Let’s REALLY Talk About Pirates and Piracy! (The poll is entirely optional)

[Beocat]

Hello all and welcome to the Asteroid Cove of Port Royal!  Here, all Pirates, regardless of anime series or Code and Creed are welcome to be discussed and explored in detail!  You may wish to discuss your favorite show based on space piracy, or perhaps examine a particular pirate in detail.  Maybe even compare which pirates are weak and which acts of Piracy were perhaps the most dastardly!  Anything about the Space Pirates of anime goes!  The Flag of Freedom flies above our prow and the liquor is strong!

 

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Well, to start things off, I suppose I will talk a bit about one of my favorite Space Pirates (I have many), Ryoko Hakubi.  For those of you whom her name fails to ring a bell, Ryoko was one of Tenchi Masaki’s (from the Tenchi Muyo series) harem competing for his heart  -  please do not confuse her with Ryoko Balta from Tenchi Muyo GXP.  Her backstory varies depending on which Tenchi multiverse you are watching, but it is clear no matter which you watch that she was a particularly devastating pirate.  She destroyed planets and assaulted the heavily fortified Jurai (racking up an ungodly amount of damages), and was only saved from arrest by the time running out on her statute of limitations.  She is an extreme alcoholic, unpredictable, raunchy, strong and independent, sly, honorable, and relaxed.  Her personality is not perfect, and even she has cracks in the strong façade she holds clear relics from her extremely traumatic past.  As far as Space Pirates go, she is a complex, scarred Goddess of Piracy. 

 

 

One of the things that attracts me to Ryoko as opposed to some other choices is that there is no rationalizing that what she is doing is harmless.  At no point is there any moral whittling of her chosen profession, her merciless murders, and there is no long winded explanation as to why her crimes are okay.  Her crimes are there for all to see and while she may or may not regret her actions, she continues on regardless.  With her there is always a threat of danger.  She is a Pirate! 

 

I don’t usually read fanfiction (most is terrible these days) but my favorite fanfiction was one with Ryoko starring in it!   Purity and Corruption - I still love to read it.  If you are interested in reading a well-written fanfiction steeped in sci-fi and space opera...this is the story to read.  It is also what I felt GXP should have been more like, but oh well on that one.

 

So, what are your favorites out there?  I’ll probably post on others later myself.  Is there anything about anime Space Pirates that you love or hate? Let's talk and drink your beverage of choice! 

[awesomedude20]

I don't have much knowledge on anime pirates, however I do know of one.

Lalaco Godspeed

And if everything about this chick isn't the coolest damn thing, I dunno what is.

From Space Patrol Luluco, an anime made by Trigger, she's the studio's massive reference to both Kill la Kill and Gurren Lagann, and I think they got the point across nicely.

[Ohayotaku]

Heh, first time I saw Lalaco I couldn't help but think of Mune Mune from that one episode of Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi

 

If we're allowed to look beyond anime space pirates I must confess to a certain fondness for Risky Boots from the Shantae game series

and Bangladesh Dupree from the Girl Genius webcomic

 

Edited September 13, 2018 by Ohiotaku

[Beocat]

1 hour ago, awesomedude20 said:

I don't have much knowledge on anime pirates, however I do know of one.

Lalaco Godspeed

And if everything about this chick isn't the coolest damn thing, I dunno what is.

From Space Patrol Luluco, an anime made by Trigger, she's the studio's massive reference to both Kill la Kill and Gurren Lagann, and I think they got the point across nicely.

Ahh, Lalaco.  Much about that anime reminded me of Kill la Kill so it makes sense that it was from the same studio.  I've actually found that most people have seen space pirates in anime but oftentimes don't remember them as space pirates.  A big part of that problem is that they rarely act as you would expect a pirate to act and thus, the connection is never made... A big part of the problem I have found is that Japanese authors and animators are afraid to make an unlikable or bad main character.  In some cases, the word Space Pirate gets thrown out there, but as more of a cool title than an actual profession.  There's a good chance you've seen some other ones out there too and just don't remember it.

 

1 minute ago, Ohiotaku said:

Heh, first time I saw Lalaco I couldn't help but think of Mune Mune from that one episode of Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi

My thought was more along the lines of "wow...she's wearing even less than Leeloo (Fifth Element)".  I really hope there isn't a person out there thinking of cosplaying her outfit at the next con I go to. 

[awesomedude20]

53 minutes ago, Beocat said:

"wow...she's wearing even less than Leeloo (Fifth Element)".

Actually, they're white tights XD She's almost fully clothed lol.

Don't worry though, I thought the same until I got a good look at it.

[Geano]

Well I saw this topic cumming, but thats ok. I don't really have a favorite soace pirate as I have not seen enough of the anime, or read enough of the manga to form a fair opinion of any of the characters.

In terms of which gender makes a better one. That just really depends on the situation. Men, and women have advantages in different things in life. SDo I  see no reason why that would be different in this case.

[Ohayotaku]

Vandread has an entire crew of female space pirates, but Gascogne is probably the one who most looks the part

Edited September 13, 2018 by Ohiotaku

[XII360]

1 hour ago, ArchieKun said:

I don't really have a favorite space pirate as I have not seen enough of the anime, or read enough of the manga to form a fair opinion of any of the characters.

same here, 

but i did choose male on the poll, as i've seen what /a/, or "_anime" would look like, if he was turned into a pirate

and does he look messed up, but at the same time accurate of how /a/ would speak

OPEN SPOILER AT YOUR OWN RISK, couse man, thats some traumatizing sh*t you do blackbeard >.>

 

now that i look at it though, what's ruby doing in his hand >.> (the staff is ruby, just fyi)

[Geano]

1 minute ago, XII360 said:

same here, 

but i did choose male on the poll, as i've seen what /a/, or "_anime" would look like, if he was turned into a pirate

and does he look messed up, but at the same time accurate of how /a/ would speak

OPEN SPOILER AT YOUR OWN RISK, couse man, thats some traumatizing sh*t you do blackbeard >.>

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

I mean I can understand that. Men tend to be more confrontational which may make them better space pirates, but women can, and are known for being more sneaky. So that is also a good skill for being a space pirate. Not to be sexiest here either just stating how it is figured it was good based on the poll, and where the conversation is at.

[XII360]

24 minutes ago, ArchieKun said:

I mean I can understand that. Men tend to be more confrontational which may make them better space pirates, but women can, and are known for being more sneaky. So that is also a good skill for being a space pirate. Not to be sexiest here either just stating how it is figured it was good based on the poll, and where the conversation is at.

not just stealth-wise, women in general can also "seduce"/"charm", assuming they lower their dignity, or have smart wits about them,

as male pirates clearly cant do, just imagine a male pirate (im gonna use blackbeard from FGO as my example), trying to woe' a girl...yea i cant see it happening

on the otherside, i can see Marika Kato (seems to be the characters name, though i dont know her personality, im only gonna be assuming, and say "this is not cannon"), able to charm other people, or other male pirates at that, (though for all i know, she probably isn't like that?) and make things happen as she pleases, via the spell "charm.exe"

 

i mean cmon, just look at their difference (in spoiler)

blackbeard vs katou-dono

 

 

 

good enough >.>

[Geano]

1 minute ago, XII360 said:

not just stealth-wise, women in general can also "seduce"/"charm", assuming they lower their dignity, or have smart wits about them,

as male pirates clearly cant do, just imagine a male pirate (im gonna use blackbeard from FGO as my example), trying to woe' a girl...yea i cant see it happening

on the otherside, i can see Marika Kato (seems to be the characters name, though i dont know her personality, im only gonna be assuming, and say "this is not cannon"), able to charm other people, or other male pirates at that, (though for all i know, she probably isn't like that?) and make things happen as she pleases, via the spell "charm.exe"

Well I cannot argue with anything you said here. In truth both are very good for it in different ways.

[awesomedude20]

Nearly forgot. Not canon, but I don't care, it's applicable.

Yukine Chris in her pirate gear.

As for the sneaky and charming things mentioned for female pirates up there, I'd like to mention that that doesn't always apply.

Chris here is far from seductive and would sooner shoot something dead in the face than win it over with her charm. She has also literally surfed on missiles and actively uses gunkata and quad miniguns to rek whatever needs to be blown up, so sneaky is absolutely out of the question lol.

[Beocat]

8 hours ago, ArchieKun said:

Well I saw this topic cumming, but thats ok. I don't really have a favorite soace pirate as I have not seen enough of the anime, or read enough of the manga to form a fair opinion of any of the characters.

In terms of which gender makes a better one. That just really depends on the situation. Men, and women have advantages in different things in life. SDo I  see no reason why that would be different in this case.

Space Operas are fairly rare and thus so too are Space Pirates.  Sometimes you will see them on a primarily terrestrial story.  Honestly, a lot tend to be side characters in other stories (like in UFO Ultramaiden Valkyrie, which is a story about an alien princess from Valhalla running over a poor human with her spaceship and saving his life by sharing her soul with him - a rom-com of sorts set mostly in a bathhouse on Earth (with some episodes in Space)).

 

8 hours ago, Ohiotaku said:

Vandread has an entire crew of female space pirates, but Gascogne is probably the one who most looks the part

Ahh, Vandread is a very good one too.  That and Bodacious Space Pirates are probably the two anime that spring to most people's mind when it comes to Space Pirates.  Me, I prefer the classics like Harlock   He's probably my favorite.  His outfit changes over the course of the series but to me he's the classic Space Pirate.

 

 

 

7 hours ago, XII360 said:

same here, 

but i did choose male on the poll, as i've seen what /a/, or "_anime" would look like, if he was turned into a pirate

and does he look messed up, but at the same time accurate of how /a/ would speak

OPEN SPOILER AT YOUR OWN RISK, couse man, thats some traumatizing sh*t you do blackbeard >.>

  Reveal hidden contents

now that i look at it though, what's ruby doing in his hand >.> (the staff is ruby, just fyi)

 

7 hours ago, XII360 said:

not just stealth-wise, women in general can also "seduce"/"charm", assuming they lower their dignity, or have smart wits about them,

as male pirates clearly cant do, just imagine a male pirate (im gonna use blackbeard from FGO as my example), trying to woe' a girl...yea i cant see it happening

on the otherside, i can see Marika Kato (seems to be the characters name, though i dont know her personality, im only gonna be assuming, and say "this is not cannon"), able to charm other people, or other male pirates at that, (though for all i know, she probably isn't like that?) and make things happen as she pleases, via the spell "charm.exe"

 

i mean cmon, just look at their difference (in spoiler)

 

  Reveal hidden contents

blackbeard vs katou-dono

 

 

 

good enough >.>

 

You know, I think that looks like Ruby too...makes sense...since she can choose her Magical Girl lol...  Still, although Blackbeard is like a mascot around here some days, I can think of better, more successful pirates that would be better...  I really cannot see Marika using charm to seduce anyone...some members of her crew?  Not a problem.  Marika herself?  Nope!  It is just as well.  Her personality is far better suited for commanding rather than deception and I think that the creators did a great job in playing to that part of her personality.  As for men wooing women....Tochiro (of the Harlock series, pictured up above with Harlock) managed to catch the eye of Emeraldas.  Pretty impressive (since most of the short characters in the Harlock series could be considered minor characters) and very sweet.

 

7 hours ago, ArchieKun said:

I mean I can understand that. Men tend to be more confrontational which may make them better space pirates, but women can, and are known for being more sneaky. So that is also a good skill for being a space pirate. Not to be sexiest here either just stating how it is figured it was good based on the poll, and where the conversation is at.

Haha, Ryoko Habuki is extremely confrontational and sneaky as well.  The poll was something I thought of on the fly, simply because I think there might be more female space pirates out there (and not too many alien ones actually).  That doesn't actually mean that women make better pirates or men either, but I think that perhaps some Japanese viewers might think that pirate women are especially enjoyable to look at lol.  It's still an interesting thought and in part it would need an examination of what each person thinks is an important component of a pirate's personality.  Consider Marika's father for instance.  While her mother had her and quit piracy to raise her, he stayed and sailed that ocean of stars as a Pirate.  Then again, Emeraldas abandoned her only daughter as an infant in grief to accompany her husband's coffin through space (Very cold.).  As far as who made the better pirate?  I can't really say.

7 hours ago, awesomedude20 said:

As for the sneaky and charming things mentioned for female pirates up there, I'd like to mention that that doesn't always apply.

Chris here is far from seductive and would sooner shoot something dead in the face than win it over with her charm. She has also literally surfed on missiles and actively uses gunkata and quad miniguns to rek whatever needs to be blown up, so sneaky is absolutely out of the question lol.

It definitely shouldn't always apply.  As I recall, though it has been a while, the pirates from Outlaw Star were magic users and were definitely more of a "take what you can, Obliterate all who resist!" kind of group. 

[the_twig]

We said what we thought of Boudacious Space Pirates on the other thread. Really strong first arc, the rest of it was fairly meh. It had so much potential though.

The only other space opera anime that we've seen are Heroic Age, which we don't remember much about, so won't comment on, and Planetes, which is fantastic, but doesn't really have space pirates. It does have space terrorists though.

The terrorists in Planetes were done fairly well. They were quite clearly shown to be extremists, rather than just random people who like blowing stuff up, so they had a loose structure to them.

 

They would also convert characters throughout the series.

They also targeted actual weaknesses in the space stations, such as thin shafts and the rotational motors that induced the gravitational effect.
Planetes was just a really good series that we thoroughly recommend.

[Ohayotaku]

1 hour ago, Beocat said:

Me, I prefer the classics like Harlock   He's probably my favorite.  His outfit changes over the course of the series but to me he's the classic Space Pirate

I haven’t had much experience with Harlock, which is surprising since my first exposure to anime were Star Blazers & Galaxy Expres 999 movie. I’ve seen the Endless  Odyssey series and the “Wild West” reimagining Gun Frontier. I bought the tv series collection from Discotek, but haven”t gotten around to watching it yet.

Edited September 13, 2018 by Ohiotaku

[Beocat]

3 hours ago, the_twig said:

We said what we thought of Boudacious Space Pirates on the other thread. Really strong first arc, the rest of it was fairly meh. It had so much potential though.

The only other space opera anime that we've seen are Heroic Age, which we don't remember much about, so won't comment on, and Planetes, which is fantastic, but doesn't really have space pirates. It does have space terrorists though.

The terrorists in Planetes were done fairly well. They were quite clearly shown to be extremists, rather than just random people who like blowing stuff up, so they had a loose structure to them.

  Reveal hidden contents

They would also convert characters throughout the series.

They also targeted actual weaknesses in the space stations, such as thin shafts and the rotational motors that induced the gravitational effect.
Planetes was just a really good series that we thoroughly recommend.

About Bodacious actually.... I felt it did go both down and uphill in season 2. First you had the infiltration of her crew with a pervert (which diminished the respectability of her bridge crew), but you also had her voyaging through dangerous regions of space in search of a myth. Very piratey in a way for that last part. It is just that the creators took too many departures from the story with filler and fanservice that was totally unnecessary.

 

Hmm, I think Emeraldas started as an extremist/terrorist type and became a pirate later on...perhaps if your extremists were left to thier own devices....

2 hours ago, Ohiotaku said:

I haven’t had much experience with Harlock, which is surprising since my first exposure to anime were Star Blazers & Galaxy Expres 999 movie. I’ve seen the Endless  Odyssey series and the “Wild West” reimagining Gun Frontier. I bought the tv series collection from Discotek, but haven”t gotten around to watching it yet.

Ahhh!  You have seen some classics! Some of the Galaxy Express movies have pirates in them....  If you haven't seen Harlock, Space Pirate Captain Harlock is a good place to start (you get Harlock plus a nice introduction to Tochiro and Emeraldas). There are many Harlock stories (even an all cgi one on netflix) but I enjoy that one the most. Matsumoto is the Grandfather of Space Opera anime to me. He is awesome!

 

1 hour ago, Wedgy said:

I don't know about space pirates but the thread is about really talking pirates. And the only pirate I know and love is Revy.

And why do you love Revy?  

Edited September 13, 2018 by Beocat
typos

[Beocat]

3 hours ago, Wedgy said:

Not because I love her character, but because I have a love for characters who are entirely plausible. She can be a complete monster, and when at her worst she doesn't care who she lashes out at. There's no logic to it because it's so painfully human it doesn't need that.
I know that's probably not the best reason to like a character, but there it is.

So you like that she is "real" in a sense. I understand. I am not one for Mary Sues either. Flaws are the wonderful things that make us human. I tend to gravitate to that as well..Perfect people are perfectly uninteresting after all.

[Geano]

3 hours ago, Wedgy said:

Not because I love her character, but because I have a love for characters who are entirely plausible. She can be a complete monster, and when at her worst she doesn't care who she lashes out at. There's no logic to it because it's so painfully human it doesn't need that.
I know that's probably not the best reason to like a character, but there it is.

I couldn't agree more with this. I cannot stand Marry Sue characters at all. They have their purpose in a story yes to make you apeal more to every other character in my opinion, but it is still really annoying them in a story. This is even more true in the case of this anime, or anime series like it.

5 minutes ago, Beocat said:

So you like that she is "real" in a sense. I understand. I am not one for Mary Sues either. Flaws are the wonderful things that make us human. I tend to gravitate to that as well..Perfect people are perfectly uninteresting after all.

Spoken like a true poet. I will remember that saying. Characters need to be well rounded flaws, and all make them likable.

[awesomedude20]

Just double checked.

Yeah Lalaco Godspeed is almost completely naked, mah bad. Dat Kill la Kill reference is stronger than anticipated.

[Beocat]

LOL. I thought so but but you seemed pretty sure. 

 

A thought to ponder, folks. In anime and video games, you often have bad characters saying that the things they do are actually not harmful because of .....xyz reasons.

 

What do you all think of this rationalization that frequently happens?  

 

For example, in Skies of Arcadia (video game), Vyse claims to be a pirate, but then states that they only attack military vessels and disperse the spoils to the less fortunate (Robin Hood anyone?). So, in effect, he says, I do bad things for a good cause and that makes it all okay.

 

Marika, from Bodacious Space Pirates runs under the philosophy that they are taking jobs (like a mercenary) from cruise ships to rob the guests (provide entertainment and excitement boosting future ticket sales) and the guests are unharmed because it was planned and insurance will cover the losses (also paid by the cruise ships). It must be harmless, right? But someone (probably the insurance companies...why insure them if they are paying pirates to rob them?) is still losing out on the deal. How is that harmless?

 

Anyone else have thoughts on this? It obviously isn't all pirates, but most main protagonists titled pirate seems to have this kind of warped thinking so they can sleep better at night (or perhaps make them more likable?).