Gilgamesh

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Alternative Titles

Japanese: ギルガメッシュ

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Information

Type: TV

Episodes: 26

Status: Finished Airing

Aired: Oct 2, 2003 to Mar 18, 2004

Premiered: Fall 2003

Broadcast: Unknown

Producers: Kansai Telecasting

Licensors: ADV Films

Studios: Group TAC, Japan Vistec

Source: Manga

Genres: Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi

Demographic: Shounen

Duration: 23 min. per ep.

Rating: R - 17+ (violence & profanity)

Statistics

Score: 6.65¹ (scored by 11,545 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #6162²

² based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #3436

Members: 41,915

Favorites: 185

Resources

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Synopsis

In an attempt to gather information on immortality, scientists from around the world have assembled to study "Heaven's Gate"—the tomb turned laboratory of the mythical king Gilgamesh. But soon enough, the research is deemed unethical and all planned work comes to a halt. However, a group of terrorists pay this no thought and storm into Heaven's Gate, ultimately causing an explosion that leads to the collapse of the advanced information civilization.

Many years after the incident, the siblings Tatsuya and Kiyoko Madoka are on the run from thugs. Yet this seems to be the least of their worries as they find themselves in the midst of a war between two powerful cryptic factions. With both groups claiming to fight for the betterment of society, Tatsuya and Kiyoko will have to find a way to decide who to trust.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Adaptation:

Gilgamesh

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Characters & Voice Actors

Madoka, Tatsuya

Main

Namikawa, Daisuke
Japanese

Kageyama, Hiroko

Main

Saiga, Mitsuki
Japanese

Novem

Supporting

Shibuya, Shigeru
Japanese

Sex

Supporting

Tamomura, Shin
Japanese

Madoka, Kiyoko

Supporting

Nakamura, Chie
Japanese

Omuro, Fuko

Supporting

Kobayashi, Sanae
Japanese

Madoka, Terumichi

Supporting

Namikawa, Daisuke
Japanese

Yuki, Reiko

Supporting

Araki, Kae
Japanese

Kazmatsuri, Hayato

Supporting

Fujiwara, Keiji
Japanese

Octo

Supporting

Mito, Takashi
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Kawando, Kenjirou

Producer

Takahata, Yuuichirou

Assistant Producer

Murata, Masahiko

Director

Iwanami, Yoshikazu

Sound Director

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Opening Theme

"Crazy 4U" by Kumi Kouda

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Ending Theme

	1: "Wasuremono no Mori" by Yuko Ando (eps 2-25)
	2: "Shall We Gather At the River?" composed by Robert Lowry (ep 26)

Reviews

Feb 16, 2024

vogtTD

Recommended

I want to give this an 8, but I can only justify a 7. Was this completely genius? Absolute nonsense? All of the above? One thing is for sure, it was intellectually fascinating. I just know there are deeper themes and symbolism here that I'm not fully understanding which would help me appreciate it more. The last three or four episodes wrap things up in rather messy fashion, leaving us with a fairly disappointing conclusion that falls flat. I've read the Epic of Gilgamesh before and I don't recall anything in it that matches up to what we get here, except perhaps a very ...

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Nov 12, 2023

JoeStraatmann

Mixed Feelings

I can't tell you whether I love this show or hate it. I can't tell you whether it's a brilliant burst of creativity that overcomes a miniscule budget with maniacal glee towards a story nobody else would touch without cleaning up the rough edges, or a cruel and nihilistic attempt at scoring points with the pretentious crowd, name-dropping titles like "The Sheltering Sky" along the way to let them know they're buds. Did I watch an anime that is a wild ride that shows what really happens when people play God, or pointless drivel that punches down on scientists who already have enough problems being ...

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Jun 4, 2015

Lostinblue087

Not Recommended

There are a tonne of factors to what kind of anime they like, or how much someone enjoys an anime and why they like it. For some people it’s the story, a lot of people enjoy anime for its artistic (visual specifically) merits. How the characters interact, what kind of characters they are and what kind of adventures they have. Some people enjoy their anime with an air of mystery and complexity, something a little darker, edgier, something that makes you think or something that makes you feel.

Gilgamesh contains absolutely none of this. In a sense it’s good at catching you by surprise in that ... sense since you don’t get what you’re expecting to get going into it; because you actually expect it to deliver something, but it doesn’t. If there is one thing positive that I took from Gilgamesh it’s that you can never judge a book by its cover, or its premise. Because Gilgamesh actually does have an allure to its art and it does have an interesting set up. Because of a scientific catastrophe, the sky has become a mirror, electronic media is no longer functioning and children born after the event have strange psycho-kinetic abilities. It sounds really interesting. However from the very first episode, it never appears to be a very riveting tale, everything from the acting, the soundtrack, the colour palate and the animation itself do absolutely nothing.

While the acting is actually the shows strongest point for the most part, that’s saying very little, because everything else is so incredibly bad. Immediately, the most striking feature of the show is its bland and grey colour and atmosphere (with the occasional splash of red, livid blue, brown and yellow, which might I add are all very depthless in tone). While this atmosphere is kind of cool in the beginning, it gets tired by about the third episode and it never gets any more exciting.

The animation and the character design is ghastly. Nearly all of the characters have these odd fish faces and they move very stiffly and plainly. You’d expect that there’d be all these exciting fights between the psycho-kinetic kids, throwing each other about with their minds, hurling energy at each other in big, bloody and moving mind-brawls. The Gilgamesh kids even have a transformation that is seldom ever used (and looks super goofy), but here’s the deal. There are quite a few fights sure, but 90% of them is just throwing up energy shields and teleporting, with the villains usually retreating after a couple of attacks. The animation is very lazy, the voice acting and sfx are half-assed and the fights add absolutely nothing to the show. They don’t make it any more interesting or exciting, they’re just there. I’m not going to say an awful lot about the soundtrack, since I can say it all very briefly here: it’s hilariously cheesy and bad, that’s all you need to know about that. You’ll barely even notice it’s playing (the opening theme is also awful and does not set the show up at all).

So the art and sound is super bad, how about the story and the characters involved? Nope, just as bad, if not worse. The biggest offenders are the villains, who have a vaguely explained motives and a goal that doesn’t actually end up achieving anything. Oh, also they don’t seem to actually have any motive aside from wrecking the only chance of returning the planet to normal for nearly two thirds of the entire show (SPOILER! And since they actually manage to accomplish this, the first half of the show builds up to nothing and then fizzles out SPOILER!). most of this shows story is just why? Why are they doing this? Why do they want this? Why does the main character have a romantic interest in his older sister? Wait… hold up. Yes, it is apparent that the main character is in love with his sister and if this was not the intention, the real intention was poorly conveyed. He even turns down another love interest just to pursue his sister. (SPOILER! Oh no, but it’s ok because we later find out that he’s a clone of their father, so she’s more genetically his daughter rather than his sister, so that makes it better since she looks a lot like their mother. Hold up… does that make it better? I don’t think it does, no matter how you look at it, they’re either brother and sister or father and daughter SPOILER!). The characters are all just as boring as the art and animation. Clingy younger brother, over bearing older sister, cool older male supporting role, comic relief male supporting role, love interest female supporting role, androgynous character, mysterious anti-hero that slowly becomes likeable, cold adult character, personality-less cronies; and that’s all they ever are. The characters are never more than their assigned roles, you’ve pretty much met all of these characters before.

I won’t ruin the ending if you’re still keen to watch this pretentious trite, but let me just warn you to be careful not to cut yourself on the edge, because it’s super edgy and 3deep5you and you probably just won’t get it.

So, in summary, Gilgamesh is a boring, inane, tiresome and pretentious excuse for anime. The sort of thing that people that would like to think that they have sophisticated and mature taste in anime like to pretend is super cool because almost no one has seen it(not saying my own taste isn’t any better than anyone else’s but you know what I mean). I cannot in good faith recommend that you waste your time watching this, because this is super uninteresting and is not what you’re looking for if you’re after an artsy psychological anime with an interesting message. It is also not a super obscure action anime with cool powers and strong characters. About as edgy as wearing a Korn t-shirt to school and as deep as a glass of water, Gilgamesh is not an anime worth your time, no matter what your interests are.

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Poll: Gilgamesh Episode 26 Discussion ( 1 2 ) illdoya - Jan 6, 2009	55 replies	by paqaru »» Apr 9, 2:24 AM
Great or Horrible magnus - Nov 15, 2007	18 replies	by APolygons2 »» Oct 15, 2023 4:36 PM
Poll: Gilgamesh Episode 1 Discussion DaBigD - Jan 2, 2009	26 replies	by koji_K »» May 21, 2023 2:15 PM
Poll: Gilgamesh Episode 25 Discussion RafaelDeJongh - Apr 7, 2013	5 replies	by Dawizz »» Oct 26, 2022 12:41 PM
Poll: Gilgamesh Episode 20 Discussion RafaelDeJongh - Apr 7, 2013	6 replies	by Inexplicable »» Aug 31, 2022 4:38 AM

Gilgamesh

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Gilgamesh

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Background

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Staff

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