Set in the year 2199, an alien race known as the "Gamilas" are raining radioactive bombs on Earth, rendering the planet's surface dead and uninhabitable. Humanity lives in refuges built deep underground, but the radioactivity is slowly infiltrating the underground cities too. Earth's space fleet is hopelessly outclassed by the Gamilas and all seems lost until a mysterious space probe is retrieved on Mars. Blueprints for a faster-than-light engine are discovered, and a message from Queen Starsha of the planet Iscandar in the Large Magellanic Cloud says that she has a device, the Cosmo-Cleaner D, which can cleanse Earth of its radiation damage.

The inhabitants of Earth secretly convert the ruins of the Japanese battleship Yamato into a massive spaceship, the Space Battleship Yamato for which the story is titled. Using Starsha's blueprints, they equip their new ship with a space warp drive, called the "wave motion engine", and a new, incredibly powerful weapon called the "wave motion gun" which fires from the bow.

The first season contained twenty-six episodes, following the Yamato's year-long voyage out of the Milky Way Galaxy and back again. A continuing story, it features the declining health of the determined captain Okita , and the transformation of the brash young orphan Susumu Kodai into a mature and capable-acting captain, as well as his budding romance with female crew member Yuki Mori.


According to Tokograph's news months ago, there's a rumor about the live action adaptation of the classic anime series, which originally aired from 1974-1975. The live action film will be starred by SMAP's Takuya Kimura (Long Vacation, Good Luck, Engine) who will be playing Susumu Kodai, the protagonist of the show.

It is first reported that the gravure idol and actress Erika Sawajiri (1 Liter of Tears), will be playing as the lead female character Yuki Mori, who will then make a comeback as an actress. But just days ago, according to this article, Kuroki Meisa (1 Pound of Gospel) will replace Sawajiri as on the lead female role.

The movie will start filming in mid-October and scheduled for a theatrical release in 2010.