Cybersix S1 E1

If you want any backstory on anything, you'll need to read the comics. Also, the first rule/guarantee of any anime is this: The music will always be amazing, no matter what. This show is kind of a mix between an anime and a typical western cartoon though. It only had 13 episodes, which is unprecedented for any Japanese show, or at least the ones I've seen. The shortest one would be 26 episodes in 1 season for that live action *Sailor Moon* show. Oh, and Cyber 6 got her costume from a prostitute. Even the cool hat? Seriously guys, I want that hat*.* I kind of have an obsession with them.

## Plot

The intro and opening theme are breathtaking*,* but that's nothing new. I guess I'm just surprised because this was made in 1998. *There's a time when the moon reveals its face through the clouds I let out a sigh and want to cry out loud But deep in my heart I feel love so alive In the depths of my soul I know we will survive I'm the one they would break in their greed and their pride But deep in my heart I feel love so alive In the depths of my soul I know we will survive* I could literally listen to that song all day. So… beautiful… Anyways, the story, which is also pretty good in this first episode. Granted, without the backstory I was seriously lost, but I think I've gotten the gist of it. Am I watching *Gargoyles*? Is that Commissioner Gordon? Am I watching *Batman: The Animated Series*? Is that Solomon Grundy? Am I watching *Stargirl*? Is that Frankenstein's Monster? Okay, so a man walks back to his green car and is kidnapped by a zombie. Another man sees what I assume is the same car in the middle of the road and is also kidnapped by a zombie. A female vigilante sees the zombies run off. The next day at a school, Lucas Amato is teaching his students about biology, and briefly sees the new literature teacher, Mr. Adrian Seidelman. Adrian rejects Lori's advances, mainly because she's one of his students and really young. Some guys decide to teach him a lesson, but Lucas is able to intimidate them into leaving just by standing there. Which makes sense, he's a big guy. Not as big as the zombies, but he was a boxer when he was a kid. The two become fast friends and go out for coffee, but Adrian leaves when he sees the missing persons report in the newspaper. The two men who were kidnapped were an engraver and a printer, who possibly worked at the treasury. I guess I should mention that this takes place in the fictional city of Meridiana, so the story could take place anywhere. Italy, Argentina, Canada, Japan, even the U.S. You know, because this was an Italian-Argentinian comic book series that had its rights bought by a Canadian company that passed off animation duties to a Japanese company and the show aired as a heavily censored Fox Saturday morning cartoon in the United States. Oh, and the zombies are these genetic creations called Fixed Ideas. I personally imagine Meridiana as a beautiful Mediterranean city right on the coast. While walking home, Lucas sees a Fixed Idea being chased by the female vigilante and follows them. When he catches up to them, the vigilante finally reveals her face and recognizes him, even though he's never seen her before. She runs off, and the now dead Idea melts, leaving only its clothes and a glowing green vial of something behind. It's called sustenance, and it's what the Ideas are made out of. Lucas takes it back to his apartment, and the woman is shown watching him before she gets a pain in her arm. She needs the sustenance to survive. She and the Ideas were created by the same mad scientist. She's from a now almost extinct line of genetic experiments called Cybers, and she's Cyber 6. She somehow escaped her creator, Von Reichter, also explained in the comics, and now fights his other creations in order to survive and stop his evil plans. She shows up at Lucas's apartment and demands the vial, telling him that he's in great danger, when he's suddenly attacked by another Fixed Idea. After a fight scene, Lucas is able to tackle it out his window. Cyber 6 kicks him back up to his apartment and she takes the other vial of sustenance from the dead Idea and drinks it. Okay, I know she needs it to survive and that she's not human, but that stuff is like acid! A man who looks suspiciously like Adrian, minus those creepy black eyes, reports to his superior Von Reichter about how he found the remains of the dead Idea, but his vial was empty. Reichter sends his son José to take care of it. And by son, I mean genetic clone that he treats like a son, a la Jango and Boba Fett. And no, that guy's not really Adrian, but they could've made that clearer with a different character design. I think Von Reichter wants to use the engraver and the printer to make counterfeit money for him. In the comics, Von Reichter was a Nazi, whereas here it's never outright said he was one, but there are massive hints, like his name being a reference to the Third Reich, José's name being a reference to his original real life historical figure Nazi identity in the comics, José goose stepping and wearing a Hitler Youth uniform, the placement of Cyber 6's tattoo, and possibly even more. In fact, the show tones down a lot of the sexual content of the comics, as well as its grittier nature. The next day at breakfast, Lucas is telling Adrian about what happened. He dismisses it as a dream until Lucas shows him the vial. Adrian advises him to give Cyber 6 the vial next time and just forget the whole mess, but Lucas wants to help her because he thinks she's in trouble. When they return to his still wrecked from the fight apartment, they discover that it's been ransacked by José and the Fixed Ideas. Adrian returns home, and it's here where we get the big reveal: Adrian and Cyber 6 are the same person. "Adrian" is really a woman masquerading as a man. Whoa. I honestly did not see that coming. I thought Adrian was gonna be that bad guy with the creepy black eyes who might've been Von Reichter's brother (don't know where I got that idea from) who turned good after learning that his new friend Lucas was caught in the crossfire. It turns out that he's a Techno, a creature that resembles an ordinary human that is supposed to gain a position of power to help Von Reichter take over the world. So, not a brother or Adrian. But this is even better! I do wonder if they used a different VA for Adrian and Cyber 6 though. If they didn't, kudos to that one VA for being able to subtly change their voice like that. Very impressive. Cyber 6 visits Lucas's apartment and asks for the vial. This time he gives it to her. The Fixed Ideas break in again, along with José. They learn who she is after she shows them a tattoo on her arm reading Cyber 6. She gets them to chase her so they'll stay away from Lucas, who hears something about the warehouse where the engraver and printer are being held. Cyber 6 frees the engraver and printer and fights the Fixed Ideas, while Lucas uses his car to get José to drive a truck carrying the counterfeit money into the ocean. Lucas asks Cyber 6 for her name and if he'll see her again, but she just runs off as usual. Yes, they've got a thing for each other. Von Reichter learns that Cyber 6 survived, and she vows not to run from him. You see, there were five thousand Cybers, but Von Reichter had them eliminated due to their tendency for disobedience, i.e., they had free will and refused to follow his orders because they weren't evil. Cyber 6 somehow survived and took the identity of Adrian Seidelman, after a man she looked identical to who had been in a fatal car crash. This show is really good. It's a shame it only lasted one season. It might have had to do with the budget (each episode cost $360,000 to make, which in late 2022 equals over $655,000), as well as it being received poorly outside of Canada and Japan, and fighting between NOA and TMS. I'd kill for this show to get a revival, or even a reboot, or even just to get TMS or whoever owns the rights to the music to finally release the full version of the opening song. Speaking of which, here's the ending theme, As the Rain Falls on the Mountains, sung by Coral Egan, who also sang the opening theme as well. *As the rain falls on the mountains Are my sorrows just salty tears? I whisper your name Until we're together Our love will conquer fear*

## Review

Okay, from what little information I can find on the series, the creators of the animated series debated casting a different actor as Adrian, which is what was ultimately done in the French version. In the English version, Cathy Weseluck voiced Cyber 6, Michael Dobson voiced Lucas Amato and the Fixed Ideas, Terry Klassen voiced Von Reichter, a young Andrew Francis voiced Julian, Alex Doduk voiced José, Janyse Jaud voiced Lori Anderson, Elaine, and Griselda; L. Harvey Gold voiced Terra, and additional voices, like Yashimoto, were provided by Brian Drummond and Chantel Strand. I apologize if I butchered any of their names. This series is something of a cult classic, which means it has a very small but dedicated fanbase, like the *Psychonauts* video game series. It took fifteen years for a DVD to be released, but it ultimately was in August 2014 in the U.S. The show has a number of LGBTQIA+ fans, likely stemming from the fact that Lucas could also have romantic feelings for Adrian, who he thinks is a man, and also because Cyber 6 cross dresses as Adrian. However, she is not transgender or nonbinary, and identifies as female, but she isn't very girly. There was a time where she imagined herself wearing a red dress and dancing with Lucas though. Still, she could easily be interpreted as a nonbinary or genderfluid coded main/title character. She's sort of like a grown up, more stable version of X-23 from X-Men: Evolution, or Eleven from *Stranger Things*. She's a genetic experiment with powers that eventually escapes her horrible creator and goes on the run, and then vows to fight said creators and stop their plans. That being said, Cybersix was created first, by Carlos Trillo, who wrote the comic, and Carlos Meglia, who illustrated it. Basically, in 1991, Eura Editorial wanted a new weekly series of 12 pages, and entrusted Trillo and Meglia to create a character for it. An early idea Meglia had was of a woman who would dress as a man to get into the police department, because her father had been killed, and her patrol partner would've been Lucas. They continued to make changes to the story, drawing on numerous video games, music, and newspaper stories for inspiration. One true story was included in the introduction of the first chapter of the comic. In 1984, Elsa and Mario Rios died in a plane crash in Chile, leaving behind two frozen embryos in Australia. This caused an international controversy, and several moral and legal issues were raised in regards to what should be done with them. In the end, the embryos were destroyed, and realistically, they couldn't have remained frozen forever anyways, meaning the only other thing to do would have been to implant those embryos into someone else. Trillo then asked a hypothetical question: What if the embryos hadn't been destroyed, but were stolen by a mad scientist and survived to present day? Trillo and Meglia, being men from the 1990s, also consulted a psychiatrist to better understand a woman. I'm kidding when I say that they needed help to understand women in general, what I really mean is that they needed help better understanding a woman like Cyber 6, who often asked complicated moral and ethical questions about herself and viewed herself as a monster and not really human, a bit like Frankenstein's Monster. And thus *Cybersix* was born, and the rest is a long forgotten history, what with the comics having never been officially translated into English, and a cancelled live action series that apparently never aired outside of Argentina, and possibly Russia. Not to mention a three minute long version of the opening theme that will likely never see the light of day, never mind the ending theme. Things like this are considered lost media, like all of those super old *Doctor Who* episodes.