For the purposes of this post, I shall be using the English names for characters and places.
I have recently come to the end of an 87 episode podcast run, called the 'Samurai Pizza Cast', which as the name suggests is a deep dive and dissection into anime's most dubious dub of a 1989/90 series called 'Samurai Pizza Cats', or in Japanese 'Kyatto Ninden Teyandee' (Cat Ninja Legend Teyandee).
It can be found here: https://pizzacast.libsyn.com
The series which was created by Tatsunoko Productions and ported into English by Saban, ends with a classic "everybody dies - or did they?" trope, in which the city of Little Tokyo is first threatened to be destroyed by a meteor and then actually destroyed by a nuclear missile which is deployed from Lucille's head because she is so happy that Speedy and Bad Bird were not killed by the meteor (or rather that's what should happen as the English version has tried to edit its way out of the plot problem of having Tokyo destroyed by a nuclear missile).
Suffice to say, the fact that we are here in 2025 and the series is slowly fading into obscurity, no second season was ever commissioned; even though this whole fully realised world with its departures into the surreal, constant fourth-wall breaking, and straight up madness, practically demands for a new set of writers to play in it. The other way of looking at this is that the series is already perfect because it wears its faults and foilbles like a macrophage that has displayed its conquests like trophies and medals all over itself.
The hosts of the 'Samurai Pizza Cast' in episode 87, made an attempt at trying to run through a kind of pilot for an imaginary reboot and while their concept is fun, I think that they have leaned far too heavily into the meta-narrative. Part of the problem with attempting to write meta-narrative is that you still need a proper overt narrative to make a story work. You can only burn the oil of meta-narrative so far because very quickly you run out of substance. So then, without writing a pilot episode, I will attempt to write a series arc overview of how I would reboot Samurai Pizza Cats.
Samurai Pizza Cats is essentially a farcical comedy of manners. The series has at its core: Emperor Fred who is clearly incompetent and not in control of his government, his daughter Princess Vi who is also incompetent and who might actually run the country but she is deeply selfish and irrational, Prime Minister "The Big Cheese" (Seymour Cheese) who knows all of this and is trying to overthrow the Emperor, Al Dente who is part of the Imperial Retinue and who covertly hires the Pizza Cats as a vigilante force to thwart The Big Cheese; and the Pizza Cats themselves whose series of adventures mostly amount to defeating The Big Cheese' plans, via a robot/monster of the week (which the Big Cheese is clearly paying for out of the Imperial Budget).
Most of the characters in Samurai Pizza Cats are defined by central character flaws: Big Cheese - Vanity, Fred - Incompetence, Vi - Impulsiveness, Speedy - Headstrong Recklessness, Guido - Lust, Polly - Rage, Francine - Greed, Lucille - complete obliviousness to reality, et cetera. This is why the series and the world seem so very very big. So in trying to attempt to reboot the series, it is the prime motivations and flaws, which should drive both the plot and the complications.
So then...
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The Reboot:
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Season 2, Episode 1 precise:
The year is 20XX. XX years have passed since the events of episode 54 and E2.S01 is the re-establishing episode.
Emperor Fred is dead. Fred died after staring intently at a particularly beautiful Onigiri.
The Government Council has an emergency meeting and has decided that Prime Minister Big Cheese after being given an unconditional pardon by the late Emperor and having been restored to the Prime Ministership (the council is completely oblivious to everything which happened in Series 1), should succeed Fred in an Emergency Government.
Cut to a series of spinning newspapers and a montage of various events, which show Big Cheese being inaugurated, sitting behind a desk signing things, opening train stations and hospitals, and Little Tokyo being rebuilt into an even better techno-future-past-metropolis than it was before. Accompanied with this is the old imperial mon being replaced with Cheese' own black and gold fox mon. Opinion polls show that Big Cheese has an approval rating of 83% and people generally believe that he is good and competent.
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Princess Vi who has been going to university overseas (studying politics, law, economics, protocol, macramé, and knife-fighting) for six years, arrives back home in Little Tokyo (on a Big Cheese branded plane) and discovers that she can not simply walk into the Imperial Palace any more.
As Princess Vi wanders the streets aimlessly, she happens to walk through that part of the city where Francine is again running the Pizza Cats shop. Princess Vi who recognises the place, walks in to find Francine behind the counter, with Bad Bird wiping tables and Carla sitting at a table reading the newspaper.
Bad Bird who is clearly afraid of Vi, hides behind Carla before he is met with "I don't love you any more" and Vi returns to speak with Francine (whom she has apparently never met before). Francine explains that after Fred died and Vi went away, Big Cheese was installed as "Lord Protector" (not Emperor), and that Little Tokyo and by extension Japan is now a republic.
Vi who is clearly unhappy about this, demands that the monarchy be restored and that she should rightfully assume her place on the throne as the new Empress. Perhaps to her surprise, Francine not only agrees with her that there should be a plan to restore the Empire, but also agrees to take on Vi as an employee and to give her somewhere to stay.
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Al Dente who has been demoted from the Palace Household to merely being head of security detail on the Palace Walls, now lives in a small house in the corner of the Palace complex. It is clearly a doghouse. He receives a phone call on the Bone Phone; which is covered in cobwebs and has not been used for a considerable amount of time.
Francine explains that Princess Vi has returned and that this means that their long forgotten plan to restore the monarchy should be put in place. Al Dente calls for a meeting of the Pizza Cats to plan out how they should go about this but Francine further explains that all of the Pizza Cats have gone their separate ways.
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Cut to a series of short vignettes showing where the seven Pizza Cats have gone.
Spritz is in Hawaii; running a surfing class.
Batcat is in Paris; working as a window cleaner.
General Catton is in New York; on a building construction site.
Meowsma is in London; as a train driver on the London Underground.
Polly and Guido, now apparently married, are now in Hokkaido; running a local tax accounting firm.
Simultaneously, all five of their emergency telephones ring; and they are informed that the Samurai Pizza Cats are getting back together.
Bad Bird notices that Speedy did not answer the phone. Francine explains that nobody knows where he is, and that the only person who might know is Guru Lou.
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Bad Bird arrives at Guru Lou's house in the mountains. Lou is scared of Bad Bird and immediately brandishes a sword and pins Bad Bird to the ground. Bad Bird hurriedly explains that he is looking for Speedy and Lou relents. Lou who is off-grid, has no idea that the Emperor has died, has no idea that the Big Cheese has taken over as Lord Protector, and also has no idea where Speedy is.
Inside Guru Lou's house, amidst the detritus of old newspapers, dusty science equipment, piles of books and scrolls, an old photograph of Guru Lou and Speedy flashing a peace sign, sits on a mantlepiece.
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Oblivious to everything, Speedy is working as a Sushi Chef in Seoul. Working behind a sushi train, he uses sword skills to slice fish and other ingredients very dramatically; to the applause of the customers.
The last shot of the episode is the jingling of his little bell and a closeup of Speedy's face as he realises that for the first time in years, he has been called into action.
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Roll credits.
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Augie Doggie (who is now older) and Doggie Mommy (who is going grey), are at Lucille's teahouse. Doggie Mommy complains directly to the camera that she wasn't in this episode. End with charcoal freeze frame; fade to black.
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End.
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The entire premise of a reboot series in my not very well paid opinion, should be a 26 episode arc which is a restoration comedy. Instead of being on the outside, Big Cheese is now Lord Protector and runs a surprisingly competent government.
The monster of the week element can remain, as Big Cheese' motivations to send out big robots and monsters are no longer to seize the reins of power but to scare the populace into thinking that they are in danger and it is only through his good and competent leadership that these monsters are thwarted.
In the the long run of the series and while restoring the monarchy, the Pizza Cats' internal conflict is that they know that while restoring Princess Vi to her rightful place on the throne is the proper and correct thing to do, she is horrible. In achieving the proper end, they will be bringing about a worse outcome for everyone... and they know it.
There still needs to be outdated pop culture references as though the writers live 50 years ago. There still needs to be absurd fourth wall breaks. There still needs to be absurd plots and devices that are unhinged from reality. Princess Vi needs to fall in love with another incompetent Panda like her mum did. Francine still needs to be hyper-competent and running the Pizza palace as a front company but still realising that running the Pizza palace as a front company is more profitable than the actual business of covert ninja action.
I don't think in rebooting the series, it makes good sense to stray too far from the bumbling idiocy of the original or imagining the world inside as vastly different. None of the characters should ever learn anything at all because the world is big; it just needs to be played inside of.
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