SSSS.Dynazenon

One day after school, first-year high school student Yomogi Asanaka comes across a starving man under a bridge. Introducing himself as Gauma, the strange drifter informs Yomogi that he is a "kaiju user," a person who deals with the "kaiju"—monsters who bring harm to the city and its citizens.

The following evening, Yomogi runs into Gauma and his classmate Yume Minami. Simultaneously, a kaiju appears in a populated area of the city. Due to Gauma's lack of experience controlling the kaiju, he brings out a mysterious object from a glowing pouch, summoning a giant robot known as Dynazenon. Requiring the cooperation of four people, the mecha drags Gauma, Yomogi, Minami, and Koyomi Yamanaka—an unemployed man who was wandering on the street—into its cockpit.

Their encounter with the kaiju marks the beginning of their entanglement with kaiju eugenicists—kaiju users who manipulate kaiju with ill intent—and their efforts toward bringing out the full potential of Dynazenon.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Minami, Yume Main

Wakayama, Shion Japanese

Asanaka, Yomogi Main

Enoki, Junya Japanese

Gauma Main

Hamano, Daiki Japanese

Asukagawa, Chise Main

Anzai, Chika Japanese

Yamanaka, Koyomi Main

Umehara, Yuuichirou Japanese

Mujina Supporting

Suwa, Ayaka Japanese

Anti Supporting

Suzumura, Kenichi Japanese

Kaijuu Shoujo Anosillus (2-daime) Supporting

Takahashi, Karin Japanese

Shizumu Supporting

Uchiyama, Kouki Japanese

Juuga Supporting

Kamiya, Hiroshi Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Oowada, Tomoyuki Producer

Kamei, Hiroshi Producer

Itou, Hirofumi Producer

Reviews

Nov 26, 2024

loftyy

Recommended

For a 12 episode show, it does what it needs to do well enough. Unlike it’s predecessor, we have an actual cast this time around. The drama doesn’t feel overly forced and the characters aren’t extremely one-dimensional. They have inner conflicts and struggles that they have to work on throughout the 12 episodes, and learn from them and grow and become better people.

The main focus of all of these is probably Yume, the deuteragonist, who has a decent backstory and her own personal issues she works on, while being helped with the friends she makes through the dynazenon and mecha/kaiju stuff. Unfortunately, most of the ... other characters personal struggles and backstories overshadow the MC’s which felt kind of forgotten, as it seemed it was going to have more attention paid to it. Though he acts as more of a support character and has his fair share of moments throughout the season.

Again, studio trigger did animate this, which leads to the cinematography/directing being great as usual, and the character designs this time are actually great, all of them look unique and cool in their own ways. The dialogue is also good, as usual. They sound like normal humans, not scripted animated characters.

The fights are still filled with dumb mecha/kaiju tropes and corny lines, but with a bit more self-awareness of the fact. The show peaked around episode 10 - 11, with the finale feeling squeezed in and ruining potential plot lines with a pretty unsatisfactory boring ending, which anyone could expect from the start.

ssss.dynazenon is an average mecha anime with a well rounded entertaining cast, and big dumb fights with kaijus. You could finish it in a night or 2, and be satisfied with it.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Sep 1, 2023

Tablekun

Mixed Feelings

SSSS.Dynazenon is a slight improvement from SSSS.Gridman, but that's not saying much. Gone is the dramatic antagonist of Gridman, and instead the series revolves around 2 groups, with some overlap between Gauma, and the faction of baddies. It fails to give much back story, and largely the story is rather stupid. This is more of a friendship story line, with very bland characters. All that being said, the animation is better in this series compared to SSSS.Gridman. So, it ends up being barely watchable.

Animation 8/10
- Simple art most of the way but ramps up with the mecha animation.
Sound 7/10
- ... Pretty good mecha sound design, Good ED.
Story 3/10
- It's stale and almost nonexistent, again, it's a friendship anime with mechs.
Characters 5/10
- Bland, the dynamics between all of them is fine, it's not completely stale.
Enjoyment 6/10
- I didn't hate it by the end, it is what it is, an SSSS show that's half baked.

I think it's better than SSSS.Gridman, so if you've watched that, you might want to try this out, if you got the time to spend on mid.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Aug 21, 2021

ThatAnimeSnobRE

Not Recommended

Some time ago, when an anime called Gridman came out every sellout was hyping it as something worth checking out. Long pretentious essay videos were made about directing, cinematography, thriller-like atmosphere, and a very deep message at the finale. By the end of the season very few gave a damn, because the show was more preoccupied with zooming the camera on the girls’ thighs than telling a decent plot. Fast forward to Dynazenon, the second season, where nobody was hyping it. It lost most of its potential audience during the first season, and seeing how the pretentious sellouts couldn’t milk it for all it’s worth ... they moved to pretending other shows were deep.

The most obvious reason is because giant monster shows haven’t been trending in decades. Now it’s all about harem isekai and videogame-like fantasy worlds. Even for old-school anime fans like me, the action of the SSSS moniker wasn’t elaborate or even lasts enough to have an impact. The sellouts kept talking about the aesthetic of having the monsters moving like people with rubber suits being the thing that makes the show to stand out from all the others, but, really, who gives a damn about that? It doesn’t make the action cool and it sure as heck doesn’t add realism to the physics or gravity to the situations.

Dynazenon was more like a teen drama than a kaiju series, as every character spent most of his time in dealing with every day psychological problems that with saving the world. And even then it wasn’t doing an amazing job, since the tone of the series was very somber for the type of plot it was going for. The people in the setting didn’t give a damn about giant monsters attacking and destroying entire city blocks every week. The heroes were not trying to capture the bad guys behind the monster attacks even though they were in front of them all the time. And the bad guys were not serious about their objectives either, as they constantly found enough free time to go have fun at places with the very humans they hated so much.

As a result, nothing in this show has much of an impact on the viewer. The action is too short, nobody is worried regarding the monster attacks that kill thousands of people every week, both good guys and bad guys are slacking around to the most part, and in general the anime is not committed to what it’s going for. There are many interesting themes regarding the social pressure and alienation young people are facing in contemporary societies, but the plot doesn’t go beyond mentioning them and then letting them not matter in the background.

There are also several plot twists that are supposed to change the way you view the setting and certain characters, but because of the carefree way they are handled, they don’t feel nearly as significant as they should. Half of the series comes off as slice of nothing happens, so when the other half comes up and you are supposed to care, you don’t. If the characters don’t care or they don’t take what they are doing seriously, then why should the viewer give a damn?

Thus we get another example for why modern anime are crap. They don’t have the guts to be serious or depressing despite constantly tackling serious and depressing issues. Retro anime weren’t afraid to be all that, they knew what they were and kept true to it. A school drama would be a school drama and an action mecha would be an action mecha. Dynazenon is all over the place because it tries to be a jack of all trades and ends up being a master of none.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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	Poll: SSSS.Dynazenon Episode 5 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - Apr 30, 2021	76 replies	by EastZephyr »» Dec 3, 3:22 PM
	Why did Yume break promises? Yeeto - Sep 3, 2021	4 replies	by vegeta8639 »» Oct 25, 2:15 AM
	Is there romance in this anime? RathoneL - Jun 26, 2021	3 replies	by vegeta8639 »» Oct 25, 2:14 AM
	Poll: SSSS.Dynazenon Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Jun 18, 2021	121 replies	by gannoncannon55 »» Feb 25, 11:53 PM
	Poll: SSSS.Dynazenon Episode 10 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Jun 4, 2021	106 replies	by gannoncannon55 »» Feb 25, 11:06 PM