub adapted from the English dub was released on DVD in France by Declic Images across two 5-disc box sets (26 episodes per set) in 2004.

Merchandise

Various toys and model kits were released in both Japan and Europe by Bandai, the latter usually being reboxed versions of the prior. Action figures for the Samurai Pizza Cats and the Rescue Team (the Japanese originals came as model kits comparable to today's Gundam toys, while the European figures came pre-assembled). There were also both large and small (Gachapon-sized), rubber-like figures, as well as playsets for the smaller figures, including the Great Catatonic and the pizza parlor.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Clements, Jonathan; McCarthy, Helen (2006). The Anime Encyclopedia. California: Stone Bridge Press. ISBN 1-933330-10-4. 
  2. ↑ Chipman, Bob. "Found in Translation". Escapist Magazine. The Big Picture. Retrieved 20 March 2012. 
  3. ↑ For example, the line "they've got more fur than any turtle ever had" references the similarly themed cartoon series Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, while the line "they're stronger than old cheese, stronger than dirt" refers to an advertising slogan once used for the industrial cleaner Ajax. The theme song also contains the line "As soon as someone finds the script, we might begin the show", which can be interpreted as a reference to the lack of proper translations given to Saban for production on the American version.
  4. ↑ "Kyatto-Ninden Teyandee (Legendary Ninja Cats): The Complete Series : DVD Talk Review of the DVD Video". Dvdtalk.com. Retrieved 2013-08-17. 
  5. ↑ "Discotek Licenses Samurai Pizza Cats/Cats Toninden Teyande - News - Anime News Network:UK". Anime News Network. 2013-08-13. Retrieved 2013-08-17. 
  6. ↑ "Samurai Pizza Cats: The Complete Series US DVD Release Details". Otaku News. 2013-07-30. Retrieved 2013-08-17. 

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike; additional terms may apply for the media files.