In 1978 he played bass in the song accompanying the Italian version of 'Grendizer anime manga'.
Their pilots are also traditional characters from Go Nagai's universe, Sayaka Yumi and Jun Hono from Mazinger Z and Great Mazinger respectively, and Hikaru Makiba and Maria Fleed from Grendizer.
It also has a Pilder attached to the robot's cranium, able to transform itself into a discus to slice off its target, similar to some of the enemy mechas found in Grendizer.
Based on Grendizer appears polite and refined but is also somewhat of a sadist
Another Super Robot show which was shown in America but had a more significant impact in Europe and the Middle East was another Go Nagai creation, UFO Robo Grendizer.
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One of them, a super deluxe model of the Super Robot called Grendizer (complete with the die-cast robot, a flying saucer, four ships and other accessories), which currently is out of production, is known to reach over US$400 in specialized stores and auctions.
Kikunosuke appears in the Mazinger Angels manga as the pilot for Iron Z (which is in fact a new name for Energer Z, the Mazinger Z prototype.) As well as traditional Mazinger and Grendizer characters Sayaka Yumi, Grace Maria Fleed, Hikaru Makiba and Jun Hono as they fight Dr. Hell's forces and the Vegan Empire, respectively; Daemon also appears under his Hayami Danbei alias in Grendizer.
A leading director at the Toei Animation studio during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, Katsumata worked as a director on several of Toei's anime TV adaptations of manga by Go Nagai, including Devilman (1972), Mazinger Z (1972), Cutey Honey (1973), Great Mazinger (1974), UFO Robo Grendizer (1975) and Gaiking (1976) (both Grendizer and Gaiking became later part of Jim Terry's Force Five package on U.S. television).
The team-up anime Grendizer & Getter Robo G & Great Mazinger vs. The Giant Sea Monster is very similar to tokusatsu films like Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster.