Starlight Brigade

Album artwork by Lazerhorse

Thumbnail from the Starlight Brigade Music Video

"**Starlight Brigade (feat. Dan Avidan)**" is a song by TWRP released in 2018. It was composed by TWRP and Dan Avidan for *Together Through Time.*

## Music Video

An animated music video for "Starlight Brigade" was released on May 23, 2019. It was animated by Knights of the Light Table. The video features a 90's anime aesthetic and features futuristic interpretations of the four members of TWRP, as well as Ninja Brian from Ninja Sex Party. A unique character, referred to as Strive by the animators during production, was created to embody Dan Avidan's "idealism and drive".

A shorter mix of the song was used for the music video, resulting in the saxophone solo and part of Doctor Sung's bridge being removed.

On May 29, 2019, Starlight Brigade surpassed one million views.

On November 6, 2019, Starlight Brigade surpassed five million views.

On September 11, 2020, Starlight Brigade surpassed ten million views.

### Synopsis

On the distant planet, Moebius, a young, humanoid alien named Strive gazes up at the stars with his grandfather. He witnesses the stars in the sky being absorbed into an enormous dark prism. Years later, Strive looks longingly up at the starless sky, asking himself why his people haven't left their planet yet, as their sun was taken along with all the other stars in the sky. As he looks up at the dark sky, he yells in shock as a brilliant flash lights up the sky and a burning starship streaks down from the clouds. Strive runs off toward the impact site and discovers that the object is a crystalline space ship, one that's associated with the dark prism. He places his hand on the hull of the crashed ship and gets pulled inside. The space ship changes shape from pointy, angular to smooth and curved, seemingly matching Strive's appearance as well as his his mind. Strive thinks for a moment about whether leaving his planet or not would be worth it. The voice of his grandfather in his thoughts tells him that leaving would be suicide and that it's safer on the planet. Strive ignores the anxiety in his mind and reaches for the controls, knowing that he can't just watch as his planet slowly dies. As he touches the controls, the ship bursts to life, and Strive pilots it into outer space.

Flying through the wreckage of a space battle, Strive meets the Starlight Brigade—Doctor Sung, Lord Phobos, Commander Meouch, Havve Hogan, and Ninja Brian—who are all piloting spacecraft of their own. They escort Strive to a larger space ship where the six of them meet with an unnamed character who shows them a battle map featuring ships similar to the one Strive found and the prism that stole the stars when he was a small child. Warning alarms cut their meeting short and the six pilots race to their ships.

The six fly out and face a fleet of enemy ships. After engaging in dogfights, the six ships attempts to break through the forcefield protecting the prism. Strive's ship is shot and begins to shut down. Strive panics as the screen of his ship goes dark, and reaches towards the reflection of a large star trapped within the prism. As his screen completely blacks out, he realizes in horror that the light he was reaching for was coming from the crystal in his chest, and is faced with the terrifying realization that the only light he could follow was coming from himself. He falls unconscious, and, in a fleeting memory sees himself as a small child again chasing a bright star on the horizon. As he captures the star in his hand, the realization of how all dreams are achievable through the lens of a childlike idealism come back, and what the mission to free the stars had meant to him from the very beginning. Strive wakes up, the crystal in his chest powering the ship back up and sending a strange, ethereal energy throughout his body. Strive's new energy empowers the other pilots, and together they break through the forcefield and destroy the prism, returning all of the stolen stars to the skies. Strive and the other pilots leave a rainbow trail as they fly across the skies of Strive's home planet, Moebius. The Moebians all look up and see the stars returning to their once dark skies, and Strive's grandfather is filled with pride as he sees the light of Strive's ship streak across the sky.

## Version Differences

The music video for Starlight Brigade features several differences from the album.

## Trivia

* "Starlight Brigade" originally was going to appear on Doctor Sung's solo EP, *Justice Wears High Tops*.
* An early version of "Starlight Brigade" can be heard in Phobos's segment in their Super Hero Training video series, Super Hero Training Part 3: The Ruddsmen's Squat.

* The music video features unique designs for each member of the Starlight Brigade that varies greatly from their normal designs.
* Strive, the main character of the Starlight Brigade music video, was "designed to be somewhat androgynous."
* Strive's home planet is called "Moebius."
* The character designs were heavily influenced by French artist Jean Giraud who published work under the pseudonym Moebius.
* The music video was featured on Adult Swim’s Toonami on August 3rd, 2019.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Old Swifty [@oldswifty] via *Twitter* (May 24, 2019): "We wanted to leave a lot open to fan interpretation! :D Behind the scenes, we called Dan's character 'Strive', and their home planet 'Moebius'! We tried to design them to embody Dan's idealism and drive." Retrieved {{{retrieved date}}}.
https://twitter.com/OldSwifty/status/1131862799431
2. ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/ByDj4aMJdFe/?utm\_source=ig\_web\_copy\_link. *Instagram.* May 29, 2019. Retrieved 11 July 2019.
3. ↑ Patrick Stannard [@PatrickStannard] via *Twitter* (November 6, 2019): "#StarlightBrigade just hit #5million Views! Congratulations to @TWRPband , @ninjasexparty and thanks to all the fans out there who helped make this possible. And of course special thanks to the amazing team who put this together, headed by our own @michaeldoigart & @OldSwifty !" Retrieved {{{retrieved date}}}.
https://twitter.com/LordDirk/status/1192183149972856832 *Twitter*. 6 November 2019. Retrieved 7 November 2019.
4. ↑ Doctor Sung [@doctorsungtwrp] via *Twitter* (October 4, 2019): "Trivia nugget: songs Synthesize Her, Maximum Thrust, and Starlight Brigade in their original forms were to be on the GC EP Justice Wears High Tops. But ancient TWRP Feudal Law dictates that all works of any TWRP member are subject to annexation, should the high council decree it." Retrieved {{{retrieved date}}}.
5. ↑ Old Swifty [@oldswifty] via *Twitter* (May 28, 2019): "People are welcome to interpret Strive however they would like. We designed him to be somewhat androgenous!" Retrieved {{{retrieved date}}}.
6. ↑ Old Swifty [@oldswifty] via *Twitter* (June 4, 2019): "A small sheet I made to act as a guide for background characters that would populate Strive's homeworld. The designs were heavily inspired by Moebius, and simplified down for animation. #StarlightBrigade #KotLT #Design #TWRP" Retrieved {{{retrieved date}}}.