Top wo Nerae! Gunbuster (Gunbuster)

Add to My List

Add to Favorites

Alternative Titles

Synonyms: Top wo Nerae!, Aim for the Top!

Japanese: トップをねらえ！ GunBuster

More titles

Information

Type: OVA

Episodes: 6

Status: Finished Airing

Aired: Oct 7, 1988 to Jul 7, 1989

Producers: Studio Fantasia, Tohokushinsha Film Corporation

Licensors: Discotek Media, Manga Entertainment, Bandai Visual USA

Studios: Gainax

Source: Original

Genres: Action, Award Winning, Comedy, Drama, Sci-Fi

Themes: Mecha, Military, Space

Duration: 30 min. per ep.

Rating: R+ - Mild Nudity

Statistics

Score: 7.87¹ (scored by 51,718 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #801²

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

Popularity: #1703

Members: 123,577

Favorites: 2,707

Available At

Official Site

Resources

AniDB

ANN

Synopsis

In the near future, humanity has taken its first steps towards journeying into the far reaches of the galaxy. Upon doing so they discover a huge race of insectoid aliens known as "Space Monsters." These aliens seem dedicated to the eradication of mankind as they near closer and closer to discovering Earth. In response, humanity develops giant fighting robots piloted by hand-picked youth from around the world.

Shortly after the discovery of the aliens, Noriko Takaya, the daughter of a famous deceased space captain, enters a training school despite her questionable talents as a pilot. There, she meets her polar opposite, the beautiful and talented Kazumi Amano, and is unexpectedly made to work together with her as they attempt to overcome the trauma of war as well as their own emotions.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Edit

Background

Winner of the 1990 Seiun Award for Best Dramatic Presentation.

Edit

Related Anime

Adaptation:	Comic Gunbuster, Top wo Nerae! Next Generation: Hakkutsu Senkan-hen, Top wo Nerae!
Sequel:	Top wo Nerae 2! Diebuster
Alternative version:	Top wo Nerae! & Top wo Nerae 2! Gattai Movie!!
Summary:	Top wo Nerae! Kagaku Kouza, Kaette Kita Top wo Nerae! Kagaku Kouza
Side story:	Top wo Nerae! Gunbuster Specials

More characters

Characters & Voice Actors

Takaya, Noriko

Main

Hidaka, Noriko
Japanese

Oota, Kouichirou

Main

Wakamoto, Norio
Japanese

Amano, Kazumi

Main

Sakuma, Rei
Japanese

Freud, Jung

Supporting

Kawamura, Maria
Japanese

Higuchi, Kimiko

Supporting

Fuchizaki, Yuriko
Japanese

Toren, Smith

Supporting

Yao, Kazuki
Japanese

Tatsumi, Tashiro

Supporting

Ooki, Tamio
Japanese

Announcer Woman

Supporting

Kishiro, Sakurako
Japanese

Engineer

Supporting

Oka, Kazuo
Japanese

Officer

Supporting

Nishimura, Tomomichi
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Watanabe, Shigeru

Producer

Sasaki, Shirou

Producer

Anno, Hideaki

Director, Storyboard, Key Animation, Screenplay

Masuo, Shouichi

Episode Director, Key Animation

Edit

Opening Theme

"Active Heart" by Noriko Sakai (eps 1-3)

Edit

Ending Theme

	1: "Try Again" by Noriko Sakai (eps 1-3)
	2: "Active Heart" by Noriko Sakai (eps 4)
	3: "Toki no Kawa wo Koete..." by Kohei Tanaka (eps 6)

Reviews

Sep 25, 2023

Halalex

Recommended

Joining the surprisingly short list of shows that would’ve benefitted a lot from being longer, ‘Top wo Werae GunBuster’ still manages to do so much in its mere 6 episodes that in my experience most shows fail to accomplish at all.

Granted, this might be one of my most biased takes, because most of my enjoyment of this show comes from how overwhelmingly 80s it is. And that’s not to say that it’d be a bad show otherwise, just that a lot of the charm found here is a direct effect of the period in which it was made. It’s almost like a time capsule ...

Open

Gift

May 8, 2020

Itkovian

Mixed Feelings

Gunbuster is a strange mixture of parodically cliched, half-assed storytelling and subversive, dramatically-powerful moments.

Some of this is obviously intentional, mainly the first two episodes, which are aping sports-anime tropes from Aim for the Ace! such as the klutzy-but-hardworking underdog protagonist, the idolised perfect older-sister figure, and the jealous rival, as well as the taciturn coach with unshakable belief. (Note that the intentional parody doesn't make these parts any less boring or annoying.)

However, other instances of this contrast are difficult to understand. For example, despite its bizarrely detailed depiction of "hard" sci-fi concepts like time dilation, the anime barely makes any real effort at fleshing ... out its setting and premise - the central conflict in the story is between humanity and mysterious "space monsters" about whom virtually nothing is ever learned, and whose enmity to humanity is never adequately explained.

Despite the commonplace nature of mechas as a weapon, scenes of training or military maneuvers rarely evidence any attempt by the writers to actually think about the implications of using them - Noriko, for example, seems to train more by just running around or lifting weights than by actually piloting her mech. The incongruous sight of mechs doing push-ups or running around on the ground is commonplace, despite how useless it would be to practice these things for a space battle. Although the entirety of Earth is presumably allied in fighting the space monsters, we rarely see any kind of international coalition of forces that would indicate the scale of such an effort - the sole "foreign" presence is a completely useless fanservice character who's hilariously named "Jung Freud".

Given that the series is only six episodes, it can be excused for not depicting a drawn-out military conflict with twists and turns, although it's quite repetitive to have the two major climaxes of the series both revolve around the strategy of "go into the middle of the enemy forces with a big bomb, run away, and detonate it". But the makers could have scrapped many of the pathetic fanservice bathing scenes in favour of trying to flesh out the world and the details of the situation instead, and they don't do that.

At this point it's worth mentioning what's actually good about it. It has excellent art - with the exception of a 6-7 minute stretch in the last episode where the presumably cash-strapped Gainax staff tried to be arty by panning over still frames instead of animating them, the animation is generally fluid and crisp, and the visual impact of the anime is always engrossing.

There are several genuinely engrossing battle sequences, the first of which is quite subversive in that instead of showing Noriko effortlessly carving through the enemy as another anime might, it shows her freezing up and unable to do anything due to the shock and fear of being in a battle for the first time.

For some reason, despite being totally uninterested in any of the other sci-fi elements of its premise, Gunbuster is very interested in the idea of time dilation resulting from lightspeed/near-lightspeed travel. It puts this concept to use in several very strong scenes, where the pathos comes from people knowing that they're going out into space on a journey and will come back with everyone they know having grown old or died, or from Noriko coming back after what - for her - was six months, to find that ten years passed on Earth, and everything has moved on from her. This part of Gunbuster is probably its greatest strength.

If every other element of Gunbuster was written with the attention and interest that's given to the scenes involving time dilation, then it would probably be perfect and an undeniable classic. As it stands, the anime oscillates wildly between sloppy, lazy melodrama and genuinely interesting, emotionally affecting sci-fi. Which averages out to around a 6.

Open

Gift

Feb 28, 2023

Ciaran_Zagami

Not Recommended

I cannot think of a single nice thing to say about Gunbuster.

The action scenes are flat, boring and predictable. Gunbuster does some flashy thing, several billion enemies die. There's no weight or risk. The characters are dull. All the protagonist does is cry, promise to stop crying, then cry some more because having actual character development is hard. I could maybe say something nice about the animation, but what's the point in blowing your budget on giant killer mechas if their just going to do the same stuff as a generic shonen? Just scream, fling some laser beams from its fingers and yell attack ...

Open

Gift

More stacks

Interest Stacks

Enka Songs in Anime

by ooReiko

50 Entries · 7 Restacks

Shounen and Seinen with Female (or n/b) Lead

by laraes

50 Entries · 10 Restacks

Fast paced

by eblf2013

38 Entries · 14 Restacks

More recommendations

Recommendations

View All

More news

Recent News

North American Anime & Manga Releases for May

Here are the North American anime, manga, and light novel releases for May. Week 1: May 2 - 8 Anime Releases Fate/stay night Complete Season Blu-ray [2023 Re-release...read more

May 5, 5:32 PM by Aiimee | Discuss (2 comments)

North American Anime & Manga Releases for September

Here are the North American anime, manga, and light novel releases for September. Week 1: September 6 - 12 Anime Releases Boruto: Naruto Next Generations Set 13 Blu-...read more

Sep 6, 2022 11:53 AM by Aiimee | Discuss (1 comment)

More discussions

Recent Forum Discussion

Poll: Top wo Nerae! Episode 6 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 ) MK - Aug 10, 2008	187 replies	by TheStarscream759 »» Sep 28, 4:24 PM
Poll: Top wo Nerae! Episode 5 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Ston3_FreeN7 - Aug 19, 2009	75 replies	by TheStarscream759 »» Sep 28, 7:49 AM
Poll: Top wo Nerae! Episode 4 Discussion ( 1 2 ) naikou - Sep 29, 2008	66 replies	by TheStarscream759 »» Sep 27, 12:47 PM
Poll: Top wo Nerae! Episode 3 Discussion ( 1 2 ) naikou - Sep 29, 2008	66 replies	by TheStarscream759 »» Sep 27, 6:29 AM
Poll: Top wo Nerae! Episode 2 Discussion ( 1 2 ) naikou - Sep 29, 2008	59 replies	by TheStarscream759 »» Sep 26, 12:37 PM

Recent Featured Articles

Good Vibrations: The Undervalued Artistry of an Anime’s Soundscape

Sometimes we get so caught up in the visual spectacle of anime that we completely forget about the equally important sounds that come alongside it.

by MAL_Articles

67,090 views

Spoiler

Blast From The Past: New Megazone 23 Anime To Be Crowdfunded Soon

Mecha anime shows are awesome but it's a shame that so few are released nowadays. Fortunately, AIC is bringing back one of their classics for older and newer fans. Is a reboot of Megazone 23 exciting enough to secure a successful crowdfunding campaign?

by MisterD98

16,170 views

Top wo Nerae! Gunbuster

Alternative Titles

Information

Statistics

Available At

Resources

Synopsis

Background

Visit MALxJapan
MALxJapan -More than just anime-

Related Anime

Characters & Voice Actors

Takaya, Noriko

Oota, Kouichirou

Amano, Kazumi

Freud, Jung

Higuchi, Kimiko

Toren, Smith

Tatsumi, Tashiro

Announcer Woman

Engineer

Officer

Staff

Opening Theme

Ending Theme

Reviews

Interest Stacks

Recommendations

Recent News

Recent Forum Discussion

Recent Featured Articles

MoreTop Anime

MoreTop Airing Anime

MoreMost Popular Characters

Top wo Nerae! Gunbuster

Alternative Titles

Information

Statistics

Available At

Resources

Synopsis

Background

Visit MALxJapan MALxJapan -More than just anime-

Related Anime

Characters & Voice Actors

Staff

Opening Theme

Ending Theme

Reviews

Interest Stacks

Recommendations

Recent News

Recent Forum Discussion

Recent Featured Articles

MoreTop Anime

MoreTop Airing Anime

MoreMost Popular Characters

Visit MALxJapan
MALxJapan -More than just anime-