0. Entertainment value - now and then
I actually enjoy watching this show! This is not a given with kid's shows. Your tastes changes as you age and unfortunately many kid shows present simplyfied or dumbed-down subject matters, worldbuilding and characters. While some of the dialogue, characters and scenes reflect the shows intented target audience most of the show's content could be transported into any SciFi show with a more mature target audience without any changes. But more on that later.
And I can totally see
why I enjoyed this show so much as a kid. My point of the last paragraph plays a role in this: kids are often smarter than the adults give them credit for and often notice (even only subconsciously) if they are talked down to. I can see that I appreciated a show like Galaxy Ranges that treats the audience as intelligent beings as a kid. Also, the breadth of topics, the multidimensional characters and the sheer volume of sci-fi elements were probably quite... stimulating for me as a kid.
1. Characters
There is much to like about the characters in Galaxy Rangers:
a) The protagonists:
- skilled special forces, not superheroes: the 4 titular main characters are portayed as highly talented, well trained and well equiped individuals. They are brave and have sense for justice - like you would expect of members of the special forces of the galatic police force. While they are pretty confident in their abilities, they are not invincible or even overly powerful. This extends to their equipment including the starships: nothing is really special or overly powerful. Some items might be of high quality (the robo-steeds certainly are), but everything can be lost, stolen, or blown up.
- humans, not fanatics: the rangers, while clearly being "good guys", are not fanatical embodiments of virtue.
- persons, not quirks: compared to characters of other shows the rangers personality traits are not overdrawn. Sure, Zach is "the straight man", Niko "the voice of reason", Walter "the witty nerd" and Shane "the gung-ho daredevil", but none of that is overblown (in my view) and they have other traits as well. Galaxy Rangers in general is pretty light on exposition, both in worldbuilding and in characterisation: in order to get to know the characters have to pay attention on what is shown on screen.
- a job, not a calling: this might veer into interpretation, but one of the more amusing aspects of the rangers is that they seem to treat their job as Rangers as, well, a job, especially Zach
I'm interested to see if there is an "of duty" episode.
b) The "villains" - or rather the anatagonists:
- more scoundrels and criminals, less cackling villains and dark overlords: with the exception of the Crown Queen the anatgonists so far are a collections of scoundrels and criminals but they are not portrayed in a clear black-and-white way. Sure, they have traits that make them scoundrels and criminals in the first place: being greedy, opportunistic and ruthless for instance. But they have other traits as well, both neutral and positive. When the rangers oppose someone, it is
always because of that persons actions and not because they are "evil". There are no clear "sides", there is conflict between antagonists and allegiences can switch during an episode - sometimes even multiple times. And the beauty of it is: all of this is taken as par of the course by the characters. No-one acts suprised if the smugglers has some honour, and nobody bats an eye if the Rangers work together with the same mercenary captain that had attacked them a minute ago if the situation demands it. Not discussing it and calling it out as unusual this cements the settings plurality. For kids this has a high educational value.
- the Crown Queen: as mentioned, the Crown Queen has more in common with a classical Disney Villain. She is Dark Lord (well, Dark Lady in her case, but gender does not play a big role in Galaxy Rangers) material. Still, there is much less evil laugther then you would expect and even the Crown Queen does not kick the puppy. She also does not plot to destroy the galaxy or wants to destroy the Earth because she just hates humans or whatever. So far her motivations that brought her into conflict with Earth in general and the Rangers in particular is that she uses living beings as a source of energy (the victims die in the process - more on that later) and humans seem to be particular potent for that. A very genorous view could see her as the leader of a crumbling political entity and that she only tries to protect her empire, but I think that is giving her and the writers too much credit. I expect that the Crown Queen and her Crown Empire will function as the clear "evil" power, but I'm interested in what can be learned about them in the rest of the show.
c) Extras: allies and goons:
- not of the faceless variant: with the exception of the Crown Agents the cast of characters is a pretty diverse lot. Sure, sometimes members of the same species will look the same. In general the universe is presented as very heterogeneous. In that it mirrors StarWars: the empire has its uniform Storm Troopers but everyone else is rather unique and society is racially diverse.
- more competent then incompetent: there are very few instances of comically incompetence. Victims are seldom completely hapless, allies are useful and goons are a threat. This ties in with the power level of the Rangers mentioned above: a random mercenary with a blaster pointed at a Ranger is a threat that needs to be taken seriously and may even be enough to force a surrender or retreat.
2. Themes
Since I'm just 7 episodes in I can't even say if there is a major plot arc of if its more of a "problem of the week" format (so far it has been). But I think I have a good impression of what kind of themes I can expect in the future and also what is likely not featured in the show.
What I don't expect:
- pretty much anything sexual. It's a kids show afterall and considering how non-sexualized the character designs are I doubt that
this is the kind of crap that is being get past the radar in this show. Fine by me.
- interpersonal relationships in any detail: so far this has not been in focus at all. Are Shane and Walter friends, do they hang out after work? No idea. What does Zach think of his superiors? No clue! In time we get to know more of the characters, but this is not Star Trek.
- deep personality studies: what is true for the interpersonal conflicts is also true for the intrapersonal conflicts. While I do think the characters provide a lot of material, so far conflicts have only been hinted at. Again this is not Star Trek.
What I do expect:
- Well... freedom vs. law, humanities warlike nature, genocide, greed, human diaspora to the stars, interstellar politics, spacefaring civilization vs. indigenous civilization, sciency plot critical points that will go right over the head of the target audience, synthetic vs. organic life, AI, transhumanism, nature vs. technology (regrettably...), war, crime, corruption, betrayal, loyalty. Oh, did I mention genocide? Yeah, because that is apparently a thing, introduced in the second episode no less. In short every sci-fi or Western theme of the 80's without regard of how conventionally kid-friendly it is or not.
3. Pacing
As typical for a show of this kind the episode are rather short with about 20 minutes per episode being the norm. Despite that I always have the impression that a lot happens during an episode. I don't think this is unique for Galaxy Rangers as many cartoons are rather fast-paced.
So far I've noticed several factors that work for Galaxy Rangers in this regard:
- light on exposition: there are almost no prolonged exposition scenes. The situation at hand of often just shown. Worldbuilding is done by what is shown on screen and hinted at by what (and
how) characters say. Sometime the specific choice of words is important. For instance: a simple sentence "
A Crown destroyer has appeared on our sensors!" (emphasis mine) actually tells us quite a lot. There are destroyer type capital ships. The Crown Empire has this one, but probably more.
- efficient use of frames to convey a scene: packing enough details into a frame to convey the information but still making it easy to follow (and interesting in case of an action sequence) is quite the skill
- snappy, on the point dialogue: not all dialogue is like that, but I noticed in critical situations dialogue space is used very efficiently.
- the "camera" does not focus or slow down on "dramatic" scenes: if you do not pay attention you might miss something
- no power up/transformation scenes: this is not Sailor Moon or DBZ
4. On-screen violence/bodycount
I remember that as a kid I was always annoyed how nobody ever dies in most shows. I don't think there was any reflection behind that thought, but I think it just felt wrong. The situations depicted were ones that I knew as a kid to be dangerous and deadly. I mean when I grew up there was
war in Europe! There was war in Iraq! (Of course there was war in Afrika, but western media has been rather uninterested in that) I knew that what conflict was and that people die in those conflicts!
Conversely I was pleasently suprised when for instance a Lady Oscare episode showed how a child was shot and killed (in one of the French Revolution episodes; great show btw.). It felt more real, or something like that.
Galaxy Rangers is a non-bloody show. But as an action show there is lot of fighting, explosions and firefights. So despite having a no-blood policy there is a lot of violence. And, as I've witnessed from the first 7 episodes, a rather high bodycount.
But how does Galaxy Rangers manages to show on-screen deaths and still remain a kid show? The secret is to never show the deaths directly. You will never see bodies lying arround that are very clearly dead. Causalties are also never discussed directly (like "There were 500 people on this transport you blew up! You monster!"). So if you
want you can turn a blind eye to the carnage. That is getting crap past the radar par excellence
Galaxy Rangers has three categories of on-screen deaths:
a) People in exploding buildings and vehicles: Sure, especially with buildings you can always say "well, there was nobody in it in that moment" (even if that makes little sense) or "well, it was evacuated shortly before" (even if no evacuation was ever shown, mentioned or even hinted at). But most cases are clear cut: if a vehicle that is actively shown as being crewed by living breathing creatures is blown up in space there is no doubt about the fate of the crew.
b) Creatures shot by blasters: Vehicle mounted blaster canons are shown to have a highly destructive power, and personal arms blaster are also evidently dangerous and lethal. They
can be set to "stun" but that of course implies that the can also kill. In my review of the show I will assume that all blaster shots are potentially deadly if not otherwise (that is explicitly mentioned by the characters) shown. With that in mind I regard every creature taken out by blaster fire as dead or at least severely wounded (in the show creatures taken out by blasters are usually conviently blasted out of the screen or fall behind some cover so you never see the body
)
c) Creatures put into lethal situations without any indications that they have been rescued: Probably the weakest category as you can't be sure. Here I count things like falling/being shoved into a pit of monsters (seems to happen more often then you would think...), being kicked of the hull of a starship without a jetpack, being attacked by a giant crocodile in one screen and then being suspiciously absent for the rest of the episode.