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Spiral zone is a futuristic cartoon syndicated in 1987 involving the world's five most elite soldiers fighting a renegade scientist who has invented a mind-control bacteria and taken over half of the world with bacteria-infested spiral zones.
Plot Early in the 21st century, Dr. James Bent, a brilliant but twisted scientist came up with what he thought was the best method to end war. He flew a special shuttlecraft and dropped generators in major cities around the world. Each generator unleashed a bacteria that caused everyone within its range (generally the size of a city) to become a mindless zombie. Bent's shuttle was shot down halfway through its journey and thus half the world was freed while the other half was "Zoned." Inside the Zone, skies were always dark. The humans were marked by yellow eyes and lesions on thier skin (animals were also effected) and there were also such markings on buildings. The Zone did not work underwater but as Bent was only interested in bringing "peace" to the civilized world, that wasn't a problem. The Zones fed off human energy which was why Beck did not kill anyone inside. Once a person is freed from the Zone, they will regain full control of themselves with the lesions fading. With major cities Zoned, the nations of the world put aside their own differences in order to fight off Beck, now called the Overlord, and his Black Widows. However, only five soldiers using special suits to protect themselves from the Zone could do it. While easy to destroy, Zone generators were impossible to capture as they were booby-trapped. There was also the fact that Overlord would drop more generators onto remaining military and civilian centers and thus the Zone Riders had to stop those plans, forcing a long and bitter standoff. Black Widows The renegade scientist not only invented the zone generators but also an antidote process giving him immunity to the bacteria. He used this antidote process on his small group of soldiers. While immune to the mind-altering effects, each Black Widow still has lesions on their skin. From their headquarters at the Chrysler Building of New York, the Black Widows also have a black aircraft. The Overlord rides the Bull Whip Cannon, an eight-wheel all terrain vehicle with a cannon. The other Black Widows ride Sledge hammers, which look like thrones on triangular caterpillar tracks. Zone Raiders The overlord's initial strike put all the major capitals of the world in the zone. This chaos brought forth international cooperation even between the United States and the Soviet Union. Scientists have discovered a rare material, Neutron-90, that immunizes people from the bacteria. Unfortunately, this material is in such a small quantity that only five protective suits could be made. So a group of five elite soldiers were put together. From a base inside a rocky mountain, the Zone Raiders ride an aircraft jet to be dropped off on mission points around the world. Dirk Courage rides the Rimfire, a vehicle that looks like a cannon set on a giant wheel. The other Zone Raiders ride armored combat monocycle Zone Riders. Each Zone Raider wears a specialized backpack. Later Characters A little after halfway through the series, several new characters joined the story. The Zone Raiders welcomed and the Black Widows enlisted Toys Spiral Zone was actually created in Japan by Bandai in the mid 80s as a line of extremely highy-detailed figures with futuristic military technology. Later, in the United States, Tonka took the name Spiral Zone and created a less-articulated and less-detailed line of figures and toys for the US market and sold them with the marketing support of a TV series. Airing and Syndication Information Spiral Zone is an Atlantic-Kushner Locke Production in association with Orbis Communications and The Maltese Companies. The 65 30-minute episodes were syndicated late September 1987 in the United States. Sources | ||||||||
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