YMMV / Ginga: Nagareboshi Gin

• Accidental Innuendo:
  • Near the end of episode 11, There is this exchange between Moss and Kai brothers (rough translation):
    Kurotora: "My god you're strong Moss, and fast too. The 3 of us were of no match for you!"
    Moss: "Better keep your mouth shut if you want to taste some this meat!"
  • This is from the Nordic version where the dialogue, while close to the original Japanese dialogue has been given some artistic license in order to fit better to the viewers there. This counts for the Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish and Hungarian version and they have the same dialogue although with some differences due to Finland and Hungary being Finno-Ugric languages while the others are Germanic. This version is actually filled with occasional innuendos which are most likely accidental.
• Alas, Poor Scrappy:
  • Hyena, seeing as he dies right after he discovers his courage and proclaims a Heel–Face Turn. In Ginga Densetsu Noah however, it is revealed that he survived. He simply lost his memory and got a new owner, who gave him the name Noah. So he is the title character and has a completely different personality, due to his kind owner, he has become like a role model for youngsters. He gives valuable advice to Weed's son Orion who suffers from depression from the events of The Last Wars.
  • Considering Hyena even appears as a ghost at Weed's battle with Hougen in Densetsu Weed, him being alive is a complete Retcon.
• Ass Pull: Ben regaining his sight in the Wolf Arc. To recap, he got hit in the head by Mukonga's Geki Sentsuhi Battouga, an attack that works by destroying the victim's body tissue, and it somehow made his eyes function again.
• Awesome Music:
  • The catchiness of the opening theme will haunt you for years.
  • Likewise, "Shouri No Uta" (Song of Victory), which plays twice in the series, first in episode 9 and then at the very end, the lyrics also doubling as a Tear Jerker. ^note [...] Face the bad things, in the distance. The time is now, the wind has died out. The fighters in battle are a powerful thing. And their hearts are burning. Oh my friends, listen. To the solid friendships. Song of the distance. The only thing you live for is tomorrow. So live with all the bravery you have. So live with all the bravery you have. Oh my friends, my comrades. Today's victory for sure was a song of the distance. As you all risk your lives. It's all for this very day. It's all for this very day. [...]
  • The beautiful, soothing ending theme deserves a mention too.
  • The "Sorrow" theme. Just... listen to it.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Takeda Gohei naturally receives some hate for his cruel methods of training bear hounds. Others agree it'd be unacceptable in real life, but acknowledges how it actually works in the Gingaverse, and likes him for the badass bear hunter he is. Plus, despite his methods, how many people would go to the lengths of cutting off their leg in order for their dog to live?
  • Daisuke to a degree as some people just find him annoying.
• Broken Base:
  • The Finnish Dub. It is among the most polarizing discussion between fans. Many fans dislikes the dub due to belief that the acting is bad, among couple of other issues. There are also many fans who like it for many reasons, including the voice actors sounding pleasant and sense of Nostalgia, and also saying it's not really that bad considering it was dubbed in 1989 with just 3-4 actors (which may surprise some because most characters sound very distinct) and with limited resources which included every actor being in the recording room at the same time due to the scenes having to be done in 1 single take. Information
  • These kinds of conversations are all over the internet on fan sites, discussion sites, and Youtube. An example is full movie versions of the dub being released there and receiving lot of views and positive feedbacks, while short clips from the mostly flawed moments receiving condemning feedback. The criticism towards the dub however didn't come until the uncut and undubbed version was released in 2003, and many people being introduced to it for the first time. In fact when the dubbed version was on VHS during it's original release and re-releases, it was well regarded by teenagers and kids alike without the dub receiving any real complaints or criticism.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
  • At the end of the ninja dog episode, a fairly random dog comes out of nowhere to throw the evil ninja dog boss' puppy off a cliff, with Cross throwing herself after to save it. The puppy is saved, Cross lives, and both the baby-killer dog and the puppy are 'in quest' as the narrator put it by the next episode, and Wilson's baby-killing antics are never mentioned again. Possibly a case of Values Dissonance. Possibly.
    • A case of the anime omitting why Wilson tried to kill the baby. Simply put, Kurojaki had killed and eaten both Wilson's son and mate. Thus, he wanted revenge.
  • The scene at Mutsu when Ben returns to save everyone, and suddenly this platoon leader Terry shows up. Apparently having betrayed Ohu he however reveals when throwing Ben into the crater with everyone else there as prisoners, that it's just a disguise to save everyone. After this he never appears again nor is he even mentioned making this scene pretty much padding.
    • Granted, this goes only for the European cut, by omitting pretty much of the later scenes with Terry due to graphic violence thanks to the reveal that Terry was killed by bears who suddenly appear and kill him. Before this there is also a fight between him and the Mutsu brothers, which also was omitted for violence.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • John, whose cool yet brash and headstrong attitude, as well as his status as Gin's rival, contribute a lot to his cool factor among the fanbase.
  • The Kai brothers are also well liked simply for being so lethally aggressive and determined that many fans find it endearing.
  • Riki. To this day he's still considered the most memorable and badass bearhound out of all the generations. Even decades later, when an official popularity poll was held to commemorate the series, Riki managed to place second behind only Gin.
  • Akame is especially popular among Japanese fans of the series, owing to his cool, dutiful demeanor and improbable yet awesome ninja techniques. In the aforementioned popularity poll he placed third, beating out even the main character of the sequel series and longest-running chapter of the franchise Weed.
• Friendly Fandoms: With Warriors, Survivors, and Felidae because they're all violent series about pet animals. From the other animes, Wolf's Rain, and from the other literatures, Watership Down, are also quite popular among fans.
  • Swedish fans of Ginga: Nagareboshi Gin (localized as Silver Fang) tend to also be fans of other anime titles released in Sweden during the 80s since they were all dubbed by the same company, most notably Science Fiction Sayuki Starzinger and Hello! Sandybell. These three titles are sometimes cited as a trifecta of sorts among older Swedish anime fans, not dissimilar to how 00s' shounen fans had "The Big Three".
• Gateway Series: To Scandinavian viewers this was the gateway to anime.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
  • While the series didn't receive much attention in either Japan or America (due to animes starring animals not being very popular at the time, until now), it became a hit within the anime fandom in Scandinavia and Finland, even having the show being dubbed into each of the languages, released on video (though majorly censored) and the manga translated into Finnish. This might be a bit of Fridge Brilliance considering animal series in general such as the Donald Duck franchise are also very popular in these areas.
  • A while back the author himself became aware of this to the point he went and visited his fanbase in Finland.
  • It did however, win the 1987 Shogakukan Manga Award for best shōnen series in Japan. It's more in later times that it's not remembered much in its respective country.
• Ho Yay: It's brief, but the direct Japanese lines where Gin and John part ways has John telling Gin "my heart sometimes beat faster upon meeting your gaze". Gin is really touched and they say goodbye while looking fondly at each other. It might not do much since they're dogs, but had that scene played out with humans fangirls would likely have gone mad.
• It Was His Sled: Riki survived, but dies for real in the final battle.
• Memetic Mutation: Ben's non-explanation regarding why the Kai brothers are so badass ("They fear nothing. That's why they are so fearless!") from the Finnish dub which is more or less beloved by the local fandom. It is often speculated that it was an error made by the actor due to possibly mistaking it with the word "Persistent" which is almost identical to the word "Fearless", while others believe it was a translation error though it's less likely due to being translated by a professional translator.
• Narm: "Eat it! Eat it!"
• Narm Charm: All the Nordic dubs are weird and funny listening to, to varying degrees. Examples includes females being voiced by males in the Danish dub, characters speaking with thick dialects in the Swedish one and having lots of Ham and Cheese performances, both the Finnish and Swedish one having occasional voice changes to some characters, and the Finnish and Danish ones having some slightly flat performances occasionally (quality of the acting varies ocasionally) and the Norwegian one, while having less Narm than others, has its own moments. With characters making over the top guttural sounds, and awkward crying noises, among others like names being mispronounced hilariously in the first film. However these imperfections are simply displaying how dubbing was different back in the days, and many fans prefer to watch them rather than have them redubbed.
• One-Scene Wonder: Kurojaki the Leader of Kogas. He only has close to 20 minutes of screen-time in the two episodes ( which sums up to 50 minutes) he appears in, yet he's among the most well-known characters in the saga due to being an edgy and terrifying villain, and his actions which causes a big plot point in the story despite not being the main antagonist and doesn't have much more relevance to the plot otherwise. His death is also considered a powerful moment.
• Periphery Demographic: The reason we got this show in the west to begin with. The series is shounen, but most of its (western) fans are women/girls.
• Popular with Furries: It's an anime about dogs, so many dog lovers are drawn to it. The fact the characters live on their own makes it very easy to make Original Characters for as well.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • The bear with harpoons stuck in its back, who tries to join Akakabuto's forces. After its rather terrifying backstory and demonstrated toughness, it is simply killed off by Akakabuto to show how much stronger he has become while the dogs were gathering their forces.
  • From a meta sense, there's the wolves Hyouma and Retsuga who survived their arc to join Gin's ranks at the end of the manga. While the wolf arc is considered an Old Shame by Takahashi himself and is largely out of place in the manga due to being a product of Executive Meddling, some feel that erasing those two and their entire arc from the story after the fact squanders what potential there could have been for integrating them into the plot more effectively.
  • Gin's brothers who were instantly deemed useless as bearhounds despite being Riki's pups as well. How do they feel about being inferior to Gin? What ever became of them? Did they ever learn about hunting, or were they sold off to be mere pets or competitors in the show ring like Daisuke said they would?
  • Fuji, Gin's mother and Riki's mate, had potential to be an interesting character as she was stated to have also been a hunting dog before she got pregnant. However, she's just used to be the gentle mother character her tearfully bids her protagonist child farewell before he departs on his journey, and we never see or hear of her again.
• Too Cool to Live: Riki and Benizakura
• Values Dissonance: The portrayal of dog fighting as an awesome and noble sport.
  • The Ginga series' treatment of its female characters is questionable at best and outright misogynistic at worst. Not only are there very few female dogs around to begin with, but they are almost always weak and/or whiny damsels whose only purpose is to be saved by their husbands so they can give birth to strong male heirs. Even the few cases of female dogs who are explicitly stated to be competent fighters end up as Faux Action Girls. Hell, in one chapter of Ginga: The Last Wars (which is a rather recent work so you can't blame it on being a product of its time), Cross goes as far as stating that "there are no strong females".
• Viewer Gender Confusion:
  • It's not hard to mistake Smith for a female at first due to his voice being somewhat high-pitched. The sequel series thankfully gave him a much deeper, unmistakably male voice. Get even more confusing in the Finnish dub, where he is first clearly male then suddenly turns into clearly female.
  • Believe it or not, but Pink Dragon is apparently supposed to be male.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: While the series is Shounen, the company releasing it in Scandinavia and Finland did nearly every possible edit they could think of to make it as child friendly as possible (apparently not getting it was for teens) including removing three entire episodes and editing how Akakabuto is defeated, making it seem like he died from a gunshot by Gohei when really he was decapitated by Gin.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • After the original uncut version came to Finland and Sweden in 2003, they later arrived in Denmark and Norway in 2006. The difference was, that the 2 latter were re-dubbed. However compared to the dubs made originally to the cut versions, these dubs were of unusually low-quality. Naturally fans of the original ones were not happy at all and severely criticised it.
  • They included fully overlapped voice performances which meant that the Japanese audio could be clearly heard, Very Bad Acting with the actors simply speaking loudly or shouting all the lines in an attempt to hide the Japanese track. Some of the lines haven't even been translated due to this. The lip-synching is also completely off and makes it even more distracting, even the music disappears due the yelling being so loud that it mutes it. Fans of the original dubs have since ignored the re-dub and simply watched it in Japanese or the original dubs. Watch the comparisons here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iu-AgmbxANk