monkey magic marathon

it all started here... [sick days don't have to be completely unproductive depending on the definition]


this is one of my fondest memories of eighties TV & has become the accidental theme of today whilst i'm in sick-bed mode. 

monkey, the awesome dubbed cult version of japanese TV series "saiyuki" based on the chinese novel "journey to the west" by wu cheng'en. the chinese answer to C.S. lewis dispensing chinese mythology in enlightened narrative form. but with camp kung fu. hilarious special effects. kitsch monsters instead of fauns. and karmic sutras.


i had a massive crush on the innocent youthful monk tripitaka ["remember, no violence mon-kee"] as a kid, who was actually played by sublime model/actress masako natsume who sadly died of leukemia in 1985 at 27 years of age.

Character	Actor	Dub actor	Original Chinese name	Japanese name
Tripitaka	Masako Natsume	Maria Warburg	Xuanzang	Sanzō hōshi (Genjō Sanzō)
Monkey	Masaaki Sakai	David Collings	Sun Wukong	Son Gokū
Pigsy	s1: Toshiyuki Nishida s2: Tonpei Hidari	Peter Woodthorpe	Zhu Bajie	Cho Hakkai
Sandy	Shiro Kishibe	Gareth Armstrong	Sha Wujing	Sa Gojō
"Horse"	Shunji Fujimura	Andrew Sachs	Yu Lung	Gyokuryū

[thanks wiki]