Back to Quiddity131's Profile Quiddity131's Profile

RahXephon originally aired on TV in 2002 and was one of the earliest anime produced by BONES, a studio that was formed when certain staff members from Sunrise, the industry’s foremost producers of mecha anime, broke off to form their own studio. It was the directorial debut of Yutaka Izubuchi, a veteran mecha and character designer who got his start back in the 1970s.

RahXephon’s plot starts in rather complicated fashion. We are introduced to Ayato Kamina, a 17 year old high school student who is an aspiring artist. Ayato and the general populace believe Tokyo to be the only city remaining on the Earth after ... a mysterious force known as the Mu invaded in 2012. When an enemy force attacks Tokyo, Ayato’s world is suddenly thrown upside down. After departing a crashed subway car, Ayato is pursued by government agents and rescued by a mysterious woman, Haruka Shitow, who requests he come with her. Ayato instead escapes from her as well and encountering fellow student Reika Mishima they soon finds themselves in an underground station before a giant egg. The egg hatches, exposing the titular mecha, RahXephon.

In short order things get even stranger for Ayato. He finds himself able to pilot the RahXephon and defeats a giant clay mecha known as a Dolem after it seemingly kills Mishima. The RahXephon transports outside of Tokyo, which is surrounded by a barrier called Tokyo Jupiter. Haruka, who had accompanied Ayato outside reveals the truth to him, that the rest of the world remains, and that time passes far slower inside the barrier. Outside, 12 years have gone by. The Mu control Tokyo, and their ranks include his own mother, who is revealed to bleed blue blood before the RahXephon escapes. A lot to digest in just the first few episodes, but things shift to a more traditional narrative as Ayato joins up with the anti-Mu organization known as TERRA and fights against Dolem attacks while getting used to his new life.

RahXephon has a healthy mix of character development and mystery, while one will find that most of the mecha battles are curb stomps where the RahXephon wins pretty easily. The show often comes off as if the mecha fights were included because that’s the genre it’s in, but the producers wanted to get through them as quickly as possible. This is especially apparent early in the show before things settle into more serialized storytelling around halfway through. It may not be the best show for mecha junkies, but is incredibly satisfying from a plot perspective throughout and contains a ton of interesting, and sympathetic characters. The show can certainly be complex at times; there are mysteries that go the entire course of the series before being solved, cryptic characters and the show has a healthy mix of technobabble, or should I say Mulian babble. By the time you are through with this show you will have heard terms such as “Ollin”, “Ixtli” or “Yolteotl” more times than you can count. The show also has a really fulfilling love story, one of my personal favorites in anime, albeit one that is rather non-traditional for reasons I won’t get into to avoid spoilers. It is a quite an emotional experience; an episode around two thirds of the way through is widely acclaimed on that front by anyone who has seen the show and I find the show’s conclusion just as good.

RahXephon has often been described as an Evanglion ripoff and I can’t stress enough to ignore such claims and watch the show without considering the shadow of Eva. Those who claim the show to be a ripoff are quite ignorant of their mecha anime history. While both shows are of the same genre and share some surface similarities as a result, RahXephon in fact draws its primary inspiration from the 1970s anime Brave Raideen and the Robert Young short story Dandelion Girl. Much of the show’s terms and concepts also draw upon James Churchward’s fictional continent/civilization of Mu. RahXephon I actually consider to be quite superior to Eva, it lacks the numerous production issues that plagued that show, paces itself far better, has far more likable and sympathetic characters and sticks to a proper landing with its ending.

Aesthetically, RahXephon’s animation is fairly strong, with only one episode that I can think of being of noticeable less quality than the others. I am not the biggest fan of the character style, although they are generally well designed and unique in appearance. While the mecha battles tend to be rather short, the mecha designs are quite strong, with numerous examples of bizarre enemies for Ayato to fight. Musically the show is quite the masterpiece. Composer Ichiko Hashimoto does a tremendous job mixing a wide variety of genres including jazz pieces, piano, even rock songs. She also has many musical themes inspired by the Polovtsian Dances from the opera Prince Igor. Hashimoto sings the song’s ending theme, Yume no Tamago, a wonderful piece of music and one of my all-time favorite anime ending themes/sequences. She also provides the voice for Ayato’s mother, Maya, in one of the most haunting voices I’ve heard in an anime. I’ve never run across her again in any other anime I’ve seen, which is quite unfortunate. The show’s opening theme, Hemisphere is also quite strong, composed by the well-known Yoko Kanno and sung by Maaya Sakamoto, who voices Mishima. The one downside is that despite having 3 separate CDs released for it, there are still many songs, including some of the best ones that are completely left off the soundtrack.

I can’t stress enough how good this show is. It is a strong recommend for any fans of the mecha or sci-fi genre.

As one who has seen nearly everything that director Yoshiyuki Tomino has made, I am sad to say that Brain Powerd is far and away his worst TV series (but not his worst anime period; that distinction goes to Garzey’s Wing). The show was Tomino’s first TV anime after a four year break and at 26 episodes is his shortest series in over 20 years. Which can only be looked at as a good thing, as I can only imagine how hard this would be to stomach at 50 episodes.

In Brain Powerd, mankind has discovered a giant structure known as Orphan, deep underneath the ocean. ... Numerous scientists and intellectuals have foretold that Orphan is going to rise out of the ocean and head off to space, but in doing so will absorb the energy of the Earth, killing all those not aboard it. Orphan has also created or “given birth” to sentient mecha enemies called either Brain Powerds or Grand Chers (depending on who they are aligned with). Chief among those who support Orphan are the Isami family. Their son, Yuu, who is also a Grand Cher pilot decides to leave his family, joining the organization Novis Noah, who is responsible for fighting Orphan and preventing it from destroying the world.

The best way to describe Brain Powerd and its plot is a confusing mess. In the very first episode we have a year time skip, and one may have to watch it multiple times to understand what is going on. Complicated and nonsensical terms are thrown out constantly. Character motivations often seem contradictory or just not realistic. We often have characters going on lengthy rants or switching sides for reasons hard to determine. Sometimes you will be watching an episode and it will feel like you skipped or missed an episode by mistake because of how oddly handled the transitioning is. This ultimately leads to a show where a whole bunch of characters say a lot of stuff, do a lot of things, but at the end one wonders what the point was.

Thematically, Brain Powerd seems focused on the concept of demographic collapse. Problematic parent – children relationships are quite a focus, moreso than any of Tomino’s other works. In particular Tomino goes hard after working mothers. Yuu’s mother is shown as largely ignoring him and his sister Iiko, leaving them in the care of her mother while she spends her time at Orphan until they became old enough to become test subjects. Yuu eventually responds to this by abandoning his parents while his sister sticks around with Orphan but changes her name due to her hatred of them. Novis Noah captain Anoa McCormick is shown as having abandoned her son, causing him to become an Orphan pilot and go on a rampage later in the series. Brain Powerd also focuses on this in a rather unique way by portraying the show’s mechs as if they were children themselves, and their pilots were their parents. Tomino is clearly trying to deliver a message here, but how effective he does so is highly questionable and I also got to ask why a mecha anime is the place to go with such a thing.

The show is rather notorious for being called an Evangelion clone, and if there is one thing I can say in the show’s defense, it is not. People who call the show an Evangelion clone are clearly quite ignorant of Tomino’s history, or appear to have an axe to grind with him as he was critical of Evangelion when it came out and around the time Brain Powerd was being produced. Brain Powerd in fact draws heavily upon tropes from old Tomino shows, things that Evangelion itself drew inspiration from. People who have a history with Tomino will see so many familiar things here, although usually handled quite poorly in comparison to how they have been used before. Don’t avoid this show due to false and ignorant claims that it took things from Evangelion. Avoid it because it sucks!

Design-wise, Brain Powered is a mixed bag. The character designs are rather iffy to me, or at the very least the way the characters are animated are rarely impressive. The mecha designs which are at least halfway interesting come from Mamoru Nagano, who has returned to work with Tomino for the first time since 1985’s Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam. This would be the first show that famed musical composer Yoko Kanno would work with Tomino (also teaming up later to do Turn A Gundam). Kanno’s music score helps prop up the show and provide some mysticism it wouldn’t have otherwise. At the same time, her work is far superior in practically every other show she has done.

If there’s one more thing I need to touch upon with respect to Brain Powerd it is the rather shoddy production quality. The usage of title cards and eye catches is done in rather inconsistent fashion and they even screw up on one of the episode previews, showing it for the wrong episode. The English language dub is quite the mess, despite being done by a studio whose work I often enjoy (Ocean). The show comes off as if a small group of actors was used for the entire show, with several characters sharing the same voice actors. Two of the show’s key female characters, Hime and Quincy get recast halfway through the show for indeterminate reasons, and at least in Quincy’s case, not for the better. One episode for some unexplained reason also switches out the voices of several of the side characters, as if half the voice cast took the day off or something. I suppose that the dub felt it had to match the total mess that the show’s plot is.

In any case, this show is quite the disaster. I suppose one may want to see it if they are a Tomino fanatic, but beyond that this show is worth skipping.

Space Warrior Baldios is an anime TV series that originally aired from 1980 to 1981. At this time, the super robot genre from the 1970s was still raging on, and at first glance, Baldios looks to be yet another one of those shows. Three separate fighter crafts combine to form the titular mecha, which was quite the standard at the time. The well-known Mobile Suit Gundam, which premiered a year before hadn’t yet had have enough of a ripple effect on the industry to firmly establish the “real robot” genre. Despite this, Baldios does a fairly good job at distinguishing itself for the time.

Baldios begins ... on the planet S-1. Hopelessly polluted, the leaders of S-1 have two choices, either go along with military leader Gattler, who seeks to invade and take over another, less polluted planet, or the scientific community, led by Dr. Reigan, who are working on a device that they hope can help repair the environment. Gattler stages a military coup where S-1’s emperor is killed and he imposes himself as leader (or “fuhrer” as stated in the official US subtitles). Dr. Reigan is soon killed as well and his son, Marin is forced to flee in the craft Pulseburn. Gattler leads S-1’s populace and military forces, known as Aldebaran to space and Marin’s craft warps along with them to Earth.

Gattler puts top underling, Aphrodia, in charge of Aldebaran’s forces as it seeks to take over Earth. Aphrodia has a personal grudge with Marin, who killed her brother while seeking escape. Marin makes his way down to Earth and becomes a key part of the Blue Fixer organization, the main force fighting off Aldebaran. Although initially doubted as an alien invader, Marin becomes a key part of Blue Fixer, who soon create the Baldios robot as their main fighting force.

With the main narrative established, Baldios settles into its groove. Each episode tends to feature Aphrodia and the Aldebaran forces launching a new attempt to defeat Blue Fixer and take over Earth. And while the show is made up of mostly stand-alone episodes (with the occasional two—parter), it does a fairly good job at providing us with entertaining and non-repetitive storylines. In fact the mecha action of the show seems to take a back seat and is not a major part of each episode (although they do find a way to fit in the Baldios combining sequence in pretty much every episode). The character development of the show is fairly strong. Along with Marin, there’s approximately a half dozen central characters in the Blue Fixer organization and each gets some room for development and growth with their own focused episodes. Things rarely feel stale or repetitive. We also have several episodes that eschew the formula and focus largely on the Aldebaran side of things. While Gattler is pure evil, Aldebaran has several good people with in it as well and we meet several sympathetic characters in its ranks. Aphrodia gets a fair amount of development and it is interesting to see her views on Marin soften as the series goes on.

Technically, the series is never going to really impress. The character animation is rather shoddy, the music is repetitive and the mecha design is nothing special. Technically, other shows of the same era like Gundam and Ideon outshine it here. Yet the story and characters more than make up for it.

Things move to a head as we near the end of the show. The attacks by Aldebaran get more and more fierce, to a level where Gattler doesn’t care how much he environmentally damages the planet he is hoping to move his followers to. The show ends very abruptly (in the middle of a 2-parter in fact), and quite grimly. From what I have read, the show was cancelled, originally planning on 39 episodes, but only 31 got to air. This clearly shows. The recent US bluray release features 3 more episodes that were produced, one which acts as the penultimate episode and the latter 2 which take place after the aired finale and continue things. Although they don’t fully conclude the storyline they do feature a major plot twist which while shocking is also quite fitting. In order to see the complete ending, one will have to resort to the movie, which as of this writing I have yet to see.

Anyway, for ones who like mecha/sci-fi shows, and anime from the late 70’s and early 80’s, this show is worth the experience and comes highly recommended.

Kiraboshi!

An original mecha series from Bones, the same studio that brought us RahXephon and Eureka Seven, Star Driver is quite a bit different from your typical mecha fare. On the island of Southern Cross there is a mysterious masked organization known as Glittering Crux. Their mission is to discover the island's four seal maidens and shatter their seals. Each time they do so, they gain more power over the mysterious stone figures that lay in the mine that they use for their headquarters. With each seal that is broken the more power these “Cybodies” have, until the final seal is broken, and they will be ... able to be unleashed upon the world.

Unfortunately for Glittering Crux, the island has a newcomer, teenage boy Takuto Tsunashi. Takuto posses a Cybody of his own, the Tauburn. Each time Glittering Crux tries to unleash one of its Cybodies, which become usable in the mysterious dimension known as Zero-Time, Takuto is able transform into the "Galactic Pretty Boy" and wield the Tauburn, being perhaps the world's only way to stop Glittering Crux from accomplishing their plans. At the same time Takuto must maneuver a love triangle involving his friend Sugata Shindou and his fiance, Wako Agemaki, who is one of the island's maidens.

Star Driver is a fairly interesting take at first on the mecha genre. It is written by Yoko Enokido, the same person who wrote the show Revolutionary Girl Utena. That show's influence on the style of this show is quite apparent. The show is neither your traditional super robot show nor the gritty real robot type of show that Gundam has made popular. Rather it is something completely different. Similar to a show like Code Geass, high school drama is a big part of the show; in fact to a level where you sometimes think the mecha battles are complete after thoughts. The mecha themselves are quite pretty (arguably the highlight of the show) and the storyline is structured that Takuto is only able to fight one Cybody at once, and it is quite complicated for them to be repaired, What this means is that we typically have a new mecha battle practically every episode. Both the design and the animation are fabulous, and the music just adds to it. If I was viewing this show purely on its visuals and styles, it would get a very high mark.

When your main character proclaims himself a "Galactic Pretty Boy" you learn that you can't take things too seriously, and that's really the way to approach this show. It is a fun viewing, but usually not very thought provoking. Several aspects of the plot are quite laughable, most notably that nearly every single member of Takuto's school is a member of Glittering Crux but they often don't realize each other are members when it should be quite obvious. Other rather foolish aspects of the storyline include the perverted school nurse and one of Takuto's classmates being married to a wealthy senior citizen who lives thousands of miles away and doesn't speak the same language as her. The love triangle between Takuto, Sugata and Wako is also quite a focus although we do eventually add to it other dynamics from several angles to liven things up.

Where the show falters is that it becomes very formulaic at times. You generally know exactly how each episode is going to go; namely 12-15 minutes of character development, often focusing on a supporting character, a singing sequence (much like Utena) as Zero-Time appears and Takuto gets in the Tauburn (along with his pretty boy costume) and Takuto quickly defeating his opponent. Rince and repeat. The best episodes are those that completely eschew this formula. The show also has an overabundance of characters. Most notably, a pair of characters are introduced approximately 2/3 into the show, get a lot of focus, and end up being completely useless to the overall storyline. Trimming them as well as several others would have helped, especially as the show rushes its way through its conclusion.

If you can get over those faults though, there is a lot to like about this show and it provides a high level of entertainment and enjoyment.

Boogiepop Phantom is up there for me as an enthralling and exceptional anime experience. It has one of the most unique narrative structures and styles I’ve seen in an anime and is a worthy viewing for that reason alone. Fans of horror are strongly recommended to check this show out, as its one of the best in the genre.

Given its narrative structure, providing a plot summary doesn’t do much good, it is probably better to describe the setting the show takes place in. One night in an unnamed city, a pillar of light appears. Approximately a month has passed, and there is strange goings on. ... Some high school students are disappearing. There are rumors of the mysterious angel of death, “Boogiepop” being responsible for them. In the same city a mysterious series of murders had occurred five years ago that are also connected.

Rather than approach things in a traditional way, Boogiepop Phantom’s style is to focus each episode on one of the high school students living in the city. For example you have Moto Tonomura, an introverted girl with a crush on a boy, Saotome, who disappeared. There’s also Jounichi Hisashi. His dream of being an athlete ruined by a bone tumor, Jounichi starts seeing large bugs appear on people, which he has a strong desire to eat. Misuzu Arito, whose friend was murdered five years ago tries to spread the love of “Panuru” to everyone. While providing us interesting stories for various characters, each episode provides further bread crumbs of the mysterious goings on in the city

The narrative structure is really interesting in several ways. For one thing, many characters receive a brief appearance in one episode, and then a further fleshed out storyline in a later one. For example, the first episode focuses on Moto, but she has a brief scene with Jounichi, who is the focus of the second episode. Upon seeing the second episode his strange behavior in the first makes a lot more sense. This structure results in the story being non-chronological in nature. When you combine this with the numerous instances in which the show flashes back to the events of five years ago, it makes the show like a puzzle, with each episode providing further pieces to put together the whole and more and more of the storyline becomes clear.

This makes the show a really interesting experience in my opinion. It is a show with a lot of depth, and one that really rewards rewatchings. If anything, the second or third viewing experience, once you have a better idea of what is going on, is more fun than the first. Which I suppose is also a criticism one can have for the show. If you’re the type who prefers to only watch things once and then immediately move on to something else, this show may not be the thing for you. But if you’re one who enjoys going back to old favorites, this is a show that will continue to reward you with each subsequent viewing.

In addition to the show’s narrative structure, the style is pulled off really well as well. Each episode is shown in very muted colors, which combined with the mysteriousness of the setting, the character design and some really strong sound/musical choices gives this show a really mysterious and scary atmosphere. The level of mystery and fright that this show provides is really up there.

There are some places in which the show isn’t doing itself many favors, in particular the fact that so many characters look alike or are meant to be facsimiles of each other, as well as that decent portions of the plot are not told in the show but rather warrant additional research into the light novel series that inspired the show in the first place. For example, there is not just Boogiepop, but a separate character known as Boogiepop Phantom who wears the same outfit. It is quite easy to confuse the two characters unless you know to look for certain differences in their facial features. There’s one scene where Boogiepop Phantom appears in a school girl outfit rather than her usual attire, causing most viewers to confuse her with another character, Nagi Kirima, the closest the show has to a heroine. Boogiepop Phantom is also known as the Manticore, but the character of Saotome is also referred to by that name. Boogiepop Phantom takes on the form of a girl named Minako, yet there’s another major character with the name of Manaka. And so on. One is apt to lose their mind with how convoluted everything gets when some fairly easy to make choices could have cleared up a lot of this confusion.

Anyway, that aside, there is no reason to not see this show. I come back to watch this show at least every few years and there is always something new and interesting there for me to discover.

Galaxy Express 999 was one of the very first anime franchises I got into and remains one of my favorites today. People looking to get into the franchise have several options, including the original manga (which unfortunately has not been released in English), the movies and the TV series. All three are worth looking into.

The basic premise of the show is that it is far in the future and one of the most popular ways to travel throughout space is through the Galaxy Railways corporation’s space trains. Most famous of these is the 999, which is designed as a train from the 20th century. The ... 999 travels throughout the universe, landing on many planets for as long as a local day lasts. Unfortunately tickets are both incredibly expensive as well as very desirable. The other big part of the show’s premise is that people have been able to live forever by acquiring mechanical bodies. Unfortunately only those who are rich can afford them, resulting in 2 classes, the elite who get to purchase mechanical bodies and live forever, and the poor, who suffer and hope their entire lives to earn enough to obtain one. A big lure for the 999 is that its last stop is a planet where one can get a mechanical body for free!

This is where the show’s main character, Tetsuro Hoshino comes in. A poor boy wandering through the snow with his mother, it is his goal in life to obtain a mechanical body for both of them. Unfortunately his mother is soon killed by a group of machine men and Tetsuro nearly dies himself. However he is rescued by a mysterious blonde woman named Maetel. Maetel gives Tetsuro a pass to the 999 as long as he agrees to travel with her. Thus begins a long quest as Tetsuro and Maetel travel across numerous planets and experience various adventures with the end goal of Tetsuro obtaining a mechanical body. A key theme throughout much of the show is whether it is worth obtaining a mechanical body or whether it is better to remain human.

The show has a really interesting and unique premise and one that consistently keeps you entertained. The show’s format permits for a lot of different types of storylines, and Leiji Matsumoto has a lot of great ideas that we see throughout the series. Tetsuro and Maetel are two extremely likable characters and it is a blast to go on this journey with them. The mystery behind Maetel is another important part of the storyline, and one that will run throughout the entire series. Going through my most recent re-watch of this show it was also good to see how willing they were to provide at times melancholy and depressing storylines which you wouldn’t necessarily expect from a show in this era. While we are not likely to see either of our two heroes be in a jam they can’t get out of, there are many sympathetic characters they run into throughout the show, many of which do not have happy endings.

I think many could get a bit scared by the show’s length. 113 episodes is very daunting. Especially when one can simply watch the movie version and basically get the entire storyline in less than 2 and a half hours. I think one can view the show’s length as both a good and a bad thing. One good thing about the show is that most of it is made up of stand-alone storylines (presented in batches of either 1 or 2 part episodes). There’s maybe 10-15 or so critical episodes, and technically one could leave the viewing experience to just those if they really wanted to. Also with rare exception one can usually watch most episodes in any order they want. So one could watch even say, 40 to 50 episodes to see the best the show has to offer while skipping out on some of the weaker storylines. My recommended viewing would be to at a minimum watch episodes 1, 3-5, 7-8, 22, 42, 79-81 and 111-113. These episodes in aggregate will provide you with the main storyline of the series (including each storyline that is covered in the movie), as well as cameos from famous Matsumoto characters Captain Harlock and Emeraldas, and some background on the 999’s Conductor, a storyline we unfortunately don’t get in the movie version. My choices for the remaining strongest individual episodes include 15, 26, 65 and 68, although I could name another good 20-30 more episodes at least that are of high quality.

Being at this length, the show does possess some overused storylines. In particular, Tetsuro frequently has his pass stolen forcing him to find some way to get it back. This has got to be the central plot of at least 15-20 or so episodes. There are also numerous scenes where Tetsuro is shocked to find an evil person has a mechanical body. It is interesting the first few times, but the shock has got to wear off once it’s happened double digit times. There is the occasional deus ex machina, especially with Maetel. Although generally the characters are likable enough where you don’t mind it as much.

This is a show from the late 1970’s/early 1980’s and another thing one will have to get used to in order to like the show is the older animation style. I personally love anime from this era, so I’ve never minded it, but I do recognize that it will turn some people off. The music also gets stale after a while and they don’t mix it up enough considering the show’s length.

The last subject I’ll touch upon is whether you should see this show if you have already seen the movie. No questions asked, the movie will spoil you on the biggest secrets in the show’s storyline. The movie has better animation, better music and overall a more thrilling and exciting ending. The individual episodes in the TV series that the movie adapted can’t really compare to their movie version. At the same time, there are lots of interesting stand-alone storylines not in the movie that is worth seeing here.

Is this show worth seeing? Definitely. I think it’s likely that only the most hardcore fans will go through and watch all 113 episodes, but there is plenty to enjoy here even if you aren’t really familiar with this franchise. It’s also a nice gateway to other Matsumoto works such as Captain Harlock. I have a hard time ever seeing this show not among my favorites.

The Ideon: Be Invoked is the thrilling conclusion to the Space Runaway Ideon franchise. In my eyes this is one of the best anime movies of all time and still is today, almost 35 years after its release.

A little bit of background is necessary coming into this movie. Space Runaway Ideon was a television series that aired from 1980 to 1981. Originally intended to last a full year, the show got cancelled after 39 episodes. The show’s director and much of the crew had been involved with the show Mobile Suit Gundam, which had suffered a similar fate, but had been provided with a ... 4 episode extension to finish the series. The show’s staff tried for the same with Ideon, including even storyboarding the final 4 episodes, but were unable to get the extension. As such those final 4 episodes were never produced, and the final episode of the series ends right in the middle of the action with a very brief and disappointing end sequence.

Thankfully the show’s staff were provided the opportunity to finish the story with a pair of movies. The first, A Contact, is a compilation movie covering the majority of the series. As a viewer you have the option to either watch that movie before seeing this one, or watching the first 38 episodes of the television series. My recommendation would be to watch the television series. The depth of character development can’t be matched with the brief compilation movie and said movie leaves things out, enough so that you will be confused by certain aspects of this movie. Be Invoked provides us with an edited version of the final episode of the TV series (with the ending sequence removed) and those final 4 episodes of footage that never got created. It provides a conclusion ending to the franchise.

This movie is the highlight of the Ideon in pretty much all respects. It greatly builds upon the characters and storyline from the TV series. Technically the movie truly shines in several respects. The animation of the movie is quite strong, significantly surpassing that of the series (significant portions of the final episode, which appear in this movie were reanimated). The franchise’s character designer/animation director Tomonori Kogawa truly does a great job here and I’ve heard that he personally animated significant parts of this movie on his own. Admittingly, I’m a biased fan of late 70’s and 80’s anime, but I think the animation quality here really stands up, even today. The music of this movie is also breathtaking. They really went full out with it. The epic scenes in the movie are made all the more so by the music supporting them. The music delivers regarding of what the scene calls for, whether it’s thrilling battle music, more somber themes or something else. There have been individuals who have listened to this movie’s music and weren’t even aware it came from an anime such as this, it is so grand in scale and style. The director and animators also don’t flinch from using interesting style choices throughout. For example the movie even features some live action footage, something virtually unheard for the format of this era.

The setting of the movie takes place entirely in space and a significant portion of the running time is the various battles between our heroes, the crew of the Solo Ship and their enemies, the humanoid alien Buff Clan. This is space opera and combat at its finest. Some tremendous battle sequences throughout the movie that don’t ever leave you bored. The sheer scale of things is often impressive, and is greatly helped by the movie format. At the same time, the movie contains enough character and plot scenes to provide a proper conclusion to the story threads and character arcs that took place throughout the series. This includes proper resolution to one of the show’s biggest mysteries in the nature of the Ide, the energy that powers the Ideon.

I’d really only have 2 warnings for people wanting to see this for the first time. First, the movie has a reputation that has a good chance of overshadowing the viewing experience. The vast majority of the people who see this movie likely are into it due to its notoriety and as such will be at least somewhat spoiled. I think the movie lives up to the hype (granted I saw it long before there was any hype over it in the first place), but there is the possibility that one expects so much of it that it can’t hope to live up to their expectations. The movie also has some content that will offend some. This movie is extremely violent and gruesome at times and doesn’t hold back. For example, the movie opens with a character seeing his love interest decapitated by an explosion, her bloody head flying past him. There is a particularly infamous scene where one of the young children gets killed in similarly gruesome fashion. The movie also contains a significant amount of nudity. I would hope that most viewers wouldn’t avoid the movie for these reasons, but they are things to consider before watching it.

Strong animation and music, thrilling space battles and plot twists, resolution and answers to the storyline from the series, I couldn’t recommend this movie further.

The Ideon: A Contact, is the first of two Ideon movies that were released on the same day back in 1982. Densetsu Kyojin Ideon, AKA Space Runaway Ideon was a 1980 television series that got cancelled after 39 episodes. A couple of years later director Yoshiyuki Tomino and crew were able to provide a conclusion to the show in the movie The Ideon: Be Invoked. In order to help people recollect the events of the TV series, this movie was also created.

The movie’s plot is basically the exact same as Ideon the television series; enough so that I’ll simply use the same description from my ... review for that show here. Ideon takes place far in mankind’s future. Mankind has searched throughout the stars, finding many long dead alien civilizations. On the planet Solo, they find the sixth such civilization, which left behind various relics such as the three trucks that make up the Ideon and a giant spaceship, incidentally called the Solo Ship. At the same time, humanoid aliens known as the Buff Clan suddenly appear. Karala Ajiba, daughter of the military commander of the Buff Clan, Doba Ajiba, heads down to the surface of Solo and in their pursuit to find her, a war between the earth settlers and the Buff Clan begins. Our heroes, led by Bes Jordan, and teenagers Cosmo Yuki and Kasha Imhof board the Solo Ship and head throughout the universe, under pursuit of the Buff Clan, who are seeking the power that the Ideon holds.

Tomino and animation director Tomonori Kogawa take advantage of the movie format to provide some enhanced animation. While a large portion of the movie is footage from the TV series, there are also several scenes that are significantly improved with new animation, and we have multiple changed character deaths. The movie’s music is quite strong, and the ending theme is one of my favorite music pieces from the Ideon franchise.

At the same time, the movie suffers from the same thing that almost every compilation movie does in that there simply is no way to provide sufficient development to the plot and characters in a movie versus a full length television series. If anything this movie is much more aggressive with the running time than it should have been. It clocks in at under 90 minutes, but really could have used even 30 extra minutes to help develop things better and retain some additional television series plots. A notable example is the fact that the movie doesn’t fully summarize the first 38 episodes of the show (the 39th episode is featured heavily in the next movie), but only the first 32. So when you start watching The Ideon: Be Invoked there are still several episode’s worth of plot that you are missing. In fact there is a recurring character who died during that timeframe in the series who just completely disappears, their death completely unexplained in the movies. Also, this movie puts in the effort to completely remove all reference to the Ome Foundation, a mysterious faction of the Buff Clan. It is true that many parts of the TV series plotline featuring this group was not in this movie. Yet said faction is referenced heavily in the second movie (its leader is a significant character), which is bound to cause even more confusion.

Is this movie worth watching? If you truly think you don’t have the time to watch the television series and want a primer so you’ll be ready for the second movie, then go ahead and watch it. This was how I got introduced to the Ideon franchise myself, after all. But you will have a far better experience if you get a chance to watch the first 38 episodes of the TV series before jumping into the second movie.

The Ideon franchise is one of my favorite in the mecha genre and is something I’ve been a fan of for a very long time. Originally created as the follow up to director Yoshiyuki Tomino’s most well-known work, Mobile Suit Gundam, Ideon never got the same play that the Gundam franchise eventually got, although it is definitely something worthy of attention in its own right.

Ideon takes place far in mankind’s future. Mankind has searched throughout the stars, finding many long dead alien civilizations. On the planet Solo, they find the sixth such civilization, which left behind various relics such as the three trucks that make ... up the Ideon and a giant spaceship, incidentally called the Solo Ship. At the same time, humanoid aliens known as the Buff Clan suddenly appear. Karala Ajiba, daughter of the military commander of the Buff Clan, Doba Ajiba, heads down to the surface of Solo and in their pursuit to find her, a war between the earth settlers and the Buff Clan begins. Our heroes, led by Bes Jordan, and teenagers Cosmo Yuki and Kasha Imhof board the Solo Ship and head throughout the universe, under pursuit of the Buff Clan, who are seeking the power that the Ideon holds.

The general plot of Ideon is very similar to Mobile Suit Gundam, which had come before it. Our hero’s settlement is destroyed by an attacking force, everyone boards a ship and escapes and is under constant pursuit throughout the series. Also like Gundam before it, the heroes in the show are principally civilians who need to learn how to cope with their circumstances. Although whereas Gundam is a war drama, Ideon has more similarities to their predecessors; it comes off more as a space opera-type show, and there are many giant robot show elements here including the three part main robot of the show, Ideon, and the alien enemy.

At the same time, much like Gundam, Ideon is not the traditional robot show, in many ways. For starters, the show does not flinch in displaying death, often times gruesome ones at that. This isn’t the type of show where everyone gets to return from each mission alive. The humanity – Buff Clan interplay is an interesting one. Both races look identical and may even share a common root, but they get into a giant war with each other over a misunderstanding and their cultural differences are often unique. An early episode presents a great example; the heroes bring out a white flag, hoping for a cease-fire, but this makes the Buff Clan fight even more viciously as a white flag in their culture means fight to the death. This is also a show where there often isn’t that much hope for our heroes. They are under constant pursuit, and even when you expect they would get a warm welcome, they don’t. Having arguably the most powerful force in the universe is not all it is cracked up to be. The show also features an interesting mystery in the power source for the Ideon, the “Ide”. The Buff Clan have their own legend surrounding it, but there is a lot more to it than just that. What’s really behind the Ide is one of the more interesting parts of the show.

Character-wise the show has its mix of both likable and unlikable characters. Cosmo, the main hero is a bit of a jerk, and if anything one may find it better to consider Bes and Karala the main characters as both are extremely likable. Kasha is a blood thirsty and aggressive girl, much like a certain red haired character from Evangelion, and similar to said character isn’t that likable either. Sheryl Formosa, a linguistic scholar (a rather unique profession for mecha anime, ain’t it?) plays another key role. On the Buff Clan side, the show unfortunately isn’t as strong as its predecessor, Gundam, in providing a lot of interesting, sympathetic characters, although there is at least a few of them worth sinking our teeth into, in particular Karala’s former fiancé, Gije Zaral, and her elder sister Harulu.

The show shares several flaws from the era that this type of series were bound to have. The giant robot elements are in heavy force throughout much of the show. The Ideon is made up of three transforming trucks, and most episodes feature them fighting on their own before combining to win the day at the end. The show throws new Buff Clan military officer and heavy mobile mechas at us which go down in defeat, and their frequency just rises higher as the show reaches its climax. For a while pacing can be a concern; the first 10 episodes in particular are quite slow moving. Although the show’s plot does pick up considerably in the second half.

One can’t review this TV series without bringing up the ending. While this show was originally intended to run a full year, it ended up getting cancelled after 39 episodes, featuring an extremely rushed ending. In fact the ending consists of a very brief, 1 or 2 minute scene at the end of the final episode which comes right in the middle of things and ends the show. A big disappointment if this was all we got. But the show did have its real ending eventually made, in the movie The Ideon: Be Invoked, which is a must watch if you want to see how this show really ends.

While it has its flaws, Ideon is a very good mecha anime and I strongly recommend checking it out, especially so you can see its movie ending, which is one of anime’s best. Although that’s a whole other review…

Victory Gundam is just one of the numerous shows in the Gundam franchise, but has the notable distinction of being the last television series to take place in the Universal Century timeline. While this is the same universe that iconic Gundam characters like Amuro and Char lived in, it is so far in the future that there really isn’t a need to be familiar with earlier Gundam shows (although you may get a little more out of it if you have seen previous UC shows).

The show stars Uso Ebbing, a 13-year old boy who lives in Europe and is suddenly brought into the conflict between ... the Zanscare Empire, a powerful military force that originates from the colonies, and the League Militaire, a small resistance force from Earth. As with any other show from this franchise, Uso’s claim to fame is piloting the hero’s powerful mobile suit, the Victory Gundam and helping defend his friends and allies from the Zanscare Empire.

The show is a mixed bag for many. I’ve heard some people who think it’s one of the franchise’s best shows, I’ve heard others who think it’s among the worst. It is definitely one of the show’s most polarizing. The show is known in particular for two things, its absolute brutality and the sheer absurdity of some of the show’s sequences. An often-said rumor on the web is that director Yoshiyuki Tomino was really upset at the time over the sale of Sunrise to Bandai, so he purposely made the show really ridiculous and over the top in an attempt to kill the franchise. I wouldn’t be surprised if said rumor has no facts behind it (as most web rumors), but does the show often come off as one where the director had that mentality? Yes.

A common theme of UC Gundam shows is the effects of war and how rough it can be and this show is constantly pummeling you with that theme. Only a few episodes into the series an enemy soldier finds out that he’s been fighting the 13-year old Uso. He’s so upset that the war has forced little kids like him to fight that he pulls out a grenade and blows himself up. There are a group of characters introduced into the show with the express purpose of being killed one after another, often right in front of Uso. Episode after episode ends with him sobbing over the latest horror that has occurred. To make it even worse, the show frequently has a character die only to work into the storyline something that makes their death pointless. There’s a particular moment in the show when there is a major death which is done in the most brutal fashion imaginable. As if this isn’t enough, they reveal moments later that there was a cease fire declared and if things just happened slightly differently, it never would have happened. The moment in question is arguably the most brutal in the entire Gundam franchise and I’ve known of people that have thrown up their hands and quit the show in response.

From the opposite end, the show has several scenes in it that can only be described as complete absurdity. Two scenes in particular are really famous among the fandom; the first being when an enemy soldier tries to interrogate Uso by getting naked and going into a bathtub with him, and another when a group of women in bathing suits are sent to attack Uso while he’s in his Gundam and are promptly killed by him. Both scenes are completely nonsensical yet somehow made it into the show without ending up on the cutting board floor. There is a lengthy set of episodes where the Zanscare episode are using giant wheel themed ships which are among the strangest designed in the franchise and a style we never really get again in Gundam. These are just a few examples of the absurdities that this show throws towards us.

The show has its share of both strong and extremely annoying characters. Uso is a likable protagonist and you really feel for all the things he goes through. Uso’s friend Katejina undergoes a transformation into one of the most heinous villains of the franchise and her character is one of the highlights of the show. On the other hand another friend of his, Shakti, often makes mind boggling decisions and you often get very frustrated with the character but know that she is so critical to the plot that she will continuously be there and there’s no avoiding her.

Story-wise, the show is pretty strong but takes a while to get going. The first 10 or so episodes should have been greatly compressed. You also run into a problem in that the first episode should technically be the fourth, but the sponsors forced the show to move around the order to get the titular Gundam in the first episode, making the start of the show very confusing to watch. But once you get beyond this the pace is usually pretty quick. Neither the animation or the design is a big highlight; the show is the first in the Gundam franchise to lack the interesting character designs of either Yoshikazu Yasuhiko or Hiroyuki Kitazume. The often insectoid-type mecha are a bit different than Gundam shows past, but at the same time it is hard to think of many mobile suits that are memorable, whereas I consider there to be many from earlier shows. The show has several strong opening theme songs although they kind of mask just how rough the show really is.

I think the show leaves a big emotional impression on you, and is generally worth a viewing for that reason alone. Other than being probably the darkest and most brutal show of the franchise, there aren’t aspects that I can say that single this show out as one that you have to see above all the others. It is more accessible than other Gundam shows but is likely to not be a good choice for your first Gundam show. It’s a memorable show for me, but I can see that many may not feel the same way.