Bosco Adventure: Anime in Yugoslavia
A ride through the memory lane of anime culture in Socialism
One of the first Japanese animes in former Yugoslavia was Bosco Adventure, which started airing at the Novi Sad TV in 1991. Noriko Hidaka’s opening masterpiece “Tokimeki Wa Forever” is on the playlist of my pre-war childhood when everything still felt carefree. In our translation, the series was called Plava princeza (the Blue Princess). I remember when in the vast ocean of music on YouTube, after more than a decade, I once again heard a familiar melody. It would be a lie to say it didn’t snatch a tear out of my now adult eye. The world has changed. My little niece has her own favourite cartoons and none of those are Japanese, as far as I know at least. Other animes were connected to the Otaku culture, but also aired in Yugoslavia in the 1980s, like Adventures of Maya the Bee, based on a German novel by Waldemar Bonsels from 1912. Though we were familiar with that one too, Bosco Adventure occupies a much softer spot in my heart until today.
It’s surprising just how much in tune this anime is with the concerns that plague our current social discourse, almost 40 years in the future from its beginnings. The issues of pollution, environmentalism and a right to clean and healthy resources for everyone. That’s the storyline of this anime too. The titular Princess Apricot is trying to come back to her country before the solar eclipse, but it’s occupied by Scorpio, a monster. The only way to defeat him and his forces is to sit on her throne before the eclipse, which would unleash water and drown the invaders. In her mission, she’s aided by animals who save her from the thugs sent to kidnap her by another villain called the Hoodman. She’s embraced by her newfound friends who turn her plan into an adventure for everybody. From the 21st-century perspective of the theme, Apricot and her team might be described as a fictional ancestor of Just Stop Oil, but much less irritating. Scorpio might be a great allegory of major modern polluters like Shell.
What’s not to like about this anyway? You’ve got all the good things of life in a coherent, non-threatening narrative. Friendship, support, protection and love. Those bare necessities which haven’t really changed since we crawled out of our caves wearing nothing but dry fig leaves covering your Johnson. I wouldn’t go as far as to compare her to Greta Thunberg, though many adults have bestowed her with titles that are almost as prestigious as Apricot’s own. The difference is that the Princess never ends up in handcuffs and instead of a keffiyeh wears a tiara. Also, you won’t see her with a protest sign or in that yellow jacket that makes her Swedish rival look like Georgie from Stephen King’s spine-tingling book It. And her cult doesn’t have an anthem as great as Noriko Hidaka’s Forever. The essential difference is how far the main protagonist is willing to go: to save Mother Nature, she sacrifices her own life. The Swedish activist is more of a rattlesnake which makes every roadblock look like a red carpet for middle-class rebels.
Bosco Adventure isn’t tainted by the glaring hypocrisy of greenwashing that’s grown ubiquitous within liberal capitalism. The related paraphernalia used to be popular too: everyone collected stickers depicting all the characters from the show, like Apricot’s friends and enemies. So did I, along with many other stickers from superheroes. From this perspective, I can’t find a plausible explanation for why a kid would want to collect stickers. Maybe it’s just a layover before you grow up and move to stamps. Those were also a rather short-lived obsession, though my collection does boast a few vintage curiosities. Now it’s in one of those drawers that are usually overpopulated with old audio cassettes. Since those seem to be having a comeback, I might kick my Walkman out of its retirement back into action. Indeed, it’s not just fashion trends periodically that come back.
The technology in our homes is a witness to how far we’ve come as a society: typewriters, electric typewriters, stupid and smart TVs, Sony Walkmans, Discmans, cassette and record players. Add a plethora of old charger cables for god knows what and you’ve got a whole flea market display for retro nerds. Though in today’s politically paranoid discourse, it would probably called Sony Walkperson. One thing is for sure, if I decide to look for a cassette to play again, I’d look for Noriko Hidaka, to listen to while I Marie Kondo the messy remains of my past, packed into shoe boxes filled to the brim with trinkets, souvenirs, books and unexpectedly, a photo album from my mother’s funeral. It’s puzzling to me why anyone would want to have a memento of such tragic moments like this. Some even hire a camera to record it. Is there any conceivable moment where you’d want to watch and relive it again? The mess at home reflects the state of one’s mind.
Bosco Adventure was inspired by Tony Wolf’s book Storie del Bosco. Directed by Taku Sugiyama and written by Soji Yoshikawa, it aired in mid-1980s, with a soundtrack and aesthetics which fell a bit off the radar in the meantime. Now anime is more polished and streamlined, by the times and mirroring the technical advances. The music was composed by Toshiyuki Watanabe. I found it on a YouTube channel of someone from this corner of the woods and I’m not surprised at all. Older animes like the one about the bee Maya arrived earlier, directed by Masahiro Endo and Hiroshi Saito. This one is more widely known, though not many connect it to the heritage of anime in Japan. Especially since the comics that had the biggest influence on related culture in former Yugoslavia were primarily by Bunker, Bonelli and Sclavi. But those didn’t materialise on our TV screens like the aforementioned anime series. I won’t even consider Kevin Munroe’s sacrilegious 2010 film with Brandon Routh as Dylan Dog.
Besides the Bee and Bosco, there was Robotech, admittedly out of my focus but certainly a presence among my peers. But this one was much bigger than merely an anime: a whole franchise comprised of everything from tv series and films to video games and action figures. The appeal isn’t exactly obvious to me: my action figures were cool indeed, but the only trace of action were mobile limbs, a bit like an alpha-male equivalent of Ken. Big abs and weapons you now only get to see in medieval reenactments. In particular He-Man, a superhero and the supreme character of the Masters of the Universe. My naughty adult brain might audiovisually mistake He-Man for hymen, which is a certain part of female anatomy hidden as deep as his Castle Grayskull. Finding it must be as laborious and sticky as a pornstar’s colonoscopy. Thank heavens, I’ve never seen either of those.
Just like Barbie had Ken, He-dude has She-Ra, and don’t hold your breath for too long because I can already hear someone coming up with a gender-neutral version. Not least because of the announced live-action adaptation with Nicholas Galitzine in the leading role. This will be either a complete disaster or a delicious piece of millennial nostalgia served with feel-good icing on top of the virile cake. As far as I know, Disney isn’t in charge of this one so it will escape Kathleen Kennedy’s neutering claws. But we’re still not in the clear. Anyway, Robotech was originally developed in the USA but it’s based on four Japanese anime series stirred together into a soup with a taste of gold because it got bigger than anyone expected. The central premise sounds like Elon Musk’s wet dream: an alien starship crashes on a Pacific island, filled to the brim with advanced technology.
Luckily, Robotech is out of reach for Musk’s sharp tusks. Its derivatives are hence developed into a piece of machinery capable of saving our humbled guts from extraterrestrial invasions. I wish it was that easy in our analogue world, but maybe we’re already on the way without being fully aware and the AI is just a vessel taking us in that direction. Compared to this ultra technological utopia, the phenomenon of Bosco Adventure speaks of a more humane, kind and altruistic world. Its turtle-shaped balloon is definitely a better place to be than a stranded spaceship. If our Earth is a lifeboat, we better learn how to treat it like that. Otherwise, we’ll have to get behind the steering wheel of Robotech’s intergalactic arc and get the fuck out of here before the flames of global heating burn your pubes. If there’s anything better than Hidaka’s merry tune Forever, it’s the possibility they’ve got Daft Punk’s hit Technologic on a permanent loop inside. In that case, sign me up, high time for take-off and tripping. We’ll take the princess with us too.
