- Title: Starchaser: The Legend of Orin
- IMDb: link
Starchaser: The Legend of Orin is a movie that has alluded me most of my life. Just missing out on seeing it theaters, somehow I never caught up with it on home video, cable, or streaming. Until now. Sadly the ambitious, albeit derivative (stealing prominently from Star Wars and countless other sci-fi tales), animated 3D film wasn’t worth the wait.
The plot follows a young miner named Orin (Joe Colligan) who comes into the possession of a hilt of an invisible laser sword (think Thundarr’s fabulous Sunsword if the blade was invisible most of the time) which will lead him to uncover the lies used to enslave his people and discover a wider world beyond Mine-World.
On his journey, Orin will meet a roguish smuggler (Carmen Argenziano) and his talking ship (Les Tremayne), a fembot (Tyke Caravelli), and the princes-esque daughter (Noelle North) of a planetary governor who will help him in his quest to return and free his people from the evil Lord Zygon (Anthony De Longis).
Viewing the film 41 years after its release, it’s pretty obvious why Starchaser disappeared from theaters in one week and never really had much of an impact afterwards. I will admit that the film portraying androids and robots as the great evil, buried deep down in the plot to be mined out over the course of the film, does still work (possibly even better today than in 1985 given the arguments over the rise of AI).
However, there’s barely a hint of originality to be found, and even what it “borrows” from other films, all cobbled together, whether they fit together or not, is a bit of a mess. If you asked ChatGPT to write a sci-fi adventure you might very well end up with something like Starchaser. The early computer animation of the time, particularly its character design, has some interesting aspects and you can see it influencing films like Titan A.E. or Atlantis: The Lost Empire 15 years later.
Had I seen it as a kid would Starchaser: The Legend of Orin have greater pull? Perhaps, although the plot is a mess of Orin’s various misadventures in space that drags in multiple spots before returning our hero to fight our bad guy and save the day. Honestly, I’m glad to have finally seen it, but it turns out I really didn’t miss much at all.
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