History Anime / SpaceBattleshipYamato

** [[spoiler:Desslok. Makes more sense in the American dub, where he was in a dimension where time worked differently, and was merely trapped a moment ''from'' death.]]

* BeePeople: Literally. A bee-like insectoid race from the planet [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Beeland.]]

** Except the BeePeople, who get to look a little more insectoid. Their [[TheQuisling traitorous queen]] looks much more human than the rest of them.

* WackyWaysideTribe: The Bee-People.

** While averted in the rare situation ([[spoiler: like the Yamato being submerged in what amounts to an ocean on Pluto and running out of air]]) for the most part it's played completely straight.

** In the second season, [[spoiler: Saito/Knox]] sets charges in the Comet City as part of a suicide mission. Kodai got out quickly, but he had a several-minute head start and just escaped in his life. In the American dub, a bridge crewmember radios Wildstar that "[[spoiler: Knox]] got out just in time." Of course he's never seen again.

** CompositeCharacter: Both characters fill roles held by Yuki Mori (Nova) in the original series -- [[BridgeBunnies Bridge Bunny]] and [[HelloNurse medical care]], respectively. Yuki is promoted to fighter pilot.

* TranslationConvention / TranslatorMicrobes / AliensSpeakingEnglish ([[MindScrew or something]]): Except for one case early in the series where Analyzer has to translate the Gamilus language for his human friends, all the aliens speak Japanese (and, in the dub, English) both to the humans and to each other, even in the case of different races that you wouldn't expect them to have a common language.

* NeverSayDie: Averted, except in episodes where it isn't. In general, the dub was inconsistent about this. One episode addresses that several crew members had died, however, in the final Iscandar episode, the poisonous gas used by the Gamilas/Gamilons is portrayed as "radioactive sleeping gas", implying that anyone infected would come out of it at some point, yet Kodai/Wildstar's (and the rest of the crew's[[labelnote:*]]The "Star Force" moniker only exists in the dub[[/labelnote]]) reaction to Yuki/Nova clearly indicates that she [[spoiler:had died, although just before that, she had used the Cosmo Cleaner D/Cosmo DNA [[DisneyDeath just in time for her to come out of it.]]]] Then later in the same episode, Captain Okita/Avatar is directly portrayed as [[spoiler:dying from his already existing radiation poisoning before he has a chance to see the Earth restored.]]

** The ''Rebirth'' webcomic is set decades after the original series. When a rather grizzled-looking Wildstar goes to confer with Desslok for the first time in decades, he's annoyed to see that Gamilons apparently age slower than humans, and Desslok looks completely unchanged.

* ComicBookAdaptation: There were two mini-series from Comico in the 80's, one ongoing from Argo Press in the 90's drawn by Tim Eldred, and two webcomic limited series by Eldred titled ''Star Blazers: Rebirth'' and ''The Bolar Wars: Extended.''

* ComicBookAdaptation: There were two mini-series from Comico in the 80's, one ongoing from Argo Press in the 90's drawn by Tim Eldred, and two webcomic limited series by Eldred titled ''Rebirth'' and ''The Bolar Wars: Extended.''

* ComicBookAdaptation: There were four comic adaptations set in the ''Star Blazers'' universe. The latest is the webcomic ''Rebirth.''

** The official website's "History of Star Blazers", changes details or makes them up from whole cloth (for instance, giving the characters full names: we now know that Avatar's first name is Abraham and Nova's last name is Forrester). However, there are some inconsistencies, such as the "Great Island" (where the "Wildstar" family comes from) also being called "Okinawa" (where the "Kodai" family comes from)[[note]]The flashback in episode 13 clearly depicts Mt. Fuji, which is nowhere near Okinawa.[[/note]].

* TechnologyPorn: ''2199'', full stop, with the live-action movie as a distant runner-up. Original also kinda qualifies, but in a ''very'' stylized, Matsumoto-specific way, which doesn't look like this for many. The periodic sight of the wave motion engine reconfiguring its massive components to become the heart of the Wave Motion Gun, to the accompaniment of [[MostWonderfulSound ominous, escalating sound effects,]] certainly counts.

->’’We’re off to outer space’’\\
‘’We’re leaving Mother Earth’’\\
‘’To save the human race . . . our STAR BLAZERS!’’
- - >- - Star Blazers theme

* WebComic: [[http://ourstarblazers.com/vault/fanfic-comics/ Two]] produced by Tim Eldred, who was also the artist for the short-lived [[{{Comics}} comic book adaptation]] by Argo Press. The first being ''Rebirth'', set a generation into the future of Star Blazers but recalling several of the old cast. The other being ''The Bolar Wars: Extended'', seeking to utilize elements that were [[ScrewedByTheNetwork cut out]] in the aired series.
* {{Woolseyism}}: In the Star Blazers dub, Mamoru sacrifices himself against the Gamilons to give Okita time to escape, rather than martial pride. Every other adaptation of the series has gone with this reason.

** In Japan, the name ''Yamato'' carried certain cultural connotations that would be hard to instill in a Western audience. As a result, the ancient battleship is still the ''Yamato'', but before leaving Mother Earth, it receives an in-universe rechristening. From there on, the ship is known as the ''Argo'', a name based in ancient Greek legend.

* ShoutOut: Admiral Okita's response to the Gamilas request for his surrender is a direct nod to real life UsefulNotes/WorldWarII General Anthony "Nuts" McCaullife and his response to the Germans' request for his surrender.

* DatedHistory: The entire premise of the show relies on the then current belief that the sunken Yamato was mostly intact under the sea, and could be refitted into the Space Battleship. Years later, advances in technology disproved it pretty badly: the ship split in half while sinking, and the wreckage is more or less torn to pieces. ''2199'' had to reinvent a more convoluted story of camouflage as a shipwreck during construction to keep the original idea of a spaceship Yamato.

** In the final episode of the first series (the Iscandar arc), we never actually see the Cosmo Cleaner D/Cosmo DNA being used to save the Earth. We're meant to assume that the device worked like it was supposed to, and that the Earth was saved, but considering that the original Japanese airing was in 1974, and no other installments came until a couple or so years later, one could originally never be sure it did work on Earth as effectively as it did [[spoiler:on the ship when the Gamilas/Gamilons tried to use their "radioactive sleeping gas" on everyone]]. For all the Japanese viewers knew at the time, the device may have only worked partially, if not at all.
** The English version ends with the narrator speaking over the closing shot of the ship above Earth, saying definitively to the accompaniment of triumphal music, "In the year 2200, the Star Force returned... and saved Earth." It's a very satisfying moment, and if it's not present in the original Japanese, then it counts as a {{Woolseyism}}.

* FollowTheLeader: ''StarWars'' and both versions of ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|1978}}'' drew heavily from ''Space Battleship Yamato,'' sometimes practically scene-by-scene. See also OlderThanTheyThink.
** Both ''Series/{{Crusade}}'' and the third season of ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'' were essentially the first season of ''Yamato'' transplanted into their respective continuities.
** On the other hand, the 2010 live-action movie clearly takes inspiration from ''Series/BattlestarGalactica2003'' in multiple ways, from {{Gender Flip}}ping multiple characters, to taking more cynical spins on their original premises (e.g. [[spoiler:Captain Okita's revelation that he made up "Iscandar" and the radiation-cleaning technology, just because humanity needed hope -- and because the fact the message capsule removed the radiation from around Kodai when it landed gave ''him'' hope.]]) The effect of the ship emerging from warp also looks exactly like the "kawoosh" from ''Franchise/{{Stargate|Verse}}''.

** For the UsefulNotes/FurryFandom we have ''ComicBook/AlbedoErmaFelnaEDF'', who shares many points with ''Yamato'' including the [[spoiler:WaveMotionGun, except the ''Albedo'' version of that weapon is considered as an ArtifactOfDoom, not to mention being even more powerful than even the 2199 version of the same weapon, being capable of destroying ''whole galaxies'' with it]]. The author admited he took some inspiration from ''Yamato'' for the plot in an interview, along many sources.
%%* ForgottenSuperweapon

[[quoteright:254:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/yamato.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:254:No, [[SeanConneryIsAboutToShootYou the]] ''[[SeanConneryIsAboutToShootYou Yamato]]'' [[SeanConneryIsAboutToShootYou is NOT about to shoot you.]] That's what the [[WaveMotionGun big muzzle in the bow]] is for.]]

In response, humanity refits the wreck of the World War II battleship ''Yamato'', lying at rest on the exposed surface where the ocean used to be, into a space battleship, using plans for a star drive included in Starsha's message. The ''Yamato'' then sets forth on a desperate quest to reach Iscandar and save humanity....

* AdaptationalBadass: in the 2010 movie, Analyzer is a belt-mounted PDA[=/=]"[[ComicBook/NewGods Mother Box]]" before being installed into his traditional robot body - except ''it's over 20 feet tall.''

* AlienInvasion

* AppliedPhlebotinum
* ArtificialGravity
* TheAsteroidThicket
** The ''Yamato'' can use its naval anchors to build one as a shield around the ship.

* BeamSpam

* {{Bowdlerization}}: In one scene where Kodai/Wildstar walks past the face-down and *clearly dead* bodies of some of the other crew members following a wreck, the English ''Star Blazers'' dub gives them ''voiceovers'' joking with each other about being dizzy and how Dr. Sane is going to run out of bandages.

* TheBridge
* CanonDiscontinuity: ''Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato'' which led to a remake of the whole Comet Empire arc in the second series.

* TheCaptain: Okita/Avatar

* ContrivedCoincidence

* CoolStarship

* DeathIsCheap: Dessler
* DemotedToDragon: Desslok in The Comet Empire

* DisneyDeath: [[spoiler:Yuki/Nova]], regardless of [[NeverSayDie how it's portrayed...]]

* EarthShatteringKaboom: The destruction of planets Gamilas and Iscandar (by a SelfDestructMechanism) in ''The New Voyage''

* ElaborateUndergroundBase
* TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt

* FindTheCure

* ForgottenSuperweapon
* FrothyMugsOfWater (The TropeNamer, after ''Star Blazers'' and Doctor Sane's "spring water".

* HeelRaceTurn

* HistoricalHeroUpgrade: A very conscious one, especially in the second episode, which notes the ''Yamato's'' lackluster record and complete failure in its final suicidal mission. Considering that the ''Yamato'' was seen as symbolic of Japan itself, and that the show was made only a generation after the war, it's likely the entire point of the series was the romantic notion that Japan, like the ''Yamato'', could still someday achieve the honor and greatness it failed to in the past.
** Approaches ValuesDissonance in the live action 2010 movie, when Captain Okita gives a stirring speech about the original Yamato representing hope for a people under attack from a dire enemy. That must have been interesting news for Korean, Chinese, British, Australian, Dutch, Filipino, and American audiences...

* HumanAliens: The Gamilons were indistinguishable from humans in early episodes, but during the first season (perhaps as a ShoutOut to ''WesternAnimation/YellowSubmarine,'' of all things) their skin color was switched to [[AmazingTechnicolorPopulation blue]]. Dessler actually goes from pink to blue ''before our very eyes''. The traditional joke is that Desslok had the original animators taken out and shot.

** The Deingilian race from ''Final Yamato'' were descendants of humans who escaped from TheGreatFlood (caused by the water planet Aquarius) by a alien spaceship

* InfiniteSupplies: While averted in the rare situation ([[spoiler: like the Yamato being submerged in what amounts to an ocean on Pluto and running out of air]]) for the most part it's played completely straight.

* LukeNounverber: Only in ''Star Blazers'' (like "Derek Wildstar", for example)

* MechaShow

* MilitaryMashupMachine

* MythologyGag: Dr Sado's cat appears just [[OneSceneWonder once]] in the series when he's sending a message home; in the 2010 movie, it's with the doctor ''on'' the Yamato.

* ANaziByAnyOtherName: Dessler and the Gamilons in general. [[spoiler: which makes his subsequent HeelFaceTurn kind of disturbing]]
** Gievn their planes, tactics, and attitude in the first season, Dessler is more like the Americans, making the FaceHeelTurn more obvious. In the Episode 2 flashback that depicted the Allies sinking the Yamato in WWII, the American planes are given the Gamilus theme music when they fire upon the battleship.

* NeverSayDie: Averted...except in episodes where it isn't. In general, the dub was inconsistent about this. One episode addresses that several crew members had died, however, in the final Iscandar episode, the poisonous gas used by the Gamilas/Gamilons is portrayed as "radioactive sleeping gas", implying that anyone infected would come out of it at some point, yet Kodai/Wildstar's (and the rest of the crew's[[labelnote:*]]The "Star Force" moniker only exists in the dub[[/labelnote]]) reaction to Yuki/Nova clearly indicates that she [[spoiler:had died, although just before that, she had used the Cosmo Cleaner D/Cosmo DNA [[DisneyDeath just in time for her to come out of it.]]]] Then later in the same episode, Captain Okita/Avatar is directly portrayed as [[spoiler:dying from his already existing radiation poisoning before he has a chance to see the Earth restored.]]
* NewPowersAsThePlotDemands: Sanada seems to invent amazing devices on the fly to get out nearly any situation. For example, Dessler's last attack in the final Season 1 episode, firing his [[WaveMotionGun Dessler Cannon]] at the ''Yamato'', only to have the blast reflected by a coating based on Gamilon technology.. never before seen before that moment on the ''Yamato'', and never mentioned again.

* NotableOriginalMusic

* OhCrap: Dessler gets one at the end of the first season, when the ''Yamato'' [[spoiler: reflects back at him a shot from his [[WaveMotionGun Dessler Cannon]]]].

* OldSchoolDogFight

* PostScriptSeason

* PyrrhicVictory
* RammingAlwaysWorks: The Yamato rams Dessler's ship in ''Farewell Yamato'' and the second season of the remake, and all it did was ''bend some metal''.

* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: Analyzer UO-9/IQ-9 has a perverse sense of humor, and the hots for Yuki/Nova.

* RoboSpeak

* SecretTestOfCharacter: When they reach Iscandar, it's revealed that Queen Starsha [[spoiler:actually had the means to send the Cosmo Cleaner D/Cosmo DNA to Earth (that is, without Earth having to come to Iscandar), but wanted to test humanity's worthiness to survive; an action she regrets.]]

* SeeTheWhitesOfTheirEyes: Even the damn WaveMotionGun has to be fired at spitting distance.
** This was a plot point in the Comet Empire series: the Empire's Wave Motion Gun-like ship outranged the Earth fleet, picking off ships without needing any other weaponry.

* TheSmurfettePrinciple

* SpaceIsAnOcean / SpaceSailing: Refurbished wet navy ships, complete with anchors and anti-fouling paint below the "waterline". Though it's a bit jarring to see a ship in the first episode[[labelnote:*]]Kodai Mamoru's vessel, which was NOT a refitted wet-navy ship[[/labelnote]] "sinking" into the distance well before the obligatory explosion.
** [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] by the fact the ships are expected to land in and operate on water as well as space, and the fact that the titular ship ''is'' a wet-navy ship in the first place.

* SpoilerTitle: Only in the original Japanese series

* StandardSciFiFleet: space fighters, Destroyers, Carriers, and Space Battleships

** Both live action and ''2199'' pointedly avert this.
* SupernaturalAid: In the first episode, the Earth is told of a gift that will save the planet, and the season is then all about the journey they have to take to retrieve it.

* TalkingIsAFreeAction: Used egregiously in the final battle of ''Be Forever Yamato'' with the sudden death of Captain Yamanami and Kodai's HeroicBSOD over sacrificing Sasha to defeat the Dark Nebula Empire.

* TakeOurWordForIt: In the final episode of the first series (the Iscandar arc), we never actually see the Cosmo Cleaner D/Cosmo DNA being used to save the Earth. We're meant to assume that the device worked like it was supposed to, and that the Earth was saved, but considering that the original Japanese airing was in 1974, and no other installments came until a couple or so years later, one could originally never be sure it did work on Earth as effectively as it did [[spoiler:on the ship when the Gamilas/Gamilons tried to use their "radioactive sleeping gas" on everyone]]. For all the Japanese viewers knew at the time, the device may have only worked partially, if not at all.

* ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: Done accidentally by the Yamato when they test fire the WaveMotionGun on a Gamilon base situated on a floating continent. However, instead of destroying the base, the beam just straight up [[EarthShatteringKaboom destroys the entire continent]]. Oh, and did we mention that (in ''2099'' at least) the continent was roughly '''the size of Australia'''?
** The crew prefers to fire the WaveMotionGun when it's charged at [[UpToEleven 120%]].

* TranslationConvention / TranslatorMicrobes / AliensSpeakingEnglish ([[MindScrew or something]]): except for one case early in the series where Analyzer has to translate the Gamilus language for his human friends, all the aliens speak Japanese (and, in the dub, English) both to the humans and to each other, even in the case of different races that you wouldn't expect them to have a common language.

** And how would Analyzer know how to speak Gamilon anyway?
* TouchedByVorlons: the 2010 movie omits Starsha's message and has the capsule land on Earth instead (in the original series, it landed on Mars), so they reinforce their claim to remove the radiation by curing Kodai despite him being at ''ground zero'' of the crash. Dr. Sado is justifiably spooked.

* UndergroundCity

* WackyWaysideTribe: the BeePeople.
* WagonTrainToTheStars
* WaveMotionGun: The TropeNamer.
** Not to mention CrazyAwesome.
** Interestingly, the WaveMotionGun was [[UnbuiltTrope not treated as something invincible]]:
*** At the end of the first season, Dessler's one was reflected back at him. After coming back, he'd always be VERY careful at using his WaveMotionGun against the ''Yamato'', taking care to neutralize or prevent the deploying of the WMG reflector before firing.
*** In the second season we have three different incidents of Wave Motion Guns utterly failing in their job:

* WorthyOpponent: too many to name.

* YouHaveFailedMe: In addition to using a TrapDoor to dispose of men who laugh at their own jokes, Dessler is known to shoot subordinates ([[spoiler: Vice President Hisu in the first season and Admiral Vandeburg in the second season]]) with a gun that is only shown smoking after the act. An exact inversion of FamilyFriendlyFirearms: in a series where Family Friendly lasers actually would be expected, this guy seems to prefer old-fashioned guns.