1001 Nights in Andromeda

1001 Nights in Andromeda

Manga Chapter 14-4

TV Episodes 103 - 104

Manga Chapter Summary:

Many shots pass by the 999 as it travels through space. It seems that someone is shooting at them from behind! Several of the shots end up hitting the 999 and it starts descending towards a nearby planet. The Conductor announces their next stop as “Alibaba”, with a layover of 40 hours. The 999 crashes into the sand on the planet. The Conductor says they are 10 kilometers away from the station. He feels it is his duty to contact the station. Tetsuro volunteers to go with him and they start walking through the desert. They eventually come across some skeletons! The Conductor claims there is a monstrous bird, Roc, that lurks in this area. Suddenly the ground around them becomes dark, and they realize Roc is above them!

The two of them flee and hide under a small tunnel in the ground. The Roc has a hard time landing and crashes into the ground. Looking in the other direction, Tetsuro and the Conductor spot a woman who lies in the sand, passed out. They believe she must have been seized by the bird and pull her under the tunnel with them. The Roc starts getting angry, with its food having gotten away. They wait until it is night time and Tetsuro spots an oasis in the distance. Tetsuro heads over there and scoops up some water with his hat, and realizes there are number of smaller birds of the same species as the Roc. The Roc approaches Tetsuro and grabs him with its beak, as if it’s about the feed him to the smaller birds, which may be its children.

Suddenly, the Roc is startled. The birds start shrieking “Alibaba” and start flying off. With the birds gone, Tetsuro and the Conductor start carrying the passed out woman with them to the station, noticing that she is quite heavy. They eventually make their way to the station, which appears to be in ruins, as if it was hit by bandits. They decide to head back to the 999, carrying the woman with them. As they approach it, they see an explosion! One of the train cars has burst aflame. Tetsuro rushes in and finds just Maetel’s hat, realizing she was kidnapped. We see a group of bandits carrying Maetel off with them. Tetsuro and the Conductor start walking away from the train and are hit by an explosion! They are held tied up with Maetel that night, as the bandits are grouped around a campfire. Suddenly some shots are fired, similar to those that struck the 999 near the start of the chapter. The bandits recognize them as coming from Alibaba and there is a big explosion.

Tetsuro, Maetel and the Conductor are now seized by a new group of bandits as the original group is wiped out. Maetel claims this is the real Alibaba as they are seized by several mechanical vehicles with long arms. Suddenly a large group of the birds show up and start eating the bandits and their vehicles while Tetsuro, Maetel and the Conductor hide. They wait and eventually the birds fly off. They climb back up to the surface and see a lot of bird poop all over the place. Within the poop are numerous remains of mechanical bodies, those that had belonged to the bandits. Maetel talks about how on this planet thieves attack thieves and the cycle continues on and on. One final bandit, the one Tetsuro and the Conductor had found earlier reveals herself. She says her name is Crescent and she wants to exchange bodies with Maetel. She is no longer interested in this planet and wants to go to other worlds. She thinks there’s nothing she can’t get without stealing. Suddenly the Roc flies by and grabs her with its beak, flying away with her! Cries of the mechanical bodies call out from the bird poop. The 999 makes its way back out to space.

TV Episode Summary:

This storyline is arguably the most changed we’ve had thus far in the TV adaption, especially in the first episode. The second episode predominantly covers what we got in the manga chapter although there are still major changes.

In the first episode, we see Tetsuro and Maetel on the train, reading the book 1001 Nights. The Conductor announces their next stop as he does in the manga, and Tetsuro realizes this must have been why Maetel had him read this book. The 999 then starts getting shot at as it had been in the manga. Maetel claims its bandits from this planet. After the 999 crashes, the Conductor departs for a bit to apologize to the other passengers. Maetel warns Tetsuro that they may be attacked by bandits. Tetsuro thinks back to Antares. Maetel tells Tetsuro to get his luggage and that they should step off the train. The Conductor tries to stop them, but they depart anyway. Maetel tells Tetsuro there are no police on this planet. The Conductor catches up with them, wanting to make contact with the station as in the manga. After spotting the skeletons on the ground, a giant whirlwind approaches them. Once they get up from it, it is daytime. A group of bandits are there on camels, demanding they hand over everything. Maetel tosses them her luggage and they demand their clothes too. They find the Conductor is gone, with just his clothes there.

The bandits are about to leave when a woman, their leader, Alibaba, appears and demands they take them with them. They eventually make it past an oasis and to a temple. While they head there we see another woman, with blue earrings, watching. Maetel and Tetsuro are thrown before Alibaba in a large hall, with her eating some food. Alibaba asks them if they can entertain her, as she’s bored. If they can satisfy her, she’ll set them free and return their things. If they fail, they will be fed to the Roc. Maetel claims Tetsuro is an accomplished swindler. Tetsuro is surprised at first and she tells him to think of the 16^th night in the book they read. Maetel claims she lost her fortune. She had saved her money for a long time, but Tetsuro had spotted it. We head to a fantasy sequence where we see Tetsuro watching her from the window when she counts her coins, 40 in total. Maetel heads out to hide it. She makes her way to a cave while Tetsuro follows and she digs a hole to hide it in. Once she’s gone, Tetsuro digs it up.

Maetel says she realized the thief was Tetsuro, the famous swindler. She looked around for him and eventually spots him and walks by, talking out loud to herself about how she has 20 more coins such that he can hear her. Tetsuro realizes this isn’t good. He stops by her home and gives her some fruit for them to eat, then claims he forgot about something and heads out. Tetsuro rushes back to the cave and puts back the 40 coins, thinking she’s going to put 20 more in. Tetsuro returns to Maetel’s home where she’s finished eating, and he declines to eat and heads off, anxious to get more coins that night. That night Tetsuro digs up the pot in the cave and now finds all the coins are gone. Maetel approaches him from behind. We return to the present. Maetel claims Tetsuro then had a change of heart and they now travel together.

Alibaba claims this is the most interesting story she’s heard from tourists thus far and orders her underlings to return their things. Tetsuro and Maetel leave the temple. Alibaba’s underlings are upset at her letting them go. She thinks their story is rarer than the things they could steal. That said, she orders the bandits to head out and this time seize just Maetel. Tetsuro drinks some water at an oasis and they decide to split up, with Maetel heading back to find the Conductor and Tetsuro heading off to the nearest town. It is Tetsuro though that finds the Conductor, sans his clothes, and tells him that Maetel has it, so he heads off. Suddenly the monster bird Roc appears above Tetsuro! It is here where the first episode ends.

In the second episode, the Conductor catches up with Tetsuro after the Roc crashes into the ground as it does in the manga. They decide to head to the station. At the 999, Maetel sees a woman approach, the one who had been watching them earlier. She shoots at Maetel, ordering her to come with her. We see the original group of bandits arrive at the 999 and find Maetel gone, claiming the real Alibaba must have taken her. Alibaba sees the Roc, then finds the bandits chasing her so she flees on her camel. She fights the bandits with her scimitar, but is eventually knocked off her camel and the thieves take Maetel with them. Tetsuro and the Conductor come across the passed out Alibaba. The sequence in the manga where we see an oasis and there are children of the Roc bird is cut.

Tetsuro and the Conductor make their way to the station, finding it destroyed as in the manga. Alibaba wakes up. She talks rather nonsensically and claims to be the real Alibaba, then leaves. Tetsuro and the Conductor make their way back to the 999 as in the manga, finding Maetel gone. We see Maetel being held in a room by the imposter Alibaba and her bandits. The real Alibaba goes to the bandit’s hideout and kills many of them, storming her way in. Eventually she makes her way to the imposter, who is holding Maetel in her arms. The imposter leaves while the real Alibaba has to fight more bandits. Tetsuro comes in and shoots a bandit, then goes after the imposter. He finds her in a room, hooking herself and Maetel to a machine, trying to exchange bodies with her. She claims she’s grown tired of living here. Tetsuro shoots at the device and the imposter falls over in pain.

Tetsuro and Maetel head out, while the real Alibaba is still fighting a bandit. Tetsuro and Maetel make their way back out into the desert. Eventually, the next morning, the real Alibaba approaches, once again trying to capture Maetel. She successfully ties up both Tetsuro and Maetel and drags them with her. She brings them to a tent in an oasis, claiming she has taken her pray back. The imposter shows up with her bandits and they again fight each other. The Roc birds then show up and start grabbing the bandits with their beaks while Tetsuro and Maetel hide in the tent. The real Alibaba makes her way back into the tent.

After the Rocs fly away we still see the remains of the mechanical bodies of the bandits on the ground, although they are no longer in the poop of the Rocs. Alibaba is now the last bandit left. Tetsuro and Maetel want to leave, but Alibaba claims she wants Maetel’s body too. She argues with Tetsuro, believing stealing is the way to go about things rather than working hard and buying a pass. Maetel shoots her, knocking her down, and the Roc shows up and flies away with her in its beak. Tetsuro and Maetel talk on the 999 about how the thieves lived the wrong way; that all that are left are the Rocs now and they too will consume each other.

Not included in the episode is the character of Crescent, although the real Alibaba for all intents and purposes takes her role in the story. We also don’t see the large mechanical vehicles that grab Tetsuro and Maetel, nor the bandits using the beam blasts that they originally shot at the 999 while on the planet itself.

TV Episode Cast:

Tetsuro Hoshino – Masako Nozawa

Maetel – Masako Ikeda

Conductor – Kaneta Kimotsuki

Alibaba – Kazuko Yanaga

Bandit A – Banjou Ginga

Bandit B – Seiji Sato

Bandit C – Kouji Totani

Head Family Alibaba – Sumi Shimamoto (episode 104 only)

Narrator – Hitoshi Takagi

Kazuko Yanaga previously appeared as Emilia in episodes 44 – 45, Lelan in episode 63 and Secret Agent in episode 86. Banjou Ginga, Seiji Sato and Kouji Totani have all played a variety of minor characters throughout the show. Ginga also plays the recurring Mysterious Voice character while Totani voices the 999 Locomotive. Sumi Shimamoto voiced Suzie in episodes 75 – 76.

Non-Spoiler Analysis:

Both the manga chapter and episode this time draw inspiration from “One Thousand and One Nights” a famous collection of Middle Eastern folk tales, also known as “Arabian Nights”. The collection includes various stories gathered over centuries by various authors and scholars. The giant monstrous bird, Roc, is also a Middle Eastern mythology and appears within One Thousand and One Nights. Alibaba is a character from the story “Alibaba and the Forty Thieves” which also appears in One Thousand and One Nights. I haven’t personally read it, but I’d assume the story Maetel tells in the first episode is also influenced based on it.

Despite its long length (64 pages) the manga chapter doesn’t have much of a plot to it for most of it, featuring lengthy walks through the desert and scenes with the Roc, before becoming more plot focused as it approaches its end. I can kind of understand, as a result, why the TV adaption is so different than the manga chapter, as much so as any adaption we’ve seen in the series thus far. The design of the Roc is a design we’ve seen used by Matsumoto before, such as one used for another bird in the Galaxy Express 999 movie for the sequences on the planet Heavy Melder. We’ve seen Tetsuro, Maetel and the Conductor kidnapped numerous times by now, so this time wasn’t all that different. The appearance of the Rocs to essentially save the day at the end fits a lot better in the manga chapter, as a lot of the scenes with them from the manga were cut from the TV episode. Literally showing us the poop of the Rocs in the manga was rather disgusting and a logical cut for the TV episode.

Continuity isn’t always a strong suit for Galaxy Express 999, this chapter is yet another one where we see the train itself absolutely trashed, but it is able to make it back into space, completely skipping over how that is, and I’m sure we’ll see it in prime condition again in the next chapter! Also the concept of Maetel’s body being seized has occurred several times in the past and appears once again here. The TV episode gives us the rare scenario where we see the Conductor sans clothes, although unlike being completely invisible as he has been portrayed as in the past (ex. “The Country of Atonement” chapter), his body appears to be made up of small whirlwinds. Overall this wasn’t a bad chapter, but I would have expected more of a story given its long length. While the TV adaption obviously has some padding to it, I did like it better.