Monster Rancher

Monster Rancher, known in Japan as Monster Farm (モンスターファーム, Monsutā Fāmu), is a Japanese anime television series based on Tecmo's Monster Rancher video game franchise. It originally aired on TBS in Japan for two seasons from April 1999 to September 2000. In North America, the series was first licensed by BKN, Inc. and broadcast with an English dub on the Bohbot Kids Network, the Sci-Fi Channel, the Fox Family Channel, and Fox Kids in the United States and YTV in Canada. It was later licensed by Discotek Media in 2013.

Synopsis
The world of Monster Rancher was once a highly advanced technology-oriented civilization. The people of this society were especially skilled at genetic engineering. Using gene manipulation, they were able to develop special designer pets and store their genetic information on stone tablets known as "disks", similar to CDs. Using these disks, the artificial animals could be regenerated at special shrines.

However, war broke out between the countries of the civilization. The pets were modified into biological weapons, and the war of the monsters began. The great civilizations completely annihilated each other, leaving nothing but relics behind, and much of the world's technology was lost. The monsters were sealed into their mystery disks and hidden away.

Centuries later, as humanity was just beginning to rediscover basic technology, people found the artifacts owned by the so-called "Ancients" and attributed divine properties to them. They also discovered the lost disks and shrines. Using these, monsters were again born. Only through the power of the phoenix could the lost discs be revived back into living monsters.

Thus started a popular new sport, Monster Breeding. Breeders or trainers raised monsters for battle to compete in nation-wide tournaments to see who could raise the strongest beast.

(Source: MU)

List of Published Books
Yukimiya, Chino (Author & Illustrator), "Monster Farm: Enbanseki no Himitsu" Gangnan Comics , 2 volumes already published (as of June 1, 2000)


 * 1) Released date October 1, 1999 - ISBN 978-4757501102
 * 2) Released date June 1, 2000 - ISBN 978-4757502574

TV Anime
Monster Rancher is an anime series based on the video game series made by Tecmo. The episodes are directed by Hiroyuki Yano, who also directed Daigunder and co-directed a Lupin III television special. The Japanese animation studio TMS Entertainment produced the show.

The series was brought to the United States by BKN, with an English dub produced by Ocean Studios. It was also broadcast in the United States on the Sci-Fi Channel and Fox Kids and in Canada on YTV. In the United Kingdom, the series aired on children's Saturday morning show Live & Kicking, with episodes also airing on CBBC (on BBC Two) until April 9, 2001. Repeats of the series continued throughout the year and early February 25, 2002.

ADV Films licensed the home video rights to the series and released its first twelve episodes on four DVDs. In 2005, BKN International A.G. licensed the DVD rights for 73 episodes of Monster Rancher to Digiview Productions; however, only one DVD was released. In 2012, the series was available for streaming on Hulu. Discotek Media licensed the series in 2013, and released it on three English-dubbed DVD box sets in 2014, and a single box set with the original Japanese audio subtitled and uncut on July 28, 2015. Discotek Media later released the series on a Blu-ray Disc set on May 29, 2018.

Season 1: The Secret of the Stone Disk
In Japan, under the title Monster Farm, the series was broadcast on TBS for two seasons; the first 48-episode season, The Secret of the Stone Disk (円盤石の秘密, Enbanseki no Himitsu), aired from April 17, 1999, to March 25, 2000.

Season 2: The Legendary Path
The second 25-episode season, The Legendary Path (伝説への道, Densetsu e no Michi), aired from April 1 to September 30, 2000.

Video software
As video software, the VHS version of "Secret of the Disk Stone" was released from 1999 to 2000 by Rooms RECORDS (now: B Zone Co.). "Road to Legend" has not been released on VHS.

The DVD video will be released from Super Vision, and "Secret of the Disk Stone" will be released in two DVD-BOX volumes (8 volumes in total) of 4 discs each. June 27, 2016, and is being supplied as a single volume for rental DVDs. The first software version, "Road to Legend", was released on October 23, 2009 as a 4-disc DVD-BOX.

Blu-ray -BOX was released from Frontier Works on December 21, 2018. In addition, these two works are distributed on the official paid video distribution site "Tokyo Movie ONLINE".

Broadcast Abroad
It is also broadcast in the United States and Germany. The title name is "Monster Rancher".

Online Distribution
From August 7, 2019, up to 3 episodes of each series have been distributed for free from YouTube's "TMS Anime 55th Anniversary Official Channel". From September 9, 2020 it was changed to deliver three episodes at once for each series. All episodes of each series are available on the d anime store.

External Link

 * TV Anime "Monster Farm: Enbanseki no Himitsu" ─ Wayback Machine (For archived October 27, 2000)
 * TV Anime "Monster Farm: Legend e no Michi" ─ Wayback Machine (Archived December 12, 2000)
 * Monster Rancher Series ─ YouTube Playlist
 * Monster Rancher ─ IMDb
 * Monster Rancher ─ Wikipedia EN
 * Monster Rancher ─ Wikipedia JP

Trivia
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