Saber Marionette J - Season 1

Three hundred years after six men crash-landed from space on an uninhabited planet named Terra II, six cities have developed (one for each of the original founders). Genetic engineering assured the survival of the race, as every man raises clones instead of children from natural propagation. Unable to genetically engineer women, however, has resulted in a planet of men and their android servants called marionettes, all of which take female form. But suddenly, out of happenstance, a local boy, Otaru, from the city of Japoness awakens a special marionette named Lime from a secret underground capsule. Lime has the ability to laugh and get angry and demonstrates amazing strength - attributes that make her unlike any other marionette. But more importantly Otaru and Lime become friends.

The Imperial Guards of Japoness fear that evil despot Faust, leader of another city called Gartlant, is up to something dreadful. Three of Faust's special marionettes, termed Saberdolls, suddenly appear in Japoness and destroy a group of secret agents that previously burned down resident fancy boy Hanagata's house. The Saberdolls then disappear just as nimbly as they arrived. Even though Hanagata annoys Otaru, Otaru still fights to save Hanagata's little brother from the flames. But civilians impede Otaru's would-be rescue, claiming the cause hopeless. In an act of valor, Lime saves the boy, leaving the others to question the differences between man and machine.

Furor Faust, spurting Hitler-like slogans, plans to attack Japoness. Meanwhile, Otaru, Hanagotta and Lime take a tour of the national museum in Castle Japoness. When Lime accidentally breaks a national treasure, Imperial Guards race after the trio. Otaru sacrifices Hanagata to the mob in order to escape with Lime, but they end up in a secret room that houses the Shogun, Japoness' leader. Just as the Shogun starts to enjoy their company, and alludes to knowing more about Lime's origin, one of Faust's Saberdolls, Panther, disobeys Faust's orders and appears to eliminate the Shogun. Lime battles with Panther, but both are on equal footing and are getting nowhere. In the melee, Otaru accidentally awakens another special marionette, Cherry. With Cherry's help, they defeat Panther, who returns to an angry Faust and is punished for disobedience. Otaru, now with two devoted and human-like marionettes, walks home.

Cherry is in love with Otaru, but every time she gets close enough for a kiss, Lime interferes. After defeating average street thugs in a fight, Cherry solicits their help in a faux kidnapping plan designed to get Otaru alone. Otaru responds to Cherry's "ransom" letter and quickly goes to an abandoned warehouse to rescue Cherry. But when Otaru's moment of triumph comes, dangerous smugglers appear at the warehouse.

The Shogun sends for Otaru, Lime and Cherry and explains why the two marionettes are different than others - they each have a special maiden circuit that gives them emotion. Unfortunately, the secret to making maiden circuits was lost long ago. But just as he's about to explain Otaru's role in the mystery, an android replica of Faust flanked by Saberdolls appears to learn the secret himself. Once he does, the android explodes, wounding the Shogun. As the Saberdolls attack and Lime and Cherry defend, Otaru frees another marionette with a maiden circuit, Bloodberry. Another marionette has joined Otaru's family.

Bloodberry, also attracted to Otaru, takes a more forward approach to love. But after Otaru refuses her forward advances and marriage proposal, she decides to woe him by making his greatest wish come true. Bloodberry mistakenly thinks that Otaru's wish is to fly, so she makes a flying machine and they fly away, much to Otaru's fright and dismay. They crash land on Mt. Kamuna where the evil beast Ponta lives. Lime, Cherry and Hanagata assemble flying machines of their own for rescue.

With three marionettes to feed, Otaru finds that his financial means have rapidly dwindled to one remaining coin, enough for one day's supply of rice. Otaru sends Lime to get the rice, but she returns with a lottery ticket instead, having been tricked into believing it a magical piece of paper. When Otaru's idea of running a burger stand ends up costing more than it profits, their only hope remains in the lottery ticket. Luckily Otaru and company win the "happiness is yours" prize - unluckily the prize is a year's supply of pickles.

Hanagata, now Otaru's annoying neighbor, has finally decided to declare his love for Otaru, but just as he attempts to do so, marionette collectors kidnap Lime, leaving Otaru devastated and in no mood to listen to Hanagata's declaration. Spurned, Hanagata peevishly tells Otaru that his feelings for the marionettes are unnatural. But Otaru ignores the jibe, saves Lime and insists upon caring for each marionette as if they were human.

Faust makes his move and overthrows another of the six cities. Intent on ruling all of Terra II, his next target will be Japoness unless someone can break into the heart of Gartlant and destroy the main computer. Otaru agrees to take on the secret mission issued by the Shogun's council, not for patriotism, not for honor, but for the fame associated with being a hero. He's a sucker for trading cards in candy boxes. But when Lime learns that war makes you lose people, she decides to go on the mission alone. Fortunately, Hanagata informs Otaru, Cherry and Bloodberry in time for them to reach Lime in an underground passageway just as she needs help fighting Faust's Saberdolls.

After Otaru, Lime, Cherry, Bloodberry and Hanagotta successfully repel the Saberdolls, they journey into Gartlant to detonate the central computer. Cherry plans for Lime, Bloodberry and Hanagata to distract the city's guards while she and Otaru hack into the main computer room and place explosives on the central computer. The plan appears to work until, in the midst of their escape, Otaru and company find themselves surrounded by the Saberdolls with deactivated explosives in hand.

In the midst of Saberdolls, Otaru and gang look defeated until a young boy named Micky rescues them by blinding the Saberdolls with flash pellets. Resolved to make Gartlant a better place and save Japoness, Otaru and friends trek once again to the main computer room, this time through another series of abandoned tunnels. Before Otaru can enter the computer room and complete his mission, however, he has an urgent need to relieve himself, which similarly spurs the need in Hanagata. But as their golden arches fall into the computer room, the Saberdolls catch up.

Upset and jealous that Otaru kissed one of the Saberdolls, Luchs (in an attempt to distract her during the effort to destroy Gartlant's central computer), Lime, Cherry, Bloodberry and Hanagata make for poor companions on the trip back to Japoness. When they happen upon an abandoned spa resort, Otaru resolves to take a break and enjoy the facilities to ease the group's tension. When a plasma tornado develops over the resort it suddenly becomes clear why the spa resort had been abandoned, and why Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry abruptly malfunction. Otaru builds an iron "lightning" rod to attract the plasma tornado away from the resort, kisses each of the ill marionettes goodbye, and plans to sacrifice himself to the tornado by making sure the rod stays in place.

After saving it from Gartlant, Japoness gives Otaru and ganga a hero's welcome. Otaru gets an agent and abandons himself to a lifestyle filled with fame and fortune, ignoring his marionettes, who decide to leave Otaru. But fame has taken its toll on Otaru and he realizes just in time how much he misses his marionettes.

Constantly fighting over who is the most deserving of Otaru's affections, Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry enter a marionette contest designed to honor the best marionette on Terra II. The Saberdolls, Panther, Tiger and Luchs, are also ordered to enter the contest disguised and seduce Otaru to Gartlant's side. The Saberdolls make a mess, however, and Otaru's marionettes soon discover their true identities.

The Shogun summons Otaru, Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry to the Pioneer Museum where Lime first awakened. He tells Otaru that the maiden circuits not only make emotion possible, but they allow the marionettes to grow and develop like human beings. The Shogun explains that, in accordance with this extraordinary feature in the maiden circuit, it will soon be necessary for Otaru to revive the human female for humans to continue to survive on Terra II. Otaru questions what the Shogun means, and how he can accomplish such a task just as military agents from Gartlant set the museum on fire. Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry save Otaru and the Shogun from the flames, but they are unable to save what the Shogun most cherishes - the picture of a girl named Lorelei.

The marionettes learn about life and death when Lime adopts a squirrel for a pet. As Lime nurses the squirrel back to health, and then chooses to set the squirrel free for its own good, the marionettes experience new emotions, proving that their maiden circuits are continually growing, just as the Shogun said they would. When the Shogun hears of the pet project that the marionettes have undertaken he is pleased because the growth signifies one step closer to reviving females on Terra II.

Lord Faust gives the Saberdolls one last chance to wreak havoc on Japoness before casting them out forever. This time the Saberdolls do not fail. They slip in to kill the Shogun while an unidentifiable huge black machine (also sent by Faust) distracts Otaru, Lime, Cherry, Bloodberry and Hanagata. Suddenly, as the machine is poised over the city, Cherry recognizes that it's a huge bomb. Faust's command holds the key to Japoness' survival.

As a plasma bomb the size of Marlon Brando hangs over the Japones capital and Geltland Marionettes menace Japones's borders, Otaru springs into action, but Lime, utterly devastated by Emperor Ieyasu's death, refuses to leave his side despite Cherry and Bloodberry's entreaties. The others streak off in the direction of the bomb, but on the way they are stopped by the Geltland Saberdolls, who declare that anyone who defies their lord, Faust, must die. Just as Otaru is about to get severely asswhupped, Lime, who suddenly pulls herself together, saves him, her instinct for protecting Otaru for the moment overwhelming her devotion to her "grandpa", followed by Cherry and Bloodberry. However, even Lime's timely intervention may not be enough to save our heroes - an ominous electrical storm is brewing above their heads, and the Saberdools aren't frightened by total electrocution as long as they take their opponents with them.

Now that there is no living ruler of Japones, Bloodberry muses aloud, they'll have to pick a 16th Emperor of Japones, and if they have any sense they'll pick Otaru. This prospect excites Cherry - she'll get to be the first lady! She can see it now - a laughing, leering Otaru, wearing a black robe and scary makeup, forcing Cherry to undress and ravishing her before his court - no! Otaru should definitely NOT be Emperor! At the same time, half a world away, the Saberdolls have been cast out of the court of Faust again, permanently this time - that is, unless they can bring him the otome kairo of Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry. Nobody expects them to return successfully, or even alive. Meanwhile, the minds of the previous Emperor and Chamberlain in the bodies of Tamasaburo and Baiko soothe the Japones parliament, and reconstruction work on the castle continues.

When Lime fled in horror at Tiegel's death, she encountered Soemon Obiichi, Otaru's swordmaster. At his query, Lime poured forth her confusion about hearts - they make her and her "sisters" happy, but they also cause so much pain...! What's the point of having a heart at all? Soemon offers to help her out of this misery, and by the time Otaru finds Lime, her heart - her otome kairo - is gone. Lime is stiff and unresponsive and her pupils have closed completely, but she's still alive. Otaru takes her home and puts her to bed. A crowd gathers in Otaru's house that before long is scouring Japones town for Lime's missing "heart", and Otaru joins them despite objections that he should stay with Lime. Soemon tries to console Otaru, saying that Lime is Lime, missing hardware or not. Otaru goes home and finds Lime waiting in the genkan (place to change shoes), up and around but still almost totally unresponsive to any stimulus.

Otaru, his Marionettes and the entire population of Kasahari Apartments are all going to have an outdoor barbecue by the river to celebrate Lime's recovery from last episode - or just because they really wanna have a barbecue. However, even though the weather is nice and everyone gets off to an early start, they are unable to ditch Hanagata successfully - though late and still clad in his official Otaru PJ's, he arrives, loudly bemoaning his mistreatment. After Lime breaks the generator that Gennai brought, Otaru is sent upstream to a potter of Gennai's acquaintance to get some earthenware so that they can barbecue the old-fashioned way. At the mention of Gennai's name, the potter agrees to lend some real nice dishes 'n' stuff to Otaru and shows him the kiln. The potter and his assistants have found an underground plasma reservoir that, though quite temperamental, can cook up pottery 10 times as fast as a normal kiln when it's working properly. This gives Otaru an idea...

Geltland has been busy. Apart from their cloud-clearing device, they have completed another Saberdoll, of sorts: the Saber Beast Leopard. Also, once they have the otome kairo from Lime, Cherry and Bloodberry, they will be able to complete the Sabelberg II, the sequel to the big bunny-eared blitzbomb that was so soundly defeated by JaponesGar a while back. The Marionettes have fun new toys, too: their custom-made limited edition one-firing-day-only Otaru Mamiya teacups. Bloodbery is on her 15th cup of tea of the morning, Lime refuses to eat or drink out of anything but her teabowl, and Cherry has given her teacup a place of honor at the family shrine. However, they don't get to revel for long - their pleasant lunch with Hanagata (who simply will NOT behave himself) is interrupted by the arrival of Hikozaemon in Baiko's body, who summons Otaru and his girls (and, by default, Hanagata) to a conference at the royal palace.

Fifteen generations ago, Lorelei, an Earthling scientist on board the colonization ship Mesopotamia, designed a central computer for the new colony to be established on Terratoo. Evidently something of an Evangelion fan, she used three different aspects of her personality to give the computer humanlike thoughts and emotions, making it almost as if it were alive, and thus able to think creatively and kill off the crew if they become a problem and so forth. In fact, by the time the Mesopotamia reached Terratoo, she had nearly finished it - all that remained was to iron out some emotional instabilities... Flash forward to the present. The same computer, still aboard the Mesopotamia, has awakened and appears to be attacking those dwelling on the planet's surface, firing probes that smash the ground open and produce flashes of electrical energy that paralyze any electronics within range, including Marionettes and Saberdolls.

For reasons that Faust cannot fathom, Panter and Luche saved him from being killed by one of the Mesopotamia's projectiles, and they, Otaru, the Marionettes, Ieyasu and Hikozaemon are now underground, safe for the moment. Wasting no time, Ieyasu lays out the plan: Japones is prepared to use JaponesGar to attack the Mesopotamia, but since the current incarnation of JaponesGar is stationary, Japones needs Geltland's plasma diffuser (see episode 21) and rocket-booster technology to escape Terratoo's somewhat hostile atmosphere and get to the offending spacecraft. At this point, Otaru interjects that he was under the impression that the Mesopotamia was completed destroyed 300 years ago - that's why the six survivors were sent to the surface with little or no hope of survival, right? As it turns out, the admittedly harder-to-take truth is that the Mez is, in fact, still there.

As the Marionettes, aboard JaponesGar, approach the Mesopotamia and missiles begin to explode all around them, Luche feels the Mesopotamia's feelings - love for Lorelei, anger at those that would take her away - resonating in her otome kairo and Lime hears Lorelei's voice again, telling her to flee while she can. But then, the computer's chattering mind suddenly stops, and as the attack on the surface of Terratoo continues, JaponesGar punches through the Mesopotamia's hull. Once inside, it doesn't take Luche long to ascertain the location of the heart of the Mesopotamia's computer. Though the Mesopotamia's interior defenses are more than adequate, they're no match for the Marionettes and Saberdolls. In fact, one of the rockets launched at the Marionettes is quickly put to a most unintended use, as the girls turn it around and ride it down the dark corridor, laughing all the way.