Space Battleship Yamato III

Space Battleship Yamato III
Screenshot from Space Battleship Yamato III
宇宙戦艦ヤマトIII (Uchū Senkan Yamato Surī)
Genre	Adventure, Science fiction
Anime television series
Directed by	Leiji Matsumoto
Produced by	Yoshinobu Nishizaki
Written by	Leiji Matsumoto Eiichi Yamamoto Hideaki Yamamoto Keisuke Fujikawa
Music by	Hiroshi Miyagawa
Studio	Academy Productions, Group TAC
Original network	Yomiuri TV
Original run	October 11, 1980 – April 4, 1981
Episodes	25 (List of episodes)

Space Battleship Yamato III (宇宙戦艦ヤマトIII, Uchū Senkan Yamato Surī^?) is the third TV season of the Space Battleship Yamato franchise, produced in Japan in 1980. The story begins at an undisclosed date, but was traditionally believed to have taken place in the year 2205 due to statements made in several of the publications devoted to Yamato III (such as its 'Roman Album'). However, the sequel film, Final Yamato, explicitly took place in late 2203, so after the film was released, the date of Yamato III was assumed to be early 2203.

The plot centers about the drama which ensues when a stray proton missile, from a battle between the Galman Empire and the Bolar Federation, crashes into the sun causing nuclear fusion to accelerate to unsafe levels. The Yamato and crew must then set out on a mission to look for a new world for the human race. They must do so in less than one year. The English adaptation was known as Star Blazers: The Bolar Wars There were plans for a fourth season, an American-produced sequel, but it never materialised. A planned web comic series based on Space Battleship Yamato III was scheduled to be released for October 2009.

Over the course of the story, the Yamato and crew must complete their mission of finding a new home for Earthlings amidst the strife caused by the Galman-Bolar conflict. The Galmans, we learn, are the ancestral race from which the Gamilas came. After the battle with the Dark Nebula Empire ended, a battle which destroyed the planet Gamilas, Desler and his remaining forces set out to search for this ancestral homeland. They found Galman, enslaved by the cruel grey-skinned aliens known as the Bolars. They promptly liberated Galman, and a galaxy-wide war ensued.

The Yamato and crew eventually catch up with Desler, who is deeply remorseful that Earth has been dragged into this conflict. Desler dispatches a team of Gamilas-Galman scientists to attempt to restore the Sun. This effort ultimately fails.

During the course of the mission, the Yamato rescues Ruda, the exiled queen of the mysterious and hidden planet, Shalbart. It turns out that she is worshipped by peace-seeking factions within both the Galman and Bolar empires, and is wanted (preferably dead) by both governments which fear her influence. This puts a strain on the fragile alliance between Earth and the Galmans, and causes the Bolars to declare outright war against Earth.