While I had initially conceived of Demo Disc to be a way for me to cover anime that I normally wouldn't be able to properly review in full, one idea wound up being a decent alternate definition of this column: Pilots. Starting with Volume 9 in 2017, I've occasionally returned to the idea of using Demo Disc to cover initial pilot versions of various anime, namely Volume 13 in 2018, Volume 15 in 2019, & Volume 19 in 2021. While not exactly making anywhere near a majority (or even a plurality), with this fifth pilot-focused volume of Demo Disc that you're now reading, that now means that a little over 1/5 of Demo Disc has been dedicated to this subject and once things finish up with Volume 27 (whenever that happens...) it'll only be slightly less than that fraction. Now, sure, there are technically other pilots I could one day return to, but I think five sets of anime pilots, totaling 20 different pilots, is more than enough of these to have covered for Demo Disc.
Also, fittingly enough, while the majority of the pilots covered for Demo Disc originated from shonen manga, this time around they're mostly originated from shojo manga!
The Vengeful Sorceress
Running from 1993 to 1996 in Kodansha's Nakayoshi magazine for six volumes, Magic Knight Rayearth is often cited as one of the most iconic creations of the mangaka collective known as CLAMP, alongside the likes of X & Cardcaptor Sakura. Unsurprisingly, this would lead to not just one anime adaptation, but two. The first was a TV anime that ran for 49 episodes (split into two seasons) from 1994 to 1995, while in the second half of 1997 a three-episode OVA reimagining was made, both of which were animated by TMS & directed by Toshihiro "Toshiki" Hirano. TMS felt that the TV anime had tons of potential outside of Japan, so some time in the 90s (1995 seems to come up the most often) the studio teamed with The Ocean Group in Canada to produce an English dub test pilot for Magic Knight Rayearth, with apparently hopes of getting it aired on Fox Kids. This dub pilot wouldn't go anywhere, and a second attempt with Summit Media Group had an ambiguous result (there's word that 13 episodes were dubbed this time around, but no proof of the dub itself seems to exist anymore), but eventually Rayearth would finally receive a complete English dub via Media Blasters' release of the series, this time being dubbed by Bang Zoom! Entertainment; technically, there's a fourth dub for this version of Rayearth, but that was solely for Working Designs' release of the Sega Saturn video game. For the longest time it was thought that both of the old dubs for Magic Knight Rayearth TV were lost with time, but when Discotek Media license rescued the series for release on DVD & Blu-Ray in early 2017 it actually managed to find a copy of TMS & Ocean's original dub pilot & included it as an extra, so let's see how the earliest attempt to dub this iconic CLAMP series holds up, just in time for the anime's 20th Anniversary this year.
Magic Knights Luce (Hikaru Shindo), Marine (Umi Ryuzaki), & Anemone (Fuu Hououji), alongside their creature pal Mokona, have finally made it out of The Silent Forest & are continuing their way to The Eternal Spring (Eterna) as they hope to find a way to save the world of Zephyr (Cephiro) from the clutches of the evil Zyguard (Zagato). They find their way to a village that looks more like a ghost town, only for the Magic Knights to get caught in a net by said villagers, who all look ready to kill them. However, a massive monster attacks the village, accidentally freeing the girls, but even after Marine manages to kill the monster the villagers still don't trust them. Things aren't made any easier when Arcione (Alcyone), one of the servants of Zyguard, attacks the Magic Knights & puts the safety of the village at stake. Luce, being the only one who can access magic, tries her best to fight back & protect everyone, but she can't do it on her own... and, after being taken down with a single blow by Arcione, Marine wishes that she could use magic to help her friend out.
Similar to the Speed Racer Y2K dub pilot that was produced for Mach Go Go Go: Restart, TMS & Ocean's Magic Knight Rayearth pilot doesn't utilize the first episode of the series itself. Instead, it dubs Episode 4 of the TV series' first season, likely so as to give a better impression of what the anime itself was like when shopping it around in hopes of it getting picked up for North American TV back in the day. In that regard it makes sense, as this is a rather simple but newcomer-friendly episode of Rayearth, giving you a quick idea as to the kinds of characters "Luce", "Marine", & "Anemone" (all named in ways similar to their Japanese originals, i.e. "Light", "Water", & "Wind[flower]") are, showcasing the anime's ability to go from comical (complete with chibi forms of the Magic Knights for effect) to serious & dramatic, and telling a quick story that works fine on its own while also giving indications of the larger overall story found in Season 1. The story told here is a fun one, and for someone like me that's only really heard of Rayearth but never seen anything beyond the outstanding first OP sequence (which was completely replaced for this pilot with its own absolutely 90s English theme song) I can definitely see the initial appeal of a series like this, which is now considered an all-time classic. Definitely one of those "I really should watch it one day..." titles, for sure.
As for the dub itself in this pilot, it's actually rather well done & still holds up relatively well nearly 30 years later. Anime dubbing at this time, especially those done for TV airing, could vary wildly in quality so had TMS actually gotten Magic Knight Rayearth on to Fox Kids back then with this cast I think it would have been considered well above average for its time; that said, I'm sure Fox would have enforced the removal of words like "kill" & "dead", which do get used in this pilot. Sure, the script does have some of the usual one-off jokes that date it ("Anemone" twice makes jokes about "what it feels like to be in a washing machine" or "what a fish feels like", which I'm sure would have become a recurring gag for her, in the long run), but on the whole the English script feels accurate to what the original Japanese version likely was, name changes aside, and even the original Japanese score by Hayato Matsuo was 100% maintained, though who knows if that would have been kept for a proper TV dub at the time. Being an Ocean dub the cast of six is partially made up of known names at the time, namely Venus Terzo, Janyse Jaud, & Ellen Kennedy, alongside lesser-known voice actors who didn't do much more; unfortunately, the credits don't list who voiced who. However, while the majority of the cast do very well, there is one who utterly drops the ball, and that'd be Marcus Turner as Clef, the "guru" who taught the Magic Knights how to use magic; I can tell it's Turner because he's literally the only male voice actor credited. Simply put, Turner is terrible in this pilot, sounding like he's only half awake most of the time & overall gives as little emotion as possible in his lines. Beyond that low point, though, the Magic Knight Rayearth English dub pilot is a very solid one-off and shows that there could have been some potential for this show, had it gotten on American TV back in the 90s, and I commend TMS for giving it an attempt, at the very least.
Kodocha: Child's Toy
Our next two anime pilots are an interesting pair, because they are literally the shojo equivalent to the various Shonen Jump pilots that I've written about in prior Demo Disc volumes about this subject! While Jump is the primary shonen magazine for Shueisha, its shojo equivalent is the monthly magazine Ribon, which has been the home to various iconic series, including Himitsu no Akko-chan, Sally the Witch, Akazukin Chacha, Marmalade Boy, Neighborhood Story, the large majority of Arina Tanemura's catalog, & the focus of our first shojo anime pilot, Kodomo no Omocha/Child's Toy by Miho Obana. Running in Ribon from 1994 to 1998 for 10 volumes, the manga most often shortened to simply Kodocha is arguably even more known & cherished due to its TV anime adaptation by Studio Gallop, which ran from 1996 to 1998 for 102 episodes (the second half of which only recently received its very first official English release via Discotek), but prior to that Shueisha self-produced a 30-minute pilot released on December 16, 1995 under the Ribon Video imprint, seemingly to help celebrate the magazine's 40th Anniversary that year. Unfortunately, due to it being a completely different production (&, in turn, license), Discotek could not include this pilot for its TV anime Blu-Ray boxsets; maybe Discotek can one day give Kodocha a "Special Fan Disc" that includes this pilot, à la what they're doing with Reborn!. This was animated by J.C. Staff, directed by Iku Suzuki (Gargoyle of Yoshinaga House, Maze) , & featured a complete different voice cast from that of the later TV anime, while its only English translation seems to come from a very old VHS fansub from 1996 that got digitized way back when (i.e. it's 240p!), so let's hope that it doesn't look too unwatchable on a modern display & see if Kodocha still had the manic charm it's beloved for back in its original anime pilot.
Sana Kurata is a child actor who stars in the variety show "Child's Toy", while also attending her local elementary school as a real-life sixth grader. Unfortunately, her class tends to not able to get learning done due to the rowdy behavior of a group of boys lead by Akito Hayama, a quiet but tough kid. Wanting to find some way to take him down a peg (so that the class can finally get to learning again), Sana tries her best to figure out & best Hayama, even recruiting his buddy Tsuyoshi to help out. After failing via basic conversation & even challenging him to a bungee jumping contest, though, Sana winds up accidentally finding out about Hayama's rough family life, as his mother died after giving birth to him, his older sister hates him for that & wishes he was dead, and his father is more or less ambivalent to it all; coincidentally enough, this is all similar to a new role Sana got for an upcoming dramatic TV movie. With this information in hand, though, Sana does what she can to hopefully mend the Hayama Family's relationship... and through it all maybe Sana & Hayama might come to realize that they actually like each other, deep down.
Oh, who are we kidding? These are two sixth graders who are either too stubborn (Hayama) or dense (Sana) to realize that last part.
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| The moment Tsuyoshi realizes that he's the third wheel, instead of part of a love triangle. |
For those familiar with the Kodocha TV anime, this pilot's plot will sound very familiar, and that's because in just ~30 minutes this 1995 pilot tells the same overall story as Episodes 3 to 6 of the TV series, which both correspond to most of the first volume of the original manga. However, aside from a constantly moving pace (which is similar to both adaptations), this pilot is still a very unique watch, especially for those who are very familiar with the later TV anime. The big reason for that is because while both are very much comedies that can handle heavy drama when needed, Kodocha TV is known for being especially comedy-focused, with Sana herself generally being the anime equivalent to the Energizer Bunny, i.e. she keeps going & going & going, which in turn is where part of the appeal of that adaptation comes from; it's a series that demands your absolute attention & rewards you for doing so. In comparison, the pilot features a slightly more toned down Sana (which I believe is more accurate to Obana's manga), as while she still has all of her usual moments of comedy (both at her & others' expenses), it's nowhere near as madcap as the TV version would often be. She'll still talk of big game against Hayama, only to wind up being more or less helpless against reality (&, usually, leaving Hayama unsure of what just happened), and she'll still makes verbal jokes at points (like calling Hayama "Peggy"), but for those who might have found "TV Sana" to be a little too manic at points they might find "Pilot Sana" more to their liking.
Also, "Pilot Sana" is a blonde, and that's just something I can't quite get used to, honestly.
In terms of the production side of things the animation by J.C. Staff is overall very good, and even watching this via a 240p video blown up to hell on a modern 1080p display I can still see how nice this should look. The music by Hiroshi Koga is admittedly kind of "in one ear, out the other", though the ED theme "Kodomo no Kimochi" is fine & poppy enough. At least the voice cast is quality, and naturally completely different from the later TV anime. For Sana & Hayama was have Chisa Yokoyama & Megumi Ogata, respectively, and they both nail their characters very well. Yokoyama's ability to move between comedic & serious would become more iconic in 1996 when she voiced Sakura in Sakura Wars, but the Kodocha pilot actually predates that, making it a fun early example of her dichotomic knack. As for Megumi Ogata, I could identify who voiced Hayama from the very first line, due to Ogata's iconic & easily recognizable voice. To no surprise, Ogata absolutely knocks Hayama out of the park, arguably being the best overall performance in the pilot. Really, there really isn't much else to say about the Kodocha pilot, as it's a very enjoyable interpretation of the early part of the manga, but when compared to the much more well known TV anime that came later its mixture of comedy & drama is much more even-handed in this pilot, though that may simply be due to it having to get through a good amount of content in such a short amount of time. Still, if you are a fan of Kodocha but haven't checked this out, then definitely do so... even if you have to rely on a 240p digital rip of a mid-90s VHS fansub, because Shueisha has never re-released it.
Heartbeat Mystery Diary Ultra Maniac
As for out other Ribon anime pilot, we move ahead into the early 00s. Running from 2001 to 2004 for five volumes, Ultra Maniac by Wataru Yoshizumi is a series that has had its fair share of English releases, with Viz releasing the entire manga between 2005 & 2006, while the 26-episode TV anime adaptation by Ashi Pro from 2003 saw English release twice, first by Geneon in 2005 & 2006, followed by a license rescue by Discotek Media in 2017. However, prior to the TV anime adaptation there was a 30-minute anime pilot made for Ribon Otanoshimi Matsuri/Enjoyment Festival 2002 that August, alongside an OVA for Full Moon wo Sagashite (which was not a pilot, since a TV anime adaptation for that was already airing). With the full title of Tokimeki Fushigi Dairy/Heartbeat Mystery Diary Ultra Maniac, this anime pilot was actually animated by Ashi Pro (just like the later TV anime), but otherwise has a completely different staff & cast, with only character designer Miho Shimogasa (Gravitation, Mysterious Joker) returning for the TV series in any major way. Personally, I have no experience at all with Ultra Maniac, so maybe this anime pilot will be the perfect way for me to get a taste as to what this series is about.
Ayu Tateishi is a middle school girl who's cool, athletic, and hasn't thought about stuff like "magic" since the days she was a small child watching magical girl anime. However, that last one changes when Ayu comes across what looks to be a small electronic dictionary (with some weird looking letters for a keyboard) that her classmate Nina Sakura told her went missing, only for Nina to eventually reveal that she's actually a magical girl from the Magic Kingdom, has come to Earth to continue her schooling (because she flunked out back home), and after seeing how kind Ayu is to everyone wants to do everything she can to help Ayu out with her burgeoning magical skills. Luckily for Ayu, this magic can help her with a challenge from the boys' tennis team against the girls' tennis team she's a part of (a challenge that Nina essentially forced Ayu into), as it can help her become more talented to take on Tsujiai, one of her more experienced upperclassmen. Unluckily for Ayu, Nina has no magic to improve her agility & tennis skills... so Nina decides to simply turn Ayu into a boy for the time being to try to even the playing field.
The best thing something like this can do is make the new viewer think "Huh, this actually looks like fun", and the Ultra Maniac pilot certainly did that for me. I like how the concept plays around with some usual tropes seen in stories like these, like Ayu actually being relatively popular instead of being an outcast (though still with her own self-doubts when it comes to her own crush, classmate Kaji), Nina's magic being delivered through more then-modern technology instead of the usual older methods (with Nina even calling Ayu "old-fashioned" for thinking that way), and even the situation involving the two tennis clubs more or less being made into a non-factor by Tsujiai being completely reasonable about it. It's also admittedly rare to see the whole gender bender concept get flipped around by having a girl get turned into a guy, and props to Satsuki Yukino doing a decent job at making Ayu & "Ayuo" (as Nina calls "him") sound different enough to help sell the gender change. The end result of all of this is a fun little time that has an endearingly silly feel over the entire thing, and looking things up this pilot is apparently closer to the original manga than the later TV anime was, as the latter added in Nina trying to find five objects which will allow her to marry the Prince of the Magic Kingdom, though that might not be established immediately; also, for those curious, the TV anime would do its own take on Ayu becoming a boy in Episode 3.
The animation here is solid enough and shows no hesitation in showing more SD or cutesy versions of Ayu & Nina for comedic effect, with Nanako Shimazaki (Ninjala, Fushigi Yugi: Eikoden) leading things as both director & storyboarder; Shimazaki would also return for the TV anime, but only as a storyboarder. Oddly enough there's no one credited for doing the musical score for this pilot, but I have to point out that, though no song title is listed in during the end credits, the pilot literally ends with an instrumental cover of "At the Hop" by Danny & the Juniors. Yes, the 50s doo-wop song that's best known for its iconic "Bah-bah-bah-bah" chorus line is, in essence, the actual ED theme for the Ultra Maniac pilot... and, to be fair, it actually kind of fits here. Overall, the Ultra Maniac pilot is a very enjoyable time & I think does a great job at establishing the general concept of the story & our two leads, though seeing as the later TV anime apparently does diverge in focus from the manga I guess it can be argued that it might not exactly work as a direct, 1:1 way of setting full expectations for the later Ashi Pro production. However, to be fair, this pilot was made to help promote the manga, so there's that.
Beelzebub: Is the Baby You Picked Up the Demon King!?
Finally, we end this (apparent?) final look at anime pilots via Demo Disc with what had become a bit of a standard: A Shonen Jump anime pilot. Specifically, we move ahead to Jump Super Anime Tour 2010, which featured OVAs based on Bleach, Toriko, Tegami Bachi Reverse, & Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan, as well as promotional videos announcing anime adaptations of Level E & Sket Dance, but only one actual "pilot". Specifically, it's Beelzebub: Hirotta Aka-chan wa Daimaoh!?/Is the Baby You Picked Up the Demon King!?, based on the manga by Ryuhei Tamura that would run from 2009 to 2015 for 28 volumes, though in this case it's more of an early promotional piece for a TV anime that was already on the verge of debuting, similar to what Ninku & Bleach each received; in fact, this pilot even ends with a quick promotion for the TV anime. In this case, Studio Pierrot+ was already working on a TV anime that would debut on January 9, 2011, just a little over two months after this pilot first got screened, and because of that Hirotta Aka-chan wa Daimaoh!? features (almost) all of the same staff & cast as the later TV anime. 2010 would be the penultimate year of Shueisha producing these kinds of event-screened pilots, as 2011 would finish things off with pilots for both Nisekoi & Assassination Classroom, so let's see how one of the last of a dying breed came out... though, considering how enjoyable the TV anime was, I expect this pilot to be more or less the same quality as that.
Tatsumi Oga is a first-year student at Ishiyama High, a school notorious for being full of delinquents, and Oga himself is feared as one of the strongest there, having just defeated all of the strongest second-years by himself... all while having a naked baby boy clinging to his back. When his buddy/servant Furuichi asks why there's a baby attached to him, Oga explains that after "doing some cleaning" by the river (i.e. beating up a bunch of guys) he saw an old man floating down the river, only for the old man to literally open up in front of him & reveal the baby; despite Oga trying his hardest to frighten the baby with scary faces, he wound up only making the baby love him even more. A proper answer for Oga & Furuichi arrives as they're soon approached by a young girl named Hildegarde (or simply Hilda, for short) riding a bird monster, who explains that said baby is Kaiser de Emperana Beelzebub IV (or simply Baby Beel, for short), the son of the Demon King himself. However, this is because Beel's father is a lazy jerk who requested Hilda to send his baby son to the human realm & have him be raised by someone who can be a terrible father, which in turn would make Baby Beel want to destroy the world, since Daddy Demon King is just too busy to do it himself. Unfortunately for Oga, he looks to be the best/worst parent for Baby Beel, but Oga really doesn't want this responsibility. Good thing for him the strongest third-years at Ishiyama have now deemed Oga a threat, so maybe one of them is better/worse for the job!
Similar to something like Sakigake!! Otokojuku before it, part of the appeal in Beelzebub is seeing the delinquent genre get thrown around & messed with in amusing ways, and in this case it's by forcing the seeming worst delinquent to become a surrogate father to the baby son of the literal devil. This pilot, then, showcases Oga go from not wanting anything to do with Baby Beel to accepting the responsibility put upon him & seeing the two become an endearingly likeable father/son duo. In terms of adaptation, the best way to describe the Beelzebub pilot is that it's essentially the Cliff's Notes for the early portion, and by that I mean that it adapts bits & pieces of the manga's first few volumes in order to create a highly condensed introduction to the series, in general. For example, third-year leader Kunieda is introduced in both the manga & TV anime after Oga had initially dealt with fellow third-year leader Himekawa, but in this pilot her introduction is seen first while Himekawa's kidnapping of Baby Beel, Hilda, & Furuichi is instead now the climax of the pilot itself. The end result of it all is a very fast-paced 30 minutes that's a lot of fun watch, if a bit "a lot" to take in all at once, but I'd argue that it never feels hectic, at the very least.
As mentioned before, the staff & cast for this pilot is almost an exact match for the later TV anime, with literally the only real changes being that minor character Shintaro Natsume changed actors between the two (Daisuke Ono in the pilot, Daisuke Kishio in the TV anime) & the music having a second person credited alongside Yasuharu Takanashi for the pilot, namely Kenji Fujisawa. Because of that this pilot pretty much looks & sounds exactly as what I remember the TV anime sounding like back in the day, especially when it comes to the cast (I'd argue that Oga is one of Katsuyuki Konishi's most iconic roles), though maybe the animation itself has just a tiny bit of extra polish, as these Jump Festa/JSAT pilots & OVAs were made to be first shown via road shows, i.e. short theatrical runs, so Shueisha would want them to look even just a little better than most TV anime. This pilot also has a unique OP theme, "Appare☆Bancho Sanjou! Beelzebub!" by Hiroaki Takeuchi, which is fun little song in its own right, though it highly clashes with most of the OPs from the TV anime. Overall, whereas I feel that the Kodocha & Ultra Maniac pilots could both theoretically work as introductions for newcomers (though at this point they'd really only be watched by hardcore fans, obviously), I do hesitate a little to say the same for the Beelzebub pilot. It's a ton of fun, but its digest-style storytelling & fast pace might make it feel a bit overwhelming for newcomers. While 60 episodes can sound slightly imposing for the TV anime, & it naturally doesn't cover the entire manga, I still think it'd be better to just go with that instead, if you're curious, and then come back to this pilot later to see how it was first showcased via animation.
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With that we end the 23rd volume of Demo Disc, and with my plan of having one for each letter of the English alphabet (after I had already used "S" twice) I'm now down to only four more volumes to go. While one of them is still not 100% locked in for its subject, I can safely say that anime pilots aren't in any of the remaining ones I have planned. Sure, there are still other pilots out there, but I think 20 is way more than I had ever really considered covering when I first decided to go with this subject for the occasional Demo Disc back in 2017, and I'm fine with ending it at that.
Magic Knight Rayearth © CLAMP・ST/Kodansha/TMS
Kodomo no Omocha © 1995 Miho Obana/Shueisha
Tokimeki Fushigi Dairy Ultra Maniac © 2002 Wataru Yoshizumi/Shueisha
Beelzebub: Hirotta Akachan wa Daimaoh!? © Ryuhei Tamura/Shueisha
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