User reviews

Oddly enough, I've never heard or seen "Starchaser: The Legend of Orin" before now in 2020, when I watched a video about "Star Wars" knock off movies. I saw this movie in that video, and opted to sit down and watch it. So I did.

I must admit that I had expected more of a copy/paste job of "Star Wars" as it was featured in that video. Turns out that "Starchaser: The Legend of Orin" was actually original enough to stand out from being a copy, in my opinion. Sure, there were some similarities here and there, but if you look for such, you can find similarities to other movies in every single thing you sit down to watch.

And I was a kid during the 1980s, watching the likes of "Masters of the Universe", "Bravestarr", "M.A.S.K.", etc., so it was a bit odd that this animated movie had eluded me.

I found the storyline in "Starchaser: The Legend of Orin" to be entertaining and it was a fun movie to watch. Definitely was a trip down memory lane, to the mid-1980s cartoons, given the art style and animation style in "Starchaser: The Legend of Orin".

"Starchaser: The Legend of Orin" gets a six out of ten stars rating from me. I liked this animated movie, and I can warmly recommend that you sit down to watch it, especially if you like sci-fi adventures and were a child during the 1980s. Thumbs up to this one.

Some very good animation is combined with a very good score by Andrew Belling in what sadly was a bomb at the box office. I suppose a lot of money was pumped into this production due to it being produced in 3D. According to this site it cost $15 million to produce. The film only garnered in over $3 million at the US box office, which ain't bad, because it was the 80s and this was a cartoon.

The big influence for this film was George Lucas' STAR WARS. Not to mention the opening credits are a little reminiscent of the STAR TREK films as well. Anyways it is the story of a slave named Orin (Joe Colligan) who along with his people spend their lives mining for crystals for Zygon (Anthony De Longis). Orin though finds the hilt of a mythical sword which only he can use. He escapes the underground to find what life looks like elsewhere. Along the way he meets a smuggler named Dagg (Carmen Argenziano), a couple of droids (Tyke Caravelli and Les Tremayne) and a beautiful princess (Noelle North). It must be sounding quite similar to STAR WARS now.

It is a fun cartoon, although it is a little more adult orientated as it does have some sharp language and a little bit of sexuality blended in as well. It was rated PG for good reason.

One of my favorite STAR WARS rip-offs ever is an italian movie called STARCRASH, (see my review), but sometimes i can never choose between it and this amazing animated movie STARCHASER.

Don´t let the animation aspect of the whole thing put you away, because this is a magnificent Space-Opera. Twenty minutes after the beginning of STARCHASER, i already had forgotten that i was watching an animated feature.

True, the initial images are very disappointing, i swear i thought this was going to be one of those saturday morning cartoon shows for kids. But then something in this story started to grab me. First i noticed that the way that the story was being developed, didn´t exactly followed that cartoon for kids formula. Then a few minutes later an unexpected death of one of the characters ocurred and in a very crude way. From then on, i knew that this was watching something very different.

Then the battle sequences with the spaceship fighters appeared and i was totaly blowned away, by the animation, and by the direction. There are some fantastic flying action sequences in this movie, and they are planned and "filmed" in a incredible way. Every time i watch this even know i feel like i want to cheer for the characters who are flying the ships.

The animation of the spaceships is amazingly smooth, in fact they were done using computer graphics, but we only notice it because of the quality of the sequences, because there is trditional drawing covering the wireframes. In fact, although this is a very old movie, it still is one of the best integrations between traditional and computer animation i ever saw.

Then there is another good thing in the animation. Although technically very rough, we can see there was an effort to capture very human and elaborated gestures and motion, and the best thing is that it works very well indeed.

In the story aspect, obviously we find in STARCHASER a young hero, a rogue mercenary, a space princess, a cyborg villain, a pair of robots and all the Star Wars clichés you can think off. This might have been a terrible thing, but in this case all the stolen bits and pieces are perfectly blended resulting in a very good and interesting story, and in many ways much more imaginative than the classical formula followed by George Lucas. Anyway George got everything from the E.E.DOC.SMITH books from the 30´s, to "create" his saga, so it would be unffair now to call STARCHASER a STAR WARS rip-off for doing exactly the same. The characters are great specialy the two robots who have great dialogue, the action sequences are perfect and are a thrill to watch, specialy the flying scenes with the spaceships, the story is very,very good and imaginative altough it steals from everywhere, even from BLADE RUNNER, the animation is good and the soundtrack is perfect and stays in our mind forever. Maybe the only downside in this movie are the backgrounds wich altough very detailed, are always a bit blurred. But who cares !

This is a magnificent movie. And one of the best sci-fi of the 80´s. Don´t be discouraged by the animation aspect, because this is not a kids movie. Any person who likes si-fi has to like this for sure. Brilliant, brilliant and forgotten movie.

If you can find it. Don´t miss it!

This movie is basically a Star Wars rip-off, but I wish there were more of those. There are elements of the worldbuilding that I really like and most of the starship, spacer, smuggler elements as well as the places they go are pretty cool. I loved Dagg the Han Solo-like guy that resembles Burt Reynolds. He was great. I wish he had a better nick name for the kid than water snake but what can you do? Honestly this could a have been a cool movie if they stuck less to the Star Wars Jedi analogue stuff and made the Dagg Dabrimi show. He's a Han-shot-first type antihero that made me hope this movie was going somewhere it wasn't. If you're a sci-fi nerd there's something here worth watching even if it is ultimately a not the complete package. Somebody start the Kickstarter for a Dagg Dabrimi show.

So I have been searching the net trying to figure out what the heck this 3D sci-fi cartoon was that I saw in 1985, and I am thrilled to say I've found it in Starchaser. I saw the film at the ripe young age of 11. I have found a copy of it and just watched it again last night and here are my thoughts on it 19 years after its release.

Before watching it I had only vague recollections that this was a pretty cool film and a fantastic film-going experience, being a 3D film at the local AMC cinema. This 3d thing was not very common at the time--especially at an AMC mainstream theatre. I remember it being fairly dark for my 11 year old sensibilities and it was definitely influenced by Star Wars, which I personally like. It also reminded me of Logan's Run and of THX1138 a bit. It has a look not unlike Thundar the Barbarian or some of the other cartoons of that era: space ghost, He-man, etc. I saw that Matt Damon-voiced cartoon Titan AE not too long ago and couldn't help but feel like they were somehow similar in style or tone. I don't know... I was 11, like I said. I will say that overall I remember leaving the theatre with my brother who was 16 and we both liked it a lot. What's not to like about the human young hero kid trying to stop the super-villain and his army of robots?? I think there was even some sort of light-sabre sword thing that the kid had to struggle to use. That's all I can dig from the cobwebs of my memory. Don't blame me if it sucks.

Starchaser today… So I received my copy of Starchaser. It looks pretty official and I find it hard to believe, looking at this box that this is an unofficial copy of it. It looks pretty authentic.

Anyway, about the movie… Yes, it was okay. It was pretty much as I remembered it. It was pretty decent in its own way. You have to simply put the thing into context. Look at when it was made and most importantly, look at what it was made to be—a 3D sci-fi adventure. Seeing it like this… in 2D on my 16 inch TV, it doesn't really live up to what it was supposed to be, originally. I think being able to see it in 3D would be a great thing. I don't know if or how that could happen, but it should. I think this film could have a nice little cult following if it was re-released or released on DVD now with some 3D glasses in the box. It's a gem in its own way.

Yes, it does steal from Star Wars—and A LOT—but so does everything else. And really, it's not like George ever stole—hello, DUNE, anyone?! I don't really mind the stealing. And they stole from all sorts of places. There were quite a few sources referenced by these filmmakers: maybe a bit of Tron, Empire Strikes Back, Thundar the Barbarian, Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom, The Black Hole, THX1138, Logan's Run…

But you know what? I liked it. I think that overall, they succeeded with what they were trying to do at the time. I think there were some weak spots. Some of the animation looked a little lame at times, the writing was a bit flat, there were blatant moments heisted from other scripts, but they put together an interesting film overall. It was fun, it was an adventure. And if you like the nostalgia that comes with watching something older, you'll probably enjoy it. The performances are pretty decent, and it was pretty well held together by the director. I give it a thumbs up out of a sense of nostalgia and a pretty good effort on their part, at that time, knowing what they probably had to go through in order to make this 3D adventure happen.

Yes, I noticed a few damns, a son of a bitch, a bastard, a death of a principal character early on, violence towards children, some scary and mean robots and cyborgs, some sexually charged moments (no nudity), and some adult humor. I think most of that was pretty tame by modern standards and would pass over most kids' heads. I thought that it was totally appropriate and if I had kids of any age, I'd let them watch it without question.

I first saw Starchaser in 3D back in 1985 and for someone who grew up on the Star Wars trilogy I was hooked for life. A beautiful, heady mix of science-fiction, fantasy and all out action laced with humour, a little violence and excellent set-pieces Starchaser is lovingly assembled from the finest sources and has more love for it's source than the three prequels helmed by Lucas have shown. The story is straightforward: thousands of slaves mine crystals for robot overseers believing this to be the will of their God, Zygon. A young slave named Orin (superbly voiced by Joe Colligan) finds a glowing sword hilt buried in the mines that tells him of the forbidden world above and in an attempt to break free is taken under wing of surly smuggler Dagg Dibrimi.

Taking it's influence from Star Wars, whispering it's name with reverent pride, layering it with images and influences as diverse as Moebius, the cartoons of René Laloux and Ralph Bakshi's Wizards it's hard not to like this movie. It's well-animated, beautifully shot and surprisingly well written which is all the more remarkable given that it's an animated feature.

In almost any combination this would have been a lacklustre, disappointing affair along the lines of Titan A.E but under the direction of Steven Hahn it's becomes something much more special. Look at the credits and you'll see cast and crew steeped in sci-fi: Stargate: SG1's Carmen Argenziano as Dagg Dibrimi, Han Solo with the attitude of J.Jonah Jameson; Masters of the Universe star Anthony DeLongis' providing the silver-tongued menace of Zygon in the vein of an early Vincent Price are the two voice highlights among a near perfect cast. More sci-fi stars are found in the background, ranging from the voice stars of Transformers and DS9 to story-boarder Boyd Kirkland, who would later go onto direct Batman: The Animated Series' greatest episode 'The Grey Ghost'. Even after 20 years Belling's music holds up remarkably well, as much an integral character of the film as Les Tremayne's marvellously cowardly ship's computer. It kicks in at all the right places, has good strong recognisable themes for the main stars and above all doesn't overpower the movie or sound like one of John William's increasingly derivative scores. And unlike many animated features it doesn't feel the need to bolster the score with some contemporary rock or pop tracks, preferring a well-crafted mix of orchestral and synthesized soundtrack.

Watched 20 years on it's still as enjoyable. It doesn't run on for too long, still has that pleasing if eccentric aesthetic style prevalent throughout the film and above all is fun. It has a story to tell, does it with style and above all manages to make you care for the characters which is a rare enough thing in a live-action movie, and for an 80's animated feature something very much to be proud of.

Starchaser hasn't been commercially available for years aside from a VHS release some 15 or 16 years back but it has a strong and loyal fan base who'll welcome the fact it's finally been released my MGM on DVD. As an animated feature it still has a certain charm two decades on even without the 3D but where it really holds it's own is it's love for Star Wars. Anybody who felt disappointed by the three prequels and prefers the honest, simple storytelling style of the original will enjoy Starchaser.

In the caverns of Mineworld a slave named Orin (Joe Colligan) toils mining crystals for their God Zygon (Anthony De Longis) to feed the Furnace of Life in exchange for food. While mining Orin comes across a mysterious sword which contains the image of an old man who tells that there is world above them and to find the blade after it disappears leaving only the hilt. With the exception of Orin's girlfriend Elan (Noelle North) the others dismiss the message as heresy as the one commandment is "never dig up, up is Hell". Orin and Elan escape the mines which reveals a technologically advanced processing facility and Zygon is in fact not a god before killing Elan. Orin Narrowly escapes to the surface and meets a crystal smuggler Dagg (Carmen Argenziano) and with his help he goes to look for the blade and free his people from Zygon.

Starchaser: The Legend of Orin is a 1985 South Korean animated space opera inspired by both the success of Star Wars as well as the early 80s revived interest in 3D. TV animator Steven Hahn owned a animation studio in Korea which had a hand in animated several U. S. produced films and TV shows and during the off season wanted to give his crew something to work on deciding a movie would be the best way to go. Contacting Jeffrey Scott who had written for many of Hahn's TV productions, Scott produced the screenplay Escape to the Stars which would eventually become Starchaser. Initially started in 1982 with its eye on a 1983 release date, the film ended up being delayed by two years from its intended 6 month production cycle due to issues involving the 3D process which took even longer due to the lengthy amount of time needed to coordinate between Hahn's American offices and the Korean animation studio. The film was eventually ready for release in 1985 where it was screened for many executives including Roy Disney of Walt Disney Animation who voiced his admiration for the project, but due to problems with distributor Atlantic Releasing who was going through financial struggles as well as the decreased interest in 3D to the point many theaters didn't have proper conditions for the format, Starchaser failed to gain much of a foothold and underperformed making $3 million against a $14 million budget. What critical reception the film did garner wasn't positive including from Siskel and Ebert who made negative comparisons to Star Wars and lamented the violence in the film (but you know, it was okay when Star Wars did it). Starchaser: The Legend of Orin certainly falls in line with many Star Wars clones of the time, but at the same time it's much better made than many of them still has enough to justify its existence.

From a purely visual standpoint Starchaser looks great, the fact that certain critics of the time said it barely looks above the level of a Saturday morning cartoon is one of the most brazen falsehoods I've ever heard because no Saturday morning cartoon ever looked this good. The movie was one of the first to mix 2D animation with 3D models with Bill Kroyer of Tron and eventual director of Ferngully responsible for handling the model work on many of the 3D assets such as Dagg's ship. The initial setup of Mineworld and its rule by theocratic dictatorship is one of the interesting points that helps differentiate it from Star Wars and while as it goes on we do see it drift closer and closer to Star Wars inspired tropes it's still well done enough that it's never boring and the beautiful animation and effective voice direction makes this a stronger example than many I've seen.

Starchaser: The Legend of Orin owes much of its existence to Star Wars in that it wouldn't exist if not for George Lucas' groundbreaking film but while it borrows generously from Star Wars it's not without ideas or passion of its own. From an artistic and technical standpoint Starchaser not only looks great for its time but still holds up decades later. The plot does fall into pretty standard hero's journey/fantasy tropes but they're at least entertainingly done.

Star Wars: A New Hope forever changed sci-fi in 1977. It influenced countless films to come...and inspired dozens of rip-offs. Starchaser is arguably the most shameless copy this side of The Man Who Saved the World. It's staggering. They "borrow" Luke Skywalker, Han Salo, Princess Leia, CP-30 (twice!), Darth Vader, Stormtroopers, the Millennium Falcon, and light sabers! Even its score is remarkably similar. Its completely derivative, and is just as shallow as its predecessor.

But...honestly? As far as rip-offs go...this is one of the better ones I've seen. The animation is pretty good (it was an early cartoon to use computer and traditional styles), it has enough action, and the acting isn't that bad. It also has quite a few ridiculous moments that separate it from George Lucas' vision. Just trust me, its pretty goofy.

When I first watched it, I was angry, because I thought it was supposed to be legitimately good. The ending was especially cheesy. But looking back, as a good bad movie, its pretty fun. Its funny, appealing, and campy. Something that a group can riff on without being infuriated. Its not "good", but when you're in the right mood, you might have a blast.

Outstanding film, originally meant for 3D that hasn't suffered in the slightest from being banished to VHS rental tapes. A heady mix of Star Wars, manga influence and even a little Moebius take this Ten Commandments style film in fine style for a braethtaking ride, matched by beautiful set and character design, superb music and outstanding voices. Lobby for this one on DVD!

Orin is a slave forced to work in an underground crystal mine. All his people has ever known is the underground world and the robotic slave drivers from their god Zygon. One day, Orin finds a jeweled sword without the blade. He decides to search for the rumored outside world. After devastating losses, he discovers that Orin is just a mortal and he manages to climb to the surface of their planet Trinia. There are dangers abound. He encounters smuggler Dagg Dibrimi who is only looking out for himself. He joins Dagg on his spaceship as they find adventures in the wider universe.

This animated movie was panned for being a Star Wars wannabe. It definitely has a lot of similarities. It has a magical sword of light. It has robots. Most importantly, it has the trio of characters. It's the rogue, the princess, and the young innocent hero. It's sci-fi. The story is different and there is a more mature tone. The style is 70's animation. It's one of the earliest mixing of computer animation. If one is willing to overlook the Star Wars pandering, this is a functional sci-fi animated movie. There are some issues with the story but one can also overlook those.

I've been searching just for confirmation that this film existed for five years! For a while, I thought I'd just imagined seeing it, that no one had ever actually made it. Like many other people who have commented on this film, I too remember seeing it when I was maybe nine or ten. It haunted me ever since, because I couldn't remember the title or the names of the characters, only the well-crafted images. As I haven't seen it since then, and copies are indeed impossible to find, I will refrain from describing those images, for my memory may be faulty. Totally ripped off from Star Wars, yes, and horribly violent for a children's cartoon, but I loved it...

I found out about this movie on YouTube. I decided to watch this with my Grandma and she and I liked it. This movie wasn't one of the best movies of all time. Definitely a B movie. The concept was ripped off of other movies. Star Wars knock off you could say. But the story line was decent and was still manageable to watch. Some might say it was a little cheesy at times. Good vs. Evil was a great concept in this movie. The humor in it was quite funny and kept you entertained. All in all, a decent movie. If you're looking for a movie for a Friday night, this is for you. If you're looking for a stunning critically acclaimed movie, than this is not the movie for you.

Despite being a shameless rip-off of Star Wars and Logan's Run (among others) and having a rather stupid title, Starchaser (You can read the full name for yourself) is actually a very interesting film to watch.

Blessed with decent animation (for the 80's), a reasonable story and plenty of action, this is one of those movies where you stick it on, expecting to mock it, but you actually end up having a pretty good time.

Of course, nothing can take away from it's obvious plundering from it's far better known sci-fi brethren... The hero is the spitting image of Luke Skywalker, his laconic smuggler best friend is an easy match for one Han Solo, and even the cynical computer sounds just like C3PO.

If you can just past that though (And, quite a bit of casual sexism... Check out the 'fembot' with the big booty) then chances are you'll enjoy yourself. The space battles, whether they be fought with ships or fists are quite captivating, and surprisingly bloody... No Disney film is this. There's also a fair few good jokes, if you listen hard enough.

So, for a rather rare title, Starchaser ain't bad at all. I can certainly think of a handful of inferior but much better known animated titles that deserve to languish in obscurity more than this worthy effort... 6/10

I just saw this on an obscure movie channel. I agree with previous reviews that the animation is poor and it is an obvious rip-off of star wars. I felt like the plot had potential but never really matured. The movie had an extreme 80's cheese feel to it. Even with all the negatives, I found myself watching the entire movie. I needed to see what happened. The fact that this was originally supposed to be presented in 3D makes sense and explains why some of the animation seems strange. The whole idea of the hilt with no blade was interesting. The idea that a computer program was the start of everything gave the movie some promise but it just failed in the end.

Man I was exactly the same. I seen this movie when i was a kid. I couldn't remember the name . only images. I wasn't sure myself if it existed. Anyways when the net started gaining popularity in 96-97 i tried everything to find this movie, after a few months of searching i found it. I remembered the name orin, and searched the name, and the movie popped up. Anyways i found an old school movie store that had totally old cartoons, like He-Man, Thundercats, etc.. and they had tgis movie. I was shocked and i rented it, totally brought back some memories, Great movie, and nostalgic. But tuff as hell to find now that everything is dvds.

The animation for Starchaser is crisp, lively and full of those 80s-vibes like the kind you get from He-Man and Heavy Metal in a blender, and the characters are such obvious stand-ins for the characters from The Original Star Wars Trilogy it makes you wonder how the heck George Lucas didn't sue the filmmakers into oblivion for the screenplay's almost carbon-copying the plot of the first movie.

Starchaser is mid-80s eye candy that has one of the most derivative stories ever committed to film, but it does have an interesting world it barely gets time to explore and tap into properly. It truly is a time-capsule film that was riding the Star Wars gravy train all the way, without trying to associate itself directly with the films.

The film's derivative fun that emphasises spectacle and action over things like deep plot or thought-provoking character development. For what it is, it's not the worst offender of knock-off cinema; leave that stuff to The Asylum or other production companies. With that said, it's also fair to say that the high-quality animation deserved a deeper story.

Starchaser gets 3/5 stars.

When I think about this film all i can think about is how thrilled i was as a kid when i watched it, so has it lasted the test of time?, Sadly it does look dated but hell, its an animated feature film and as animation is one of my passions i cant help but tell you it was bound to happen. Lets just say think Titan A.E and your half way there a great film worth a watch if you can find it, as always e-mail me with any comments and if any one knows if you can get a dvd copy?

I remember watching this in the cinema when I was 10 years old, with 3d glasses as well. I don't know about anyone else, but during the early 80s, some movies were shown on TV in 3D here in the UK. TV guides included the red and green 3D glasses to watch them with. It was all rather naff, and the movies were usually the cheesy ones made in the 50s or 60s.

However, when Starchaser came out, the glasses we were given in the cinema were clear cellophane, so you could watch it in the movie's intended colours. I have to say it made the movie a very decent watch. When I watched it again a few years later on video, the 3d effect was lost, but the movie was still watchable, unlike other 80s fare, like Jaws 3, which has extremely poor viewing quality on TV.

As far as I know, this has never been on telly, which is a shame, I wouldn't mind seeing it again, and exercising my nostalgia!