BATTLE OF THE PLANETS

As a kid, Alex Ross was a big fan of this anime series from the 1970's, also called "Gatchaman" in Japan and later retitled G-Force, he is such a fan of this show that he went to the studios that held the rights to this series (Sandy Frank Studios) and acquired the license to produce a comic book, thus reinvigorating these characters for a new generation and bringing plenty of nostalgia to those who remembered this landmark show. Alex's style for the characters on the covers of these comic books, changed somewhat from his regular work, instead of making them look photorealistic, like Superman or Spider-Man, he embraced the Japanese anime look and came with an astounding hybrid of realism and manga. The characters look like real people in the real world yet they have these strange hairdo's and big eyes that make them unique. He was able to marry 2 different, almost opposite styles into a final work which is hard to pass by. And it doesn't end with the cover, the story inside is action packed and very entertaining for new and old readers alike, I highly recommend it! Top: Issues 1 - 6. Bottom: Issues 7-12.

Along with the 12 issue series came some special issues. There was a #1/2 produced with Wizard, a Dynamic Forces variant edition of #1 and a special trade collecting the series, all of these with new covers by Ross. There were also 3 special issues focusing on individual characters: Mark, Jason and Princess.

Due to the popularity of the series, the obligatory crossovers were available too. There was a Thundercats/Battle of the Planets crossover with a foldout cover featuring characters from both series painted by Alex Ross and there was also a Battle of the Planets/Witchblade one because those 2 were the biggest sellers for publisher Top Cow.

But all of this craze began with a couple of litographs Alex made for Dynamic Forces out of love for these characters, the one on the top left got published in Wizard and sparked the interest for these characters. Also Wizard #138 (top right) featured a cover about the crossover with the Thundercats. And if you like these characters and covers so much, I recommend you to buy the Battle of the Planets Art Book (bottom: front and back covers respectively) which features almost all the art that has been presented here.


Finally, famous anime studio ADV Films released Battle of the Planets on DVD with its original Japanese title "Gatchaman". Some of these discs reprinted artwork from the covers of the comic book series but a few have brand new artwork by Alex Ross, so if you're a completists get the collected editions vol.1, vol.3 and vol.6 which feature new art on the box and if you like get vol.2 which contains an interview with Alex talking about how much he likes these characters. See the videos below.

PART ONE


PART TWO


IN MY COLLECTION: I have the 12-issue series, the Wizard magazine, one of the lithographs, the art book and the DVD boxes 1 and 3