2007-08-25 20:05:00
When I was a little fellow of ten years old I got two VHS tapes for Christmas. These tapes were sent to me by a Finnish uncle who'd copied them from rentals, thinking his cousins would enjoy some anime.
 Hawk of Grand Prix! |
The two tapes I got as a present turned out to be copies of the first five VHS releases of the series "Arrow Emblem - Grand Prix no taka", or "Grand Prix" as it was called in Finland. Taking everything into consideration you could say that this was the first anime series I'd followed in my life. |
Now, almost twenty years later, I've refreshed my interest in the series thanks to its beautiful soundtrack. We were discussing the Karaoke Cafe event for the Anime 2006 festival on the Aniway fora and suddenly it dawned on me: I should sing both tunes! After a few hours of searching I'd dug up some footage from the series. Which in turn has led me to research the whole series as deeply as I can!
It turns out that there are loads of various items related to this series, which were released throughout the years. However, information on these items is sparse and is heavily dispersed across the Internet. So I've decided to gather -everything- I can find about Arrow Emblem on one page "<"3
On a side note: funny enough this forum discussion leads me to believe that Arrow Emblem aired in Greece in August of 2003! That's amazing for such an old series! Makes me wish I could read Greek, let alone Greek MSN-style!
In the menu on the left you can find various media and images I've found. The rest of this page contains an enumeration of facts I've dug up about the series. For now I'll be skipping stuff about the people who made the series. This stuff is easier to find :)
DISCLAIMER:
All of the information on this page (including the media and the images) have been gathered from dozens of different websites on the Internet. These include both commercial, private and auction websites. In no way do I claim the creation of any of the stuff I provide here. I have merely gathered them for posterity.
| Title | Arrow Emblem - Grand Prix no Taka |
| Also known as |
アローエンブレム グランプリの鷹 (Japan) الجائزة الكبرى (Arabia) Arrow Emblem - Grand Prix no Taka (Japan) Arrow Emblem - Hawk of the Grand Prix (Japan) Grand Prix (Poland, Finland, Sweden, Germany, France, Spain) Grand Prix - El Halcon de las Pistas (Spain, Chile) Grand Prix e il campionissimo (Italia) Super Grand Prix (America) |
| Official Site | http://www.toei-anim.co.jp/lineup/tv/grandprix/ |
| Total Episodes | 44 |
| Aired on | Fuji TV |
| Aired between | 22nd of Sept. 1977 through 31st of Aug. 1978 |
| Studio | Toei Animation |
| Staff |
Series director: Rintaro Script: Masaki Tsuji Music: Yasushi Miyazawa Original creator: Kogo Himiko Character Design: Akio Sugino, Kenzo Koizumi, Takuo Noda |
| Opening theme | "Grand Prix no Taka" by Mizuki Ichiro |
| Ending theme | "Race Blues" by Mizuki Ichiro |
Episode lists:
As is the case with many anime dubs the name for the characters get changed with each dub. For instance, just take a look at all the characters from Carc Captor Sakura and from Sailormoon.
So to make sure that Google returns this page for anyone looking for his localised version of Arrow Emblem, here's a list of the various names I've found for the main character:
The following toy models were issued by Popy in their Popinika line through 1977-80:
Apparently PB-37 came in two versions: one with, and one without a driver action figure. Also, what I thought were pictures of PB-35 are probably something else; I just don't know what yet. These pictures have been labeled "unknown 1". The toy labeled "unknown 2" seems to come from the same manufacturer, but is a mystery to me. I'd expect PB-36 to be the TS-2, but this toy clearly isn't it. Odd...
Bandai released a slotracing track featuring a set of two Todoroki Special's. Also, Club M released a garage kit for the Todoroki Special. Years back Hobby Link Japan had a page up for the model, even though it was sold out even back then. These days you can only find the garage kit in hidden away stores in Japan.
I was completely blown away when I found out on eBay that Popy had also made a 1:1 scale racing helmet, so the kids at home could pretend they are Takaya. It doesn't look that nice, but for that day and age it was definitely good enough.
While reaching deep into Google, I also ran into Nippori Toy Store. The Babelfish translation was a bit sketchy, but it seems these guys are hand building their own Todoroki Special toy, kind of like a garage kit. I will try to contact them for more details.
About three years ago some very kind soul in Japan decided to do a re-release of Arrow Emblem. This re-release came in the following form:
In a wonderful stroke of good luck I was able to find the OST CD still for sale at CDJapan. You can find the CD over here for 1200 Yen (approximately $12). I will -not- make the songs available through this website, since this CD is a recent commercial product. CDJapan also has pages for both DVD boxes (here and here), but they've been unavailable for quite some time.
Tom from Anime Stuff Radio tells me that it was quite rare for a series from the 70s to have its music released. I guess Arrow Emblem was one of those rare series, because the following LPs were released:
In 2001 the series was also released on DVD in Italy. A review for one of the DVDs can be found over here. These six DVDs include both Italian and Japanese audio and Italian subtitles.
At one point in time the TV series was also rehashed into a 'movie' called "Super Grand Prix". This movie was released on DVD in the US and can still be found through Amazon over here. The DVD was released by Liberty International on the 12th of Aug. 2003. Its ASIN number is B00005QW5D.
Opening (excerpt from "Grand Prix no taka")
Mato o neraeba hazusanai
Taka no hokori wa ore no mono
Chikaraippai habataite
Kyou no REESU wa itadakisa
Ore mo MASHIN mo kizudarakedaga
Itsuka noboruze eikoo no sora
Ore wa taka da GURANPURI no taka da!
Ending (excerpt from "Race blues")
Kaze yo wasurenaidekure
Omae to issho ni kakete itta
Otoko no, otoko no yume o
Dekkai yuuhi ga ore no GOORU sa
Hitotsu no inochi o moyashi tsukusou
Kaze yo oboeteirukai
Omae to utatta hitoribochi no
Otoko no, otoko no uta o
kilala.nl tags: arrow emblem, anime,
View or add comments (curr. 26)
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Hey Miika,
You're welcome! I love this series too and it's a shame that my finnish tapes are completely worn out ;_: I tried watching them about a year ago, but the image is just completely gone. It was so depressing! ;_;
The nice thing is that I did indeed run into one of the DVD boxes when I visited Japan last January! Unfortunately it was PIBA-7168, ie the second DVD box. It would have also set me back about 130 euros, which I couldn't afford at the time. I think it was about 20.000 Yen, so the price was actually quite decent!
Posted by Miika
I think you should have gone for it! :) (But I do understand that 130€ is a lot)
Luckily my VHS's are still in a decent condition. I just checked them and noticed that I actually have 4 of them, but unfortunately the fourth one is faulty, it has wrong audio track! Also, I regret giving the 3rd one to my cousin as a birthday present yeeaaars ago.
Anyway, do you have any idea how many VHS's were actually released in Finland? I think it's 6 (I have 1st, 4th faulty, 5th and 6th, used to have 3rd and have seen the 2nd once)
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
You could be right that it was six tapes.
I have tapes 1 and 2 over here, or was it 1 through 3? Anywho, the last tape is the one that's broken, while the first still plays decently. I really ought to digitize it asap :/
But what do I expect, from a copy made using a cheap VHS cassette about twenty years ago? :)
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Thanks to a morning-long search and the Excite translation service ( www.excite.co.jp/world/english/web/ ) I've learnt that a Mandarake store in Osaka at one point sold "Arrow Emblem" toys. Apparently they have a special section for retro toys!
Their address is:
まんだらけ なんば店
〒556-0005 大阪市浪速区日本橋3-7-6
TEL 06-6645-0772 / e-mail nanba@mandarake.co.jp
Mandala shop
〒556-0005 Osaka City Naniwa Ward Nihonbashi 3-7-6
The URL to their news item on the "Arrow Emblem" toy can be found here: http://www.mandarake.co.jp/information/2007/05/27/12nnb01/index.html
I've also bookmarked their shop in Google Maps: http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=114246382737019739941.000447220a82eed55cb25&ll=35.299435,136.065674&spn=1.253027,2.28241&z=9&iwloc=00044785625710d8213a2
Posted by Miika
Hahah. Any idea what they'd cost? :)
Btw. I'm trying my best to get to see all the episodes (No matter the language). I found the first 7 episodes or so in youtube, but I'm not having much luck with the rest. And as the first Finnish VHS seems to skip a huge amount of episodes (I'd estimate 3-12), it'd be great to see the rest.
Yeah and getting all the episodes legally feels just too f*cking difficult so...
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Actually, the Mandarake prices seem quite fair! Or actualy downright fscked up low! Back in 2005 the Fukuoka branch of Mandarake (a huge store!) sold the PB-44 (Deluxe Anchor) for Y6.400. That's about 40 euros! That's -nothing-!
Re: episodes of the show.
1. I've found a Torrent for episodes 21-44 from the Italian DVDs. I'll e-mail you.
2. Getting the episodes legally isn't -that- hard. It seems that Play Asia still has them for sale at their online store. -> http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-a7-49-en-86-1-70-b0y.html
Posted by Miika
well, yeah.. I guess I could try and get the series legally, but the prize! 166 euros... Phew... Young students usually don't have that kind of budgets for TV series. :P
But anyway, emailing the torrents much appreciated, but I found the torrent just recently anyway. (Google for the win!
I just wish I'd understand Italian a bit better. Half-decent skill with French isn't helping much, haha...
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Wow! We're in luck!
Refer to the updated "Where to buy" section. It seems that at least one Italian reseller has the DVDs for sale for nine euros apiece! o_O
That means that for a total of 54 euros you could own all six DVDs!
Posted by Miika
Whaaaaat!? I think I will HAVE TO get those DVD's, especially if they really have the Japanese audio! Damn!
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
I just tried registering with their site and let me confirm that:
1) They do ship outside Italy. Inside Europe the S&H costs amount 15 euros.
2) They do accept credit cards.
3) The even accept Paypal.
It seems that their stock of the "Arrow Emblem" DVDs is almost gone though, so I'd better hurry. Unfortunately we are currently out of money, so I can't order them myself ;_;
Damn :)
Posted by Miika
I am trying to get the remaining one's of those DVD's ordered as soon as possible.
By the way, I was trying to find Arrow Emblem discussion topic anywhere in the net, but I really haven't had much luck finding people who even know about the series. A few Finnish forums had couple of people who knew and like the series, also there are ofcourse some people who commented the youtube videos, but that's about it.
What I'm saying is that this series deserves more. I know that it was some kind of hit in Japan when it was first released and there must still be many fans in Japan atleast, but I don't think that too many people remember it anymore.
It's just kind of unfair, cause it's really a lot better than something like "Naruto", don't you think?
Oh well... I'm sure there are tons of great animes from the 70s that aren't really remembered anymore, actually "Grand Prix No Taka" has propably had more luck than many others, but still...
Sorry for the long rant, I'm just a bit tired. :P
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Hey Miika,
You're right about the lack of any real attention for the show. It seems that my website is currently the biggest "Arrow Emblem" in the west. Most other posts I find are people going "Hey yeah, I remember that show!" on some unrelated forum.
Now I won't be offering you a forum, since it really won't attract a lot of people. And of course there's the commenting system, to allow people to chat about the subject if they want to ;)
I'm not sure if there's much out there in Japan either. I've searched a few times and managed to find -some- pages with AE stuff, but it's been limited. I'll try and search some more RSN(tm).
And yeah, the seventies had dozens of good shows that I'm sure a lot of people have forgotten about :D
Posted by Miika
Heh, I am actually doing a little writing about Grand Prix No Taka for my Finnish class.
I don't know if it's very good, I pretty much just introduce the series and tell what it's about, who made it and when it's been released in Finland. I'm using this site as a source, if that's ok.
If you have any special tips, tell them! :P
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Go right ahead Miika, this is why I put this site up :)
No special tips though, sorry...
Posted by Gerardo Jaramillo
Im a fan too, im In Guatemala, and im trying to get anything around here... better if is in spanish... I saw a lot of clips on youtube... I hope I can get all the dvds somehow!
Thnks for the information
Posted by Niko
Hi there..
i'm huge fan too..
first time i watched one of these was -89 when my parents bought our first VCR.. it was 5th..
few years ago i managed to find 1,2,3 from second hand shop but that time i didn't have 6th.. i didnät have editing stuff so i couldn't digitize thme and i sold those for dezent price.
now i have 4, 5 and 5 minutes ago just vought 6 so i'm gonna see it for the first time :)
i've digitized 4 and 5... and 6 as soon as i can.
Posted by X´anethia
got any torrets in japanese language and subs in english or something? been looking for this show for long. one of my favs from my childhood
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Here's what I just emailed to another fan who asked the same question. However, you can completely forget about english subs.
===========
> Hey m8 i was searching one of my favorite series and i saw
> in your site that you have the anime episode titles in French
> and Italian. The anime's name is Arrow Emblem-Grand Prix no
> Taka. Do you maybe know or can u suggest me a place to
> download it in any language even japanese?
I know that rips of the Italian DVDs appear as Torrents from time to time. This does not happen very often and when it does there are very few seeders. I've never, ever seend the Japanese episodes appear. The original DVDs are very rare, so rips online would be even rarer. I assume they will only appear on Japan-only sharing sites. For some reason the Japanese have never gotten into Torrents, instead using other P2P networks.
I also know there's an Argentinian fansub group who sells Spanish subbed, Japanese spoken episodes through their website.
See also -> http://www.kilala.nl/Manga-Anime/index.php?id=1047
Posted by Dan Sommer
Hey Cailin,
Thanks for putting this info up! I was a huge fan of this in the eighties growing up in Sweden, and now I'd love to get a hold of this so my son can watch it, in Swedish, or if not then English subtitles. That seems to be an impossible task, but thanks for collecting all this info though.
Posted by Miika
I finally got the soundtrack to this series. And I'm very, very happy about it!
It's just nice to return to this series every once in a while... I think I'm gonna watch through some episodes again...
Posted by Folken
I have 30 episodes in japanese with spanish subs,from a chilean fansub, but apparently they don't have any more.
I am huge anime fan,so huge that over the years I've prety much master the spanish language for the sole purpuse of watching anime,belive me,no where in the world will you find more anime with subs or spanish dub. I think for political reasons many latin countries where forbidden all american media,so they started importing massive amounts of japanese stuff during the 70's all the way to the late 80's. I don't know why I am saying this, guess i felt like sharing. Any way they are working with the Italian release with Japanese audio and apparently the last dvd they got was Italian dub only.Should I post Links, or you don't do that here,sorry is my first time here.
Posted by Cailin Coilleach
Hi Folken,
Sorry for not reacting sooner! Yes, the fansubs you mentioned are something I've known about. The chilean group used to sell them on DVD, but I never bought them.
Thank you very much for sharing your ideas and insights from the latin countries :)
Posted by Luis
Hi, my name is Luis. Im a big fan of the Arrow emblem grand prix no taka series. I look the series for a long time, and i got it complete in japasese, the dvds from toshiba, and i transform it in divx archives, the 44 episodes.
Im from chile, and im not related with the fansub you mention before. But i got that episodes, and i can create the subtitles for the 30 episodes they launch. Im looking for somebody who just translate the episodes 31 to 44 and send me the translation to make the subtitles, in exchange y give the soft subs in spanish, episodes 01 to 30 (you can use google translator, its easy... or maybe i can translate some to english, buy im very lack of practice) and the 44 episodes in divx dvdrip (i can upload to megaupload).
You can write to me to lunarwolf0@gmail.com
best regards
All content, with exception of "borrowed" blogpost images, or unless otherwise indicated, is copyright of Thomas Sluyter. The character Kilala the cat-demon is copyright of Rumiko Takahashi and used here without permission.
2008-02-22 21:25:00
Posted by Miika
Hey, thank you for this site! I was/am a huge fan of the series and it's very sad to know that it's almost impossible to get hands on all the original episodes. I would do anything to get to see it un-cut with original voice actors (but subbed ofcourse as my Japanese isn't too good).
I only have three Finnish VHS releases, which are clearly cut (But still awesome). Damn, this just watching clips from youtube makes me feel so nostalgic.