In the year 2082, a fifteen-year-old girl named Eva Wei made a desperate decision that would alter the fate of Earth. Fleeing a harsh boarding school, she traveled across the galaxy to find her father, Don Wei, a legendary race manager who had not seen her in a decade. When she arrived, he did not recognize her, mistaking her for a boy and rejecting her plea for connection. To survive and stay close to him, Eva adopted the name Molly, a name she found on a poster, and took a job as a mechanic for his racing team. This deception set the stage for a high-stakes intergalactic competition known as the Great Race of Oban, where the winning team would be granted a wish to save their planet from the invading Crog Empire. Eva's true motivation was not just to save Earth, but to use the Ultimate Prize to bring her mother, Maya, back to life after a tragic race accident ten years prior. Her journey began with a simple lie, but it quickly spiraled into a battle for survival, identity, and the very soul of the universe.
The Tragedy Behind The Wheel
The Great Race of Oban was not merely a competition; it was a cosmic lottery with a deadly history. The Earth team's original pilot, Rick Thunderbolt, was a Minor League Racing Champion who had been chosen to lead Don Wei's squad. However, during the first race, Rick was seriously injured by an act of sabotage that left him unable to race again. The injury was not an accident but a calculated move by the series' main antagonist, Canaletto, also known as the Timeless One. Canaletto had orchestrated the crash of Maya Wei, Eva's mother, ten years earlier, ensuring that Eva would be driven to participate in the race to win the Ultimate Prize. The truth was that the prize did not grant a single wish; instead, the winner became the new Avatar, a guardian of the Creators' creation, a role that required eternal service. Canaletto, who had been imprisoned for 10,000 years, manipulated events to ensure that Eva, the only racer who would not want to be crowned Avatar, would win and free him from his chains. The tragedy of Maya's death was not a simple crash but a murder disguised as a mechanical failure, a secret that Eva would only uncover after the race had ended.
The Heart of The Race
At the center of the Great Race of Oban stood the Avatar, an enigmatic entity who organized the competition every 10,000 years. The Avatar was not a god but a guardian, a role passed down through the race's winner. Satis, a small, eccentric being who appeared to be the Avatar's loyal servant, was actually the Avatar himself, the previous winner of the Great Race 10,000 years ago. Satis had been weakened by the passage of time and the struggle to keep Canaletto imprisoned. When Molly refused to accept the powers of the Avatar, Satis destroyed the Pyramid of Power in the Temple of the Heart to prevent Canaletto from stealing the powers. Canaletto defeated Satis, and the Avatar was last seen in the hands of Prince Aikka, disappearing into a cloud of lights. The true nature of the race was revealed to be a test of the strongest, fastest, and most fit to be leader, not a wish-granting contest. The Avatar's power was not to grant wishes but to protect the universe, a burden that Satis had carried for millennia. The race was a cycle of life and death, a cosmic struggle between the forces of creation and destruction.
The Great Race of Oban was a galaxy-spanning event that brought together the most diverse and dangerous racers in the universe. Among them were Grooor, a biomechanical racer who ran on steam power and did not suffer losing gracefully; Flint, a pilot from Alwas who was the hometown favorite and whose races were fixed by the judges; and Ceres, the last surviving member of the Mong, an ancient race that used a flute to create hallucinations. Para-dice, a catlike hacker prodigy from the planet Weta, saw the race as nothing more than a game, while Rush, a giant racer resembling a Viking, was a friendly good-natured person who abandoned the race to duel Toros, the Crog who had led the invasion of his home world. The race was not just about speed but about the characters' motivations and the personal stakes they carried. Each racer had a story that intertwined with the main plot, from Muir, a crustacean alien who hoped to bring back his mate, to Ondai, a robot who envied organic beings and longed to feel the sensations of touch and warmth. The race was a microcosm of the universe, a place where the most unlikely heroes could rise to the occasion.
The Betrayal of Trust
Prince Aikka, the Prince and Knight of Nourasia, was a rival of Molly's but also a close friend. He raced on the back of a giant flying beetle named G'dar, which acted as his vehicle. Aikka and Molly promised each other that during their race they would not use weapons against each other, but near the end, Molly was unable to prevent Jordan from firing. Aikka felt betrayed and gained a distrust of humans. He was pressured by General Kross to cut ties with the Earth Team and eliminate them, as the Crogs had invaded his world and held his family hostage. He finally succumbed and disabled the Arrow III during a race in the mountains. Although he began to drift from the Earth Team and lose their trust, he later abandoned a race and went looking for Molly after the Arrow III crashed. During the final race, he confronted Molly and Jordan and apologized, suggesting they defeat Kross together. At the end of the series, he promised to show Molly his kingdom one day after he liberated it from the Crogs. The betrayal was not just a personal failure but a reflection of the larger conflict between the Crogs and the galaxy, a struggle that forced Aikka to choose between his duty to his people and his loyalty to his friends.
The Final Confrontation
The Great Race of Oban left a lasting impact on the galaxy and the characters who had participated in it. After the race, Molly and her father returned to Earth to live as a family again, but the journey had changed them forever. Rick Thunderbolt, who had been injured in the first race, returned to Earth but only after he encouraged Molly to tell Don she was his daughter and try to work things out. Jordan, who had become the new Avatar, was last seen on Oban, watching the team leave for Earth, with a single tear escaping from his eye. The race had been a test of the strongest, fastest, and most fit to be leader, but it had also been a test of the heart. The series had been a story of love, loss, and redemption, a tale that had resonated with audiences around the world. The 15th anniversary of the series was celebrated with a public event in Paris on the 4th of December 2021, and a Blu-ray Kickstarter campaign was launched in February 2022 to release the series in its original HD format. The campaign raised a total of €377,056, approximately 410,000 US dollars, and the Blu-rays were released at the beginning of 2023. The
The Legacy of The Race
legacy of the race was not just in the story but in the community that had grown around it, a community that had kept the spirit of the race alive for over a decade.