An esper
refers to an individual capable of telepathy and other similar paranormal abilities. The term was apparently coined by Alfred Bester in his 1950 short story "Oddy and Id", [1] and is derived from the abbreviation ESP for extrasensory perception.
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ESPERS TICKETS
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Science fiction and espers
The concept of the esper appears often in science fiction, much less often in fantasy, and is used by name much less frequently than it is referred to. Especially salient appearances of psychic abilities are in
Isaac Asimov's
Foundation Trilogy, especially
Second Foundation
, where psychological research turns up a means of
direct mental contact between humans which was lost with the development of language; in
George Lucas'
Star Wars
films, where
The Force, from a practical standpoint, essentially equates esperism plus
telekinesis; and in
Jean Auel's
The Clan of the Cave Bear
, which although not science fiction in a strict sense does contain the same view of the mental processes as Asimov described in the
Foundation novels.
In
Alfred Bester's novel "The Demolished Man", many of the main characters are espers.
[2]
In
Andre Norton's
Moonsinger
novels, the main characters are all espers.
In
Ridley Scott's
Blade Runner
, there is scene featuring a device called an "ESPER" which is used to manipulate photographs. The scene and features of the "ESPER" have influenced many films.
In the third episode of
Star Trek
,
"Where No Man Has Gone Before", Gary Mitchell and Dr. Elizabeth Dehner become ESPers when the
Enterprise crosses the
great barrier.
In the comic book series
Espers by writer
James D. Hudnall and various artists. It debuted in 1986 and has been since published by
Eclipse Comics,
Marvel/Epic and
Image Comics. The Espers are a team of people with various psychic powers who fight a global conspiracy. The comic is similar to the TV show Heroes, but precedes it by two decades.
Pow!, a British comic magazine featured the Esper Commandos, a group of powerful psychics secretly working for the British government, in their 1971 annual.
In Simon Green's Deathstalker series, espers are a strain of humans with psychic powers used as slaves to keep the Empire running.
Esper in games
Esperism has appeared sporadically in science-fiction games from fairly early on, more often given its actual name in these than in most other sci-fi sources. One especially remarkable case is the
Avalon Hill board game (later adapted to computer systems)
Star Command
, in which characters formally called Espers are available as support troops in infantry squads, and have abilities more or less matching the parapsychological theories of what an esper would be capable of.
Since the first installment in 1987, Espers have been a recurring race in
Sega's
Phantasy Star
series; Part
1,
2 and
4 all featured important, sometimes playable Esper characters; the most notable being the character Lutz.
The term is used differently in the English release of
Square Co., Ltd. Super Nintendo RPG Final Fantasy VI
(released as
Final Fantasy III
in North America), in which beings called "Espers" are essentially
demigods who wield
magical abilities, and can be killed to allow these abilities to be transferred to humans. In the original Japanese version of the game, these creatures were known as ??, (?????,
genju
) which translates roughly into English as "phantom beast." The English translator of the game,
Ted Woolsey, sought to find a word which he felt conveyed the same meaning with as few letters as possible; the English text files for the game were essentially expanded versions of the Japanese text files, taking up far more memory space than was available. In the end, he chose the word Esper. For more information regarding Espers in
Final Fantasy VI
, see
Summon Magic. Espers also appear in
Final Fantasy XII
as disgraced
deities and
seraphs, banished from the heavens due to acts of rebellion, corruption and the desire to destroy life. There are a total of thirteen Espers appearing in the game: one for each sign of the astrological
zodiac, and the thirteenth;
Serpentarius.
"Magical" attacks in the video game trilogy
Xenosaga
are referred to as espers.
Silver the Hedgehog, one of the three main hedgehogs of the
Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, has extrasensory powers.
The
Psychic type of the
Pokémon
franchise is referred to as the "Esper type" in Japanese versions. The psychic form of
Eevee is called
Espeon; this is also a reference to
ESP (Eon is the suffix for all of Eevee's evolutions). In the popular
Pokemon games, the psychic type gym leader,
Sabrina
of Saffron city and Elite four member,
Will
are known to be espers.
Espers are also present in
Yu-Gi-Oh!
Following in the line of Cybers (
Cyber Dragon representing the
Chinese dragon, Cyber Phoenix representing the
Fenghuang, and Cyber Kirin representing the
Qilin), a monster named Cyber Esper exists that has a telepathic ability to see the opponent's cards whenever they're drawn. Esper Roba is a character in the Yu-Gi-Oh series.
In the
Accolade game
Star Control 2
, there are events where crewmen with high esper ratings react in interesting ways.
The Xbox game
Phantom Dust
has a group of individuals that include the main protagonist called Espers, individuals that have lost their memories but in return gain control over psychic powers (which include moving objects at will and manipulating/producing fire, ice, telekinetic blades, wind, etc.)
Espers feature prominently in the
EarthBound series. In
Mother and
Mother 3, two characters who use these abilities are playable, while in
EarthBound, there are three.
The Japan-only
Kunio-kun game
Nekketsu! Street Basket: Ganbare Dunk Heroes
features a Florida basketball team called the Florida Espers. One member of the team is capable of teleporting to wherever the ball is and sending it to his team's hoop.
Esper is the name of a
plane, one of the
Shards of Alara, in
Magic: The Gathering.
S4 League, a third-person shooter game means Stylish, eSper, Shooting, and Sports. eSper refers to skills that can be held by the characters.
Athena Asamiya in her solo game,
Athena: Awakening from Ordinary Life
, has telepathy and other psychic powers. Also in
The King of Fighters XII
she is able to levitate her opponents as a replacement for her unability to throw them.
Esper in Anime and Tokusatsu
- Chiaotzu from Dragon Ball
.
- Reino from "Skip Beat!" is also referred as an esper
- Tsukamoto Yakumo from School Rumble
.
- Itsuki Koizumi from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
. (His abilities are only manifested in distorted areas named "closed spaces", where the common laws of physics do not apply).
- In Witch Hunter Robin
, espers are labeled as witches and hunted down by a secret organization.
- Asuna Kagurazaka accuses Negi Springfield of being an esper in Negima
, episode 2, when he is, in fact, a mage.
- The Kasuga family in 'Kimagure Orange Road' is a family of secret espers who must keep others from learning of their powers''.
- Tetsuo and Akira from Akira
.
- Reincarnation PSME (please save my earth): 6 people who were reincarnated who have to face their new memory from the past and who slowly discover their own ESP abilities.
- Popi-kun in the Akazukin Chacha
OVA.
- The Kunio-kun game Nekketsu! Street Basket: Ganbare Dunk Heroes
features a Florida basketball team called the Florida Espers. One member of the team is capable of teleporting to wherever the ball is and sending it to his team's hoop.
- Almost all the characters of Ghost Hunt like Taniyama Mai,Kazuya Shibuya and all the members of the SPR.
- The race of evolved human called "The Mu" in Toward the Terra
.
- Kamui Shiro of the popular manga and TV anime and OAVX/1999
.
- Chojin (Choujin) Locke from "Locke the Superman" is an immortal esper; there are also soldier espers raised at a school lead by Lady Kahn.
- Lilica Evett, third member of Warriors in anime Burn Up Scramble
.
- Main characters from the anime/manga Zettai Karen Children and most of the characters are in fact, Espers.
- In Miracle Girls the main characters, Toni and Mika are Espers
- Naoto and Naoya from Night Head Genesis.
- Psychics in E's Otherwise are also called Espers.
- Esper Mami in Esper Mami
- Jasmine in Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger. Other Espers appear in the series too.
- In To Aru Majutsu no Index, Academy City has a sizeable Esper population.
- Hiroto and Miyu in Engine Sentai Go-onger.
- In Katekyo Hitman Reborn, Mammon, aka. Viper, mainly known as an illusionist, is said by Reborn to be a first class ESPer long before learning how to use illusions.
References
- SF Citations for OED
- The Demolished Man