What does a daikon, a girl in a bunny suit and a seventies synthetic rock band have to do with the m

Whew, that was long title!

Okay, give up? Then here we go!

During this years past AX, I attended a panel on the importance of anime opening and closing sequences. A delightful informative panel, one of my highlights of this years AX.
Anywho, one of the clips talked about and shown was the legendary Daicon IV opening animation sequence (Clip include in article)!

Still confused… well let me give a little history to this image.

The Nihon SF Taikai or Japan Science Fiction Convention, is as you might have guessed already, is a Sci-Fi con that has been happening annually since 1962, with the location of the con changing each year. The location of the con determines it’s nickname for the year. So if it is in Tokyo, it is called “Tokon” or if it’s in Osaka it’s “Daicon” (Side note: Osaka is known for it’s daikons, a radish type plant), etc.

Anyways, for the third Daicon (The third time the con was held in Osaka) in 1981, an amateur group of animators, later to be called Daicon films, were asked to make an 8 minute short for the convention. The short was about a little school girl trying to carry out a mission by aliens to water a daikon (Which later turns into a ship) while battling various famous Sci-Fi characters to do so. It was a hit, but it was not until Daicon IV when it really became legendary.

In 1983 Daicon four took place and once again the same amateur animation team made another eight minute short for the convention to follow Daicon III. This time the short started with a 90 second prologue recapping what had occurred in the Daicon III short and then led into the current story were the school girl has grown up.

Watch the actual video clip and see how many pop culture figures you can spot:

After the flash back, where the synthetic voice appears that is a song by the seventies British symphonic rock band ELO or Electric Light Orchestra called “Prologue”. It is then followed by their song “Twilight” which is used throughout the rest of the action sequences.

This clip along with the song “Twilight” became the epitome of Otaku Culture and is not only famous through Japan but also all over the word. The reference of this clip is cameo dozen of times in anime, manga, etc. The live action drama version of Densha Otoko (AKA Train Man) uses the song as it’s opening, since the story is about an otaku. Several anime girls have dawn the bunny cosplay as a tip of the hat to Daicon IV.

So why all the hoop-la? Well it’s a very well made animation for it being a fan-made film and that little amateur animation group changed their name in 1985 from Daicon Films to Gainax!!

Yes, Hideaki Anno, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, Takami Akai, Toshio Okada, Yasuhiro Takeda and Shinji Higuchi made this film! The makers of Eva, Nadia, Gurren Lagann , FLCL, and many more!

This clip showcased their talent and with that they were able finance the now famous established company it is today.
Not only did this clip set milestones for the anime industry, if it was never around their would have probably never been the ground breaking Eva and the domino effect goes on and on.

Sadly, the two short animations will never be able to be put on DVD because of copyright issues over the Playboy Bunny costume and unofficial use of ELO’s “Twilight”. There was a Laserdisc copy made of DAICON III & IV Opening Animation was unofficially released in Japan as bonus material to a ¥16,000 art book of the animations, but if you have ever seen a laserdisc (Which I’m sure most of you haven’t http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laserdisc) It’s really big and such few copies around that it is extremely rare and valuable!

Gainax does several tips of the hat to Daicon IV through out it’s works. For example, in Fooly Cooly, Haruko dresse ups in a bunny outfit and flys around on her guitar while fighting a mecha in the series. Sounds Familiar? Also in Otaku no Video , the bunny suit is all over in it.

Well I hope you have enjoyed this trip between the boarder of your waking mind!