Last week we watched and wrote about “The Pirates of Dark Water,” a high quality but largely underappreciated cartoon. This week we’re continuing that theme with Universal’s high concept sci-fi animated series “Exosquad.”
“Exosquad” Created by Jeff Segal; Written by Mark Edward Edens and Michael Edens; Starring Lisa Ann Beley, Robby Benson, Michael Benyaer, Garry Chalk, Michael Donovan, Janyse Jaud, David Kaye, Richard Newman, John Payne, and Teryl Rothery; Run time: 20 minutes; Originally aired September 11, 1993.
“Exosquad” derives its name from mechanical exoskeletons, called Exo-Frames or colloquially E-Frames, piloted by the series’ main protagonists. As explained in the show’s opening sequence these suits allowed human beings to explore and colonize Venus and Mars jumpstarting humanities colonization of the solar system.
The series begins decades after the colonization of Mars and Venus, known along with Earth as The Homeworlds. Fifty years has passed since an interplanetary civil war between the descendants of humanity and a race of artificially created super humans known as Neosapiens. The Neosapiens were engineered to be stronger and more adept to the hostile conditions of non-Earth environments and were used largely as a slave workforce in the terraforming process. Understandably unhappy with the way they had been treated by the humans, the Neosapiens rebelled but were swiftly and definitively quelled. However, in the course of the rebellion some progress was made in regard to the relationship between the two factions and a shaky alliance was forged.
Humans and Neosapiens aren’t the only players on the interplanetary board. Like Australia of old, human criminals were banished to out planets and over time formed pirate clans that capture and scavenge Homeworld vessels and wreak havoc on humanity in space. These pirates provide the initial conflict of the series and the Exosquad is dispatched in force to quell them once and for all.
Seeing an opportunity with the human’s main military force dispatched to the outer reaches of the solar system, Phaeton, the Neosapien Governor of Mars plans a new rebellion and captures the three undefended Homeworlds with little effort needed. What follows in the 52 aired episodes is a complex second civil war between humanity and the Neosapien rebellion.
Japanese animation has been exploring these types of high concept stories for decades but something similar was exceedingly rare in U.S. animation at the time and is largely still absent today. “Exosquad” succeeded in providing an example of a high concept, smart series during a time when toy sales were more important than quality so it comes as no shock that the series was a direct response to Japanese anime.
While most shows, whether live action or animated, usually take at least several episodes and sometimes a season or more to develop a complex story with interesting characters and plot devices, it’s clear from the start that “Exosquad” had a thought out and coherent history that is evident without being spoon fed.
The exploration of the war between humanity and the Neosapiens seems to be a clear analogy for real world historical wars. The series’ executive producer, Will Meugniot, compared anime series “Mobile Suit Gundam” to the Pacific Theater of World War II and stated that most of the people working on “Exosquad” were fans of the Gundam and modeled their own series on the European Theater with specific events of the Neosapien rebellion being modeled after battles in Okinawa, Berlin, and The Battle of the Bulge.
While reception of “Exosquad” was generally positive and sometimes incredibly flattering, it was a victim of circumstance as U.S. animation was in a state of flux with many companies being bought out by larger networks. The show was ultimately moved to a 4 a.m. time slot which caused a steep decline in ratings and ultimately its cancellation.
The second and final season ended with the defeat of Phaeton and the Neosapiens and the freeing of Earth. A new antagonist is introduced when a fleet of alien vessels appear and the third season would have explored a war between humanity and this unknown alien force, complicated by the existing threats of Phaeton and the pirate clans. Sadly this portion of the story was never realized. There was talk of a feature length movie as well as a spin-off series but by then “Exosquad” had met its true match not in space but in the board room.
The franchise scraped out a meager existence for a few more years in the form of a comic book by Topps, a board game, and a game for Sega Genesis after which the concept was abandoned completely. While it’s disheartening that “Exosquad” didn’t receive the support it deserved and hasn’t remained highly regarded in the halls of nostalgia, it’s promising that it happened at all and gives hope that perhaps we can return to this type of programming someday.