Japanese tokusatsu – or “special effects” – series have long had a significant impact on American pop culture, with the most notable and popular being Super Sentai, or Power Rangers in the U.S. But decades before the teenagers with attitude took to television, other tokusatsu series were gracing American airwaves, such as The Space Giants.
The Space Giants was the U.S. adaptation of Ambassador Magma, a tokusatsu series that originally ran in Japan from 1966-1967. It was based on the manga of the same name by legendary manga creator Osamu Tezuka (known better for his work on Astro Boy and Black Jack, among others). The original Ambassador Magma follows the exploits of a giant humanoid forged from gold. who protects the earth from the alien invader Goa.
The English version follows various humanoid robot heroes who can turn into rockets in order to fight the dinosaur-like alien invaders sent by the villainous Rodak to take over the planet. Among the heroic defenders of Earth is Goldar the Space Avenger (Magma in the Japanese original). The series was released in a limited number of markets in the U.S. in 1970 and wouldn’t see wide distribution until the late ‘70s – it was eventually a usual watch on TBS’ early afternoon programming.
Hake’s Auctions has two examples of The Space Giants-related material in their current auction, which runs until July 10-11, 2019. These include a Goldar Halloween mask original art with a boxed costume, as well as a Rodak Halloween mask original art plus with a prototype mask. The Goldar lot includes penciled original artwork of the Goldar mask that has been cut out; the artwork was used to create Collegeville’s 1980 Halloween mask of the character. It also comes with a deep window box containing the Goldar costume itself. The Rodak mask set comes with a prototype mask that has been completely hand-painted and is marked “original 1” on the inside, and with a penciled original artwork of the mask itself. Both items come from the Collegeville Archives, which have several items in this auction.
