Genre(s)

Action, Adventure, Science-fiction

Synopsis

The series features the infamous space-pirate Cobra who was once forced to hide from enemies by surgically altering his face and erasing his own memory. At the start of the story he is living an ordinary life but after going to a trip-parlor (where ordinary people live out their fantasies thanks to hypnotic suggestion - a similar concept is Philip Dick's Total Recall) he starts to regain his true memories. With his android partner Lady Armaroid (a female armored being) literally 'bursting' out of the bulky domestic robot she impersonated in his years of 'vacation', and his old ship Tortuga, he now faces foes both old and new. The first, and most well-known of the manga stories sees him encountering the Royal sisters whose bodies hold the map to a great treasure. Cobra's signature weapon is his Psycho-gun, a cybernetic arm-laser which is connected to his brain and capable of targeting enemies without needing a line-of-sight. This allows him to defeat most foes with ease but some are not so vulnerable to the laser itself, also the gun drains Cobras mental energies after extended use. For backup he carries an old-fashioned Magnum revolver. Buichi Terasawa created the main character based on the famous French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo. Cobra's facial features bear resemblance to Belmondo's, and the peculiar sense of humour Cobra exhibits throughout the story seems to have been inspired by the characters Belmondo played in films.