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1985 • GoShogun: The Time Étranger

Sengoku Majin GoShōgun: Toki no Ihôjin

— Chris Stuckmann —

We stared at the collection. The collection stared back. Two large shelves filled with anime. More anime than we could ever need. Perhaps that was the problem.

Have you ever sat in front of your collection, scanning each title, searching for one to watch? Maybe you’ve scrolled through Netflix for an hour, still not finding anything. You know you want to watch something. But what?

This was the dilemma facing my friend and me that night. Both of us agreed we felt like watching an anime, but the plethora of animated entertainment in front of us made that a daunting task.

My eyes skimmed both shelves twice, and on the second pass, they stopped at GoShogun: The Time Étranger—a forgotten film from 1985—directed by Kunihiko Yuyama, who later became known for directing the Pokémon films.

Why do I own this? I pondered, removing the Blu-ray from the shelf. Glancing at the back of the slipcover, I recalled purchasing it after seeing an advertisement from Discotek (a company that primarily distributes anime from the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s). Upon reading the plot, I instantly remembered why I bought it.

The Time Étranger is set forty years after the events of GoShogun, a “giant robot anime” from 1981 that spanned twenty-six episodes. The show follows a team of pilots who operate GoShogun, a large robot that is formed from multiple parts to battle enemies. Like many anime of that era, it was renamed for American audiences as Macron 1, which spliced footage from GoShogun and Mission Outer Space Srungle to create an entirely new continuity. Étranger wisely forges a new path, presenting a daring story unlike anything I’ve seen from this specific genre.

Remy Shimada is a former member of the GoShogun team, now much older. On the way to meet her colleagues, she gets in a deadly car accident and ends up in the hospital on life support. Before long, her old friends stand over her bedside and receive the grave news that Remy is not expected to survive more than a couple days. While she lies in bed, comatose, Remy finds herself caught between life and death.

In her nightmare state, she awakes in a hotel room overlooking a dilapidated city. The buildings seem to rise in elevation, leading to a towering monument. This town is inhabited by shadowy figures and portrayed with a dull, gray color palette. They bow before the monument in submission, heads against the ground. Soon, it becomes clear that their subservience isn’t out of faith, but of fear. This is the City of Fate, and their god is not one of love.

Remy discovers her fellow teammates are in the hotel as well, and everyone—including herself—looks young again. Cryptic letters arrive for each of them, detailing in gruesome ways the manner of their deaths. Remy is told that in two days, Fate will come for her, ripping her to shreds. She’s even supplied photographs documenting her final moments.

Over the next two days, Remy and the team fight against the zombie-like horde. The emotionless mass plows forth, barely affected by Remy’s gunfire. Grenades, machine guns, and explosives are no match for the advancing mob. Fate is coming to collect its due, and it seems that nothing can stop it.

Shuffled within this horrific nightmare are flashbacks to Remy’s youth. An encounter with three young hooligans shows that her tenacity manifested at an early age. After the bullies offer money to remove her dress, she slips off her belt, and the boys think they’ve won. To their shock, young Remy wraps the belt around her fist, and decks each one of them, leaving them in tears on the pavement.

But the main focus of this flashback is Remy’s time spent at the bottom of a cavernous pit. The ground caved in beneath her feet, trapping her in the dark. Alone and terrified, she begins to hallucinate. Ghostlike visions of other children plague her delirium, their voices echoing in her subconscious. Or … could these visitations be literal? I admire Étranger for leaving this—and many other plot points—up to interpretation.

On more than one occasion, my friends and I have fantasized about the possibilities of franchise sequels. Do they all have to be the same? For instance, what if the next Star Wars film took place solely at a spaceport, the entire film revolving around a life-or-death game between two bounty hunters? No spaceships, no lightsabers, no Force. Just two hours in a random corner of the galaxy. The film 10 Cloverfield Lane is a good example of how to do this properly. Most sequels don’t simply continue the storyline, but also feel like they belong within the previously established universe. This is why Étranger is so special.

GoShogun was a show with a big-ass robot that blew stuff up. The only time Étranger even references the eponymous robot of the original show is with an insert shot of Remy’s rear-view mirror. A charm of GoShogun hangs there on a string. That’s it! Do you realize how incredible that is? Imagine a Transformers movie without a single Autobot in sight. The filmmakers have risked completely alienating their audience by making a surrealistic sequel to GoShogun … without GoShogun. This is the type of bold and dangerous move that warrants commendation.

Not to be overlooked is the chilling religious subtext on display. The legion of Fate’s servants attack Remy and the others, forcing the team to kill and maim the assailants. Are the filmmakers offering a critique of religion, possibly suggesting that blind faith begets violence? It’s not farfetched to assume. But religion isn’t the only topic on the mind of the filmmaker here.

In one shocking moment, the City of Fate’s police savagely gun down a crowd of rioters who attacked Remy and the GoShogun team. When the team demands justification for this violence, the officer’s response is telling: “We protect the city from rioters.” Is this a scathing critique of police brutality?

When the film ended, my friend and I agreed we’d picked a good one. Étranger forgoes its origins, providing a fresh and singular take on the franchise. The eerie, hypnotic visuals pinned us to our seats, and the penetrating metaphors haunted us. GoShogun: The Time Étranger has been forgotten by time. For a while, dusty VHS copies were likely buried in the corner of thrift stores, begging to see the light of day. Thanks to Discotek, there’s now a Blu-ray release. Even still, as of this writing, there are only three user reviews on IMDb, with very little information available about this gem.

Let’s change that.