Japanese X-men

Any geek that grew up in the 80’s or 90’s probably remembers the X-men cartoon that was on during the 90’s. The animation wasn’t all that great, but it was still entertaining for this teenager at the time. The intro here may bring back a few memories:

I just saw something that blew my mind though. In a rare exception to the norm, the X-men cartoon was ported and re-dubbed for a Japanese release. Here is the Japanese intro:

First of all, that heavy guitar J-pop totally reminds me of the theme to Fist of the North Star, which I have blogged about before, even starting with “Shock!” which is all too similar to Fist of the North Star’s “You are shock!”. There are also some weird inconsistencies like Magneto summoning the Brood, Cable in power armor, etc., but I’m not familiar enough with the Marvel universe to comment on them.

I can however, comment on the lyrics for the theme song. According to Wikipedia, the song is ライジング (Rising), by the Japanese band アンビエンス (Ambiance). Here are the lyrics and my attempted translation in parenthesis:

Shock!　嘘で固めたナイフ切り付け (Shock! Cut with the knife hardened by lies)
Shock!　夢を飲み込み街は輝く (Shock! Catch the dream as the city shines)
争いや憎しみで　その身削られてゆく (The conflict and hatred cut away at you)
真夜中襲いくる　人知れぬまま (They attack unseen in the night)
Break Out!
ライムライト　光るざわめき (Commotion in the limelight)
リアルタイム　濡れた幻 (Real-time wet illusion)
Cry for the moon

The translation is quite hard (for me, at least) because as often happens in song lyrics and poetry in general is that many particles (similar to prepositions, they identify the part of speech the word or phrase is) are completely omitted, so I have to guess what the relationship is between the different words. Those last two lines are the hardest, as they don’t make any sense to me, especially the 濡れた幻 (wet illusion). What in the world is that supposed to mean?

Although, that “Cry for the moon” at the end is pretty awesome.