Space battleship Yamato - Star Blazers in the west - is a cartoon from the late 1970s. The first series, from the which the film takes it's lead as far as I know, involves a planet bombarding Earth with radiation and another friendly planet offering 'cosmic DNA' that will repair the damage. The Yamato has a year to travel a gazillion light years to get the cosmic DNA.
Carnage and wave motion hilarity ensues.
After another staple of my childhood, Thunderbirds, was royally f**ked up - this looks fecking awesome.