When Professor Juzo Kabuto built the super robot Mazinger Z he envisioned a world protected from the forces of Dr Hell and his mechanical beasts by this, his ultimate invention. Made from Japanium (found only on the slopes of Mount Fuji) Mazinger B’s sheer size and power would defend humanity against evil for generations. He never imagined that his gargantuan brainchild would end its days in an unfinished suburb of a quiet Spanish town, rooted to the spot and silently, gently decaying.
Yet that is just what happened. Returning to the real world (for however short a time), just how did this mountainous monument to Manga finish up in Tarragona, a Spanish city better known for its Roman ruins than robot remnants?
Mazinger Z’s fate is bound up in the peaks and troughs of the Spanish building industry. When the eponymous manga TV series was first broadcast in Spain in the 1970s it was an instant hit. A decade later Tarragona’s planners decided to build a new suburb. Although the development was never finished the architect (and self-evidently a huge mecha fan) ensured that its guardian was one of the first elements in place at the site.
When the project failed and the builders moved on, Mazinger Z was left alone, without role or mission. He has been there ever since, perhaps waiting for the moment when he is recalled to life by any who know how to control his awesome super robot powers. It would take a genius…
Image Credit Flickr User elprimerpaso
Image Credit Flickr User La Tete Krancien
A close inspection reveals that Mazinger Z may not be made from Japanium: rather his frame was molded from the slightly more available polymer known as fiberglass. Yet he stands a lofty ten meters high, arms outstretched to shield his adopted Spanish homeland from any enemies that might dare to attack it. He has weathered the years surprisingly well; intact if perhaps a little grubby.
Image Credit Flickr User La Tete Krancien
Image Credit Flickr User elprimerpaso
Perhaps a rescue attempt could be made to liberate lonesome Mazinger Z from his Iberian ignominy...
Returning, to the world of fiction, could a certain Doctor Sheldon Cooper and his compadres imaginably make a daring Spanish raid and return the giant to life with a few well-placed squirts of oil and a little Wolowitz re-engineering?
Image Credit Flickr User jauldeardilla
Image Credit Flickr User elprimerpaso
Who can say? However, maybe the sleeping leviathan would prefer to remain where he. The rescue attempt would end with the four American scientists languishing in Tarragona’s jail:
a bazinga from Mazinger.
Image Credit Flickr User La Tete Krancien
Apologies: I really needed to put that last sentence in, really, really. Once again, apologies.
First Image Credit Flickr User Nightwing80
