Project A-ko is a 1986 Japanese science fiction anime film that had several sequels and a spin-off. This film focuses on a happy-go-lucky 16-year-old red-haired, sailor-suited teenage schoolgirl, A-ko Magami, who goes on her magical adventure from high school to outer space as she struggles to finish her homework, rescue her friend C-ko and save the Earth from the evil alien invasion. This series references a number of other works of anime from the 1970s and 1980s, such as Macross, Fist of the North Star and Gundam. The title itself is a reference to the 1983 Jackie Chan movie Project A, although the film bears no resemblance to Project A; the working title ended up sticking.
Summary
An alien space craft crashed into Graviton City, wiping out the entire population and leaving a massive crater where Graviton City is rebuilt. Students A-ko Magami, a perky, fun-loving red-haired, sailor-suited teenage girl, and her best friend C-ko Kotobuki, a bubbly, carefree optimist, enter a new year of school at the all-girls Graviton High School. Although A-ko possesses superhuman speed and strength, she considers herself an average teenager; she mostly worries about getting to school on time, chronically oversleeping her alarm clock each morning. The pair catch the unwanted attention of B-ko Daitokuji, a rich, snobbish, spoiled and brilliant fellow student. B-ko develops a crush on C-ko, and is determined to win her over. B-ko's attempts to win C-ko over fail and remembering that she was A-ko's rival back in kindergarten, B-ko creates a series of mecha piloted by her team of female followers to attack A-ko each morning. Losing each new and more powerful mecha she creates and dons the "Akagiyama 23", a powered suit that looks like a bikini. B-ko quickly escalates the fight across the school with no restraint. Trench-coated spy "D" has been monitoring A-ko and C-ko each morning and reporting to a large spacecraft as it approaches Earth. The aliens' conclusion is that they have located a lost princess whom they have been looking for. The aliens finally reach Earth and begin an all-out attack against the Graviton military, which is outmatched by the alien technology. A-ko and B-ko's own fight continues across the big city even as the military and aliens battle. C-ko is abducted in the middle of this confrontation by "D", revealed to be a member of the Lepton Kingdom of Alpha Cygni, an all-female race of aliens. C-ko is their princess. Witnessing the abduction, A-ko and B-ko set aside their differences. Infiltrating the spaceship, A-ko confronts D and the ship's alcoholic Captain Napolipolita, while B-ko rescues C-ko. B-ko then reneges on the truce and opens fire on A-ko, D and the Captain, destroying the ship's navigation system. The vessel lands, precariously perched on top of the city's Military Command Tower. A-ko happily awakens the next morning, sore from the previous day's adventures, and walks with C-ko to school in their new uniforms. The girls pass by a disheveled D and the Captain begging for donations to repair their ship. The film ends with B-ko, ready for yet another fight, smiling as A-ko appears on the horizon.
Characters
;A-ko or Eiko Magami ;C-ko or Shiiko Kotobuki ;B-ko or Biko Daitokuji ;Captain Napolipolita ;D ;Miss Ayumi ;Ume, Ine, Asa and Mari
Production and release
Production of the first movie included several artists who would later create other popular works, including Kia Asamiya and Atsuko Nakajima. Also noted is the western source of the soundtrack, credited to Joey Carbone and Richie Zito. In Japanese, "-ko" is a common suffix for girls' names, like Hanako, Rumiko, and Yuriko, or indeed Eiko, which sounds just like A-ko. The literal meaning is "child", so A-ko is a generic "Child A", a common way to reference peripheral characters in Japanese contemporary drama. In the making-of documentary for the film, it is stated that "A-ko", "B-ko", and "C-ko" were intended as generic "Jane Doe"-type names. Project A-ko was initially planned to be part of the Cream Lemon series of pornographic OVAs, but during the production of the series, it was decided to make it into a more mainstream title. The only sequence animated during its Cream Lemon days left in the revised production is B-ko's private bath scene. In a nod to Project A-ko's origins as a Cream Lemon episode, the owner and several working girls from the brothel in the Cream Lemon episode "Pop Chaser" - where director Katsuhiko Nishijima was one of the animators - can be seen in one of the classrooms A-ko and B-ko crash through during a fight sequence in the film. Director Katsuhiko Nishijima states that he took on this project because he was missing some teeth at the time and needed the funding from this film to buy new ones. The film was released to theaters by Shochiku-Fuji on June 21, 1986 alongside a shorter film titled Going on a Journey: Ami Final Chapter. Pony Video distributed the film via VHS and LaserDisc later in the year.
Project A-Ko was Central Park Media's first video release in 1991. They later released a dubbed version produced by Manga Entertainment to VHS in 1992. The English dub for the rest of the franchise was produced with Ocean Studios instead. After releasing Project A-ko on DVD in its original widescreen video format, Central Park Media later released a "Collector's Series" version in 2002, which features remastered video and coloring, a large number of A-ko related extras, commentary and interviews by many of the Project A-ko staff, and a free Project A-ko soundtrack CD. On May 17, 2011, Eastern Star released a newly remastered R1 Project A-ko DVD. It contains many of the extras of the original CPM release, minus the soundtrack CD.
Sequels
Central Park Media has released the three theatrical sequels in a single-disc DVD collection, 'Project A-ko: Love and Robots':
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After this original series, a spin-off entitled ' was created and released in the OVA format. In this two-part series, A-ko and B-ko are partners hunting monsters in an extraterrestrial environment, with no relationship to the previous series. Central Park Media released it as Project A-ko: Uncivil Wars.
