In all seriousness, when you watch enough anime, you’ll eventually begin to hear a lot of hype about certain titles, whether in the form of new internet memes, demotivational posters or even just word of mouth. I’ve come across a number of such titles, and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann falls into that category. The problem with heavily hyped shows us that you never know if it’s going to live up to all the bragging you’ve heard about it. And I heard a LOT of bragging about this show before I watched it. If you’ve read any of my other reviews, you’ll know that I don’t always enjoy the heavily hyped shows. However, this one deserves the hype it gets…well, mostly.
Breakdown:
Story (7/10)- Tengen Toppa Gurren Laggan (hereafter referred to as TTGL) starts off with humble beginnings, following the story of Shimon, a kindhearted boy who drills for his underground village, and Kamina, as hot-blooded, aspiring young man, who dreams of leaving their underground village to see the world above. The village leader tells them that there is nothing above the surface, and they’d be better served to simply dig their holes in the ground. But one day, an enormous machine crashes through the ceiling of their underground home, and proves that Kamina had been right about the existence of a surface world. The plot moves pretty quickly afterward, and soon had Shimon and Kamina are fighting for their very freedom against forces much larger than themselves.
Sound a little cliché? Well, I can assure you that it’s not. While the theme of fighting for freedom has been used a lot, TTGL puts a spin on the idea that I had never seen before. You’ll hear the phrases “fighting spirit” and “spiral power” popping up a lot in this show, which are basically references to the human will, and how it always struggles to survive against all odds. It’s very well done, and had me more or less hooked from the first episode.
Now, you’ll notice that I only rated the plot a 7 out of 10. What I found with TTGL was that the first half was excellently, and I do mean brilliantly done! The show had me invested in the characters from an early moment, I loved the action, and the theme of “fighting spirit” had me feeling very inspired. After the first half of the show, I found myself thinking “wow, how can this possibly get better”? At this point, I had rated the show at a 9 out of 10, but decided to reserve my final judgments for later.
When the second half of the show opened, something felt…different. It was hard to place my finger on it, but let’s just say that TTGL didn’t pull of a time skip as well as I’ve seen many shows do. It’s hard for me to expound upon why the second half of the show felt so different without spoiling anything, so I’ll have to be vague. Essentially, you’re still seeing all of the same characters, and watching the same show, but everything else seems to have changed. The entire world has become a different place, and it is very different from the TTGL that I grew to love. However, I kept an open mind, and kept watching, figuring that it would eventually be just as good as the first half.
But as the show went on, I never felt that same spark of “magic” that made me love it. It certainly wasn’t bad, but it just wasn’t as good as the first half. The second half of the show often repeats the phrase “absolute despair” and becomes rather dark at times. This just didn’t quite sit with me, as the first half of the show was optimistic and over the top, where the second half was depressing and over the top. Eventually, the show became so “over the top” and happened on such a large scale that my brain could barely wrap itself around what was happening at the end. I’m sorry I can’t be any more specific, but it would spoil basically everything if I was.
I just felt like the show got worse, rather than better in the last few episodes, and ultimately I very much disliked the ending. To me, the ending basically contradicted the entire theme of the show. I felt like the entire show was screaming “You can do anything if you refuse to give up!” But then the ending said “except for this one thing that you can’t do…”. I know that a lot of avid fans will disagree with me, but I really didn’t feel like the ending honored the overall feel and theme of the show.
The plot was still very good, especially early on, but it just seemed to decline toward the end…particularly the very end.
Art (9/10)- I don’t really have a whole lot to say here, other than the art was very good. It was smooth, and drawn in a way that was evocative of the crazy, over the top themes that the show carried. Excellent job, overall.
Sound (9/10)- Very good voice acting, and excellent opening and closing themes. The music toward the end of the show did a good job of conveying the emotions that the characters were feeling, and set a perfect mood. Great sound overall, just not quit deserving of a 10.
Characters (10/10)- Who can resist the over the top, never-say-never, “I can do anything” attitude of a character like Kamina? Kamina did so much to influence TTGL in so many ways, that his importance cannot be overstated. In fact, Kamina’s role in TTGL may influence anime characters of the future—he’s THAT big of a character. Really, any shortcomings that the rest of the cast had are almost eclipsed by how brilliant Kamina was in this show.
Shimon, the protagonist, is a bit passive at first, but is later forced into positions of leadership as the show goes on. He eventually takes up Kamina’s mantle, and does a marvelous job of it. These two really make quite a good combination, and make up the heart and soul of everything that TTGL is about.
Now that’s not to say that every character is as important and moving as Shimon and Kamina (I’m pointing my finger at you, Yoko). Some characters are really just there to fit their specific stereotypes, and others are purely there for fanservice (*cough* Yoko *cough*). And now that I’ve probably enraged every fanboy who reads this, I should make my point. My point is that most of the cast is well done, and has enough personality to fit with characters as big and overpowering as Kamina, however, there are a few exceptions.
I’d say Yoko is one of these exceptions, not because she’s an annoying or unlikeable character, but she’s portrayed as a main character, and she doesn’t really do much to advance the plot at all. She’s certainly not as useless as, say, Sakura from Naruto, but they easily could have replaced her with a character showing less cleavage, and still told the story perfectly fine. In fact, the character could have been male, and not much would have changed. Yeah, she slings a big gun around, and helps Shimon and Kamina out, but aside from that, she was wasn’t all that remarkable of a character. I suppose nobody is above fanservice anymore, but regardless, I’ve made my point.
Enjoyment (7/10)- I absolutely loved the first half of this show, but I just felt a steady decline as the second half progressed. Once again, this is only my opinion. Plenty of people enjoyed the second half, and some even like the ending that I thoroughly despised. Once again, I feel like the hype I heard about this show may have actually detracted from my enjoyment of it. My expectations were so incredibly high, that they would have been very hard to meet. This show did meet them for awhile, but fell rather short by the end.
Overall (8/10)- So is TTGL worth your time? Absolutely! Despite the problems I pointed out, I still very much enjoyed the show. I would only warn you to set your expectations at manageable level, otherwise, you may end up disappointed, as I was. This show does have a lot of redeeming qualities, and I can objectively say that it is very well made, despite my opinions about the plot and ending.
In short: definitely above average, but not the anime god that it’s made out to be.
