Just when I thought Ive seen read and heard it all before , its the first time in near four years here that Ive been shaken from my Gatch complacency!! Consider the following quotes if you will, from another thread by ThornGenX and Stardust respectively l :

..When I started looking on the internet in the late 90s, I saw some pages about Gatchaman and knew then BOTP was a watered down remake of Gatchaman. Only recently has my interest been re-sparked and I am starting to discover "Berg Katse". Zoltar seems kind of lame in comparison to me now...

..I too started as a Zoltar fan and love him dearly. But I am also beginning to take a liking to Katse. They are two completely different characters with different reasons for waging war on earth.But Katse is the more harmless one..

Considering the above quotes , I ask, taking that the consensus that BOTP is indeed a watered down version of Gatchaman, HOW is it that Berg Katse is the more HARMLESS one?? Is that truly the case? Exactly what differences lie between Zoltar and Berg Katse? Are they NOT both prone to merciless voilent acts and schemes? Are they not equally malevolent, misguided by Sossai, bent on Earth's destruction and stealing its rescources? Is one version of this character less harmful than the other? Im truly flabbergasted here!

Sure, Zoltar has the huge interstellar robot army thing and The Great Spirit seems more powerful than Sosai X. But Zoltar also sometimes has the honourable tendency to allow areas to be evacuated before he blows them up. Katse, on the other hand, is out to cause as much mayhem, death and destruction as possible. It's Katse that organised the handing out of poison gas in Christmas presents to little children. Zoltar makes far more sense, but Katse seems to me a much nastier piece of villainous work. Especially at close quarters. Obviously on a planetary rather than galactic scale though.

I said in the other thread I screwed up I meant to say heartless not harmless. Sometimes people make mistakes; I am not appreciating being made a fool of. However Katse vs. Zoltar does make an interesting debate.

Nobody's trying to make a fool of you. It was just odd, reading that Katse was more harmless than Zoltar. Now you've told us you meant heartless, it's clear what you meant - I don't think anyone's going to argue that point.

Well I did feel kind of stupid after realizing what I did. But thanks for that. Sorry if I took it a little too personally. When I read it I realized what a big mistake I made. However let's not let the debate die. What about their reasons for fighting. I feel Zoltar has a noble one in that he is trying to save a dying planet. He is a bit of a coward but I have always called that self preservation. But what about Katse? What exactly is hir reason?

Originally posted by stardust What about their reasons for fighting. I feel Zoltar has a noble one in that he is trying to save a dying planet. He is a bit of a coward but I have always called that self preservation. But what about Katse? What exactly is hir reason?

The answers I have picked up come from fanfic. From what I read on various gatch websites, there does not seem to be a clear answer within the show itself. I look forward to seeing what more experienced Gatch fans have to say.

Katse is too dependent upon Sosai and simply does as told. He is hir only family after all. Zoltar is a little more independent, and so presumably is possessed of a little more freewill. (it is presumably him that allows the cities to be evacuated; the Luminous One doesnt care about the people. Perhaps he lets Zoltar have this leniency because he realises what a refugee problem it will cause?)

Ive never seen Berg Katse in action so I cant judge. I have the OAV video but that I am sure is not as good as the original.

and Im truly mortified to discover that in my usual idiotic style, and expression of writing, I conveyed the wrong message, thereby offending one of our members! Stardust, I apologise hon. Please forgive me. I hadnt even realised you made a mistake but rather was more intrigued and fascinated in possibly discovering a different point of view on a character which I thought would make quite an interesting debate. Actually I was more excited by this discovery, very much like I had been flabbergasted to learn years back that it was Ken and not Joe who was more tempestuous, violent, and prone to swearing ! I really am very sorry for the way I expressed it , in my usual overexhuberant manner which inadvertantly offended you. I am duly chastised. I may be many things, ( and then some!) but belittling or making fools of fellow members is not one of them . Forgive? <<>> (You can even wear the purple ears and cape and bitchslap me a couple of times before ordering the goons to shoot me multiple times if it helps ?)

And for penance, I've taken to scrounging up all possible gatch sites for some comparisons between Zoltar and Katse. Best I could come up with was Katzemania in the BK Factlets section. In respect to copyright rules, here is the link : http://www.xs4all.nl/~calezane/tribute/bkfactlt.htm#factlet Even tho dang you should read the whole page..(its a real eyeopener esp the take on the whole Joe vs Katse thang!!), here's the excerpt I found pertaining to this threads discussion :

Mad? Suffering hormonal imbalance? There is no conclusive evidence of either. Too much energy? He does overreact to absolutely everything: a whistle makes him dive under the table, the wrong reply makes him lash out, the slightest encouragement makes him sing and kick his heels. When in uniform, he isn't calm for a moment, not even when things are going his way. (The Onna Taicho, on the other hand, is icily calm and ruthless. It may be a hormone thing, although it's suggested the male and female form have different personalities.) A coward? Probably not, as he does put himself in great personal danger (sneaking into Nambu's office just to gloat??) and can't seem to learn that getting too close to a certain Eagle will always lead to bruising. Stupid? More an airhead than actually thick; he seems to be able to speak any language, fly any vehicle and adapt to any social situation. Nasty? Very. Impatient? Extremely. And, as comes out right at the end, desperately unhappy. So maybe his villain behaviour is more a question of circumstance than of personality. And maybe not.

Also found an informative comparison between Gatch and BOTP by by Dee Ann Latona on her article on the amercanisation ( bastardisation) of Gatchaman in Anime 101 : Coming to America article. the link to that one is : http://r.empstudios.com/Zines/cyber.v3 Pertaining extract:

Galactor itself is run by two beings: an alien sent to Earth to observe it named Sosai X, and a hermaphrodite created by Sosai from a set of boy and girl twins, named Berg Katse. Katse is brilliant, but self-centered and lacking in common sense. He/She runs the organization emphasizing that every member should look out for themselves. On several occasions, one sees Katse punish guards for stopping to help one another when they're under a deadline. By the end of the series, Sosai has gone a bit funny in the head and has decided to destroy the planet entirely. Katse goes along with the plan mostly because Sosai has promised that Galactor will rule the world after the plan is complete. When the Gatchaman team corners Katse and it is revealed that Sosai is really just trying to destroy the entire planet, Katse finally loses it and jumps off a cliff into the boiling lava below.

And heaven knows where I got this sentence from, ( *dont* ask just *how* many searches and sites Ive gone through tonight! *ugh!!*) : "Episode 3 illustrates the difference between the series: InBattle, when a whiny little boy gets in the way of a giant mummy attacking an airport, the evil Zoltar warns him away; inGatchaman, villainous Berg Katse tells the mummy to step on the child. "