Now I just finished watching the most amazingly manly thing related to Studio Gainax- and it isn't Tengan Toppa Gurren Lagann. Its the two interrelated OVA specials Gunbuster the OG Gainax robot series and Diebuster its spiritual (and actual) sequel thanks yet again to time dilation in regards to lightspeed travel) Note: I have not seen the anime film Gunbuster vs. Diebuster but I believe that I do not have to- both series ended on a bittersweet note that blew my mind how GAR they were.
Note 2: Thanks to Urbandictionary's first result (as of June 24,2014) GAR is "A term used towards male characters and individuals who are so overwhelmingly manly that your own masculinity is absolutely *buried*, leaving you naught but a whimpering, swooning girl-child before them." Now that sounds sexist- because series do not need to have many- if at all male main characters and it still can be awesome.
Now going into the original Gunbuster I had literally no idea what I was going in for besides the fact that it was the directorial debut of my personal anime director hero Hideaki Anno. (As seen with my constant extolling Neon Genesis Evangelion with Pacific Rim for example- though the anime was my first real foray into actual anime that wasn't Sailor Moon or DBZ) And that there was the first recorded instance of the "Gainax Bounce" or Gainaxing where the animating of certain parts of the female anatomy got particularly bouncy. Which really got the fanservice genre going with bouncy fun for decades to come. I still think this is the best though since it is reasonable size and isn't the complete utter focus of the show.
What I didn't know- The protagonist of Aim For The Top! Gunbuster! (The actual full title of the OVA) seemed to combine the early Gundam series- which I plan on watching next- Macross, and surprisingly sports/highschool anime and Top Gun.
Cause when you have Top Gun with young females and giant freaking robots- and uncensored nudity (which actually surprised me a little since not many anime shows of the current generation get away with that- since ever relegated to Original Video Animations (OVAs- since they go straight to video for the most part and anime big screen movies because of the ratings system- most animes don't touch complete nudity with the actual anatomical upper half of females.
So episode 2's extended naked bathing scene was unexpected in regards to current standards in anime.
And surprisingly I found parallels to both Neon Genesis Evangelion and Gurren Lagann. Here me out on this. The main character, who is a female, is in my eyes- an early version of Neon Genesis Evangelion's Shinji Ikari- her facial structure, general brown haired-ness, and first general inexperience with robot maneuvering is classic Shinji- and there are psychological breakdown moments with Noriko and her partner in piloting Gunbuster- Kazumi. But here's the kicker- the awesome battles that Gunbuster is known for (ironically Gunbuster is known as a ridiculous powerhouse in terms of kill count and yet the eponymous robot doesn't show up until episode 4 of the 6 part series) That's like saying that the Gundams in Gundam don't show up until episode 30 in their series. And yet it makes sense- the dang power of the thing and size of 250m (at the time, one of, of not the largest robot in the Super Robot Genre and ease of kills- shooting a ridiculous amount of lasers and cutting swathes of enemies down. Also it is proto Gurren Lagann since the trainer "Coach" Ohta (voiced by Norio Wakamoto- of such roles as the voice of Cell and Charles vi Britannia- and who's been in the voice acting business so long that he's pretty iconic in Japan for Chuck Norris Levels of general awesomeness- I am not kidding.) constantly goes with statements that seem to reind me of Kamina's speeches in Gurren. Also the later episodes of Gunbuster have such beautiful moments as stopping billions of monsters by shooting a ridiculous number of lasers and having Earth send a ginormous black hole bomb made from the entirety of Jupiter condensed down.
They use a black hole bomb and Gunbuster is created by combining two robots- not original since that had started to catch on in the genre- but yeah- Gurren Lagann type stuff here. And surprisingly most of the anime is nowhere near this amazing since a lot of it sets up the world building aspect.
Alsi there's an early version of Asuka Langley Sorhyu/ Shikinami thanks to those Rebuild of Evangelion films- in the character of Jung Freud- that is her name. And she has the red hair, different nationality (Soviet Russian- even though the series is set in 2015-2050s for the most part- instead of German and her attitude is cocksure and 'genius.'
And unlike Eva, the length of the series (6 episodes instead of 26) the budget is spend overall much better than the later series that is much more well known, The piece de resistance in that regard is the final episode, which outside of the time skip in the last few minutes, is animated in complete black and white and filmed on color film- which makes it possible for the end switch to color. This was actually really jarring to me because while I do love Eva- it's last two episodes are some of my least favorite. And yet Gunbuster was beautifully animated there.
So should you watch it? Depends- if you don't like nudity and 1980's versions of common tropes with the animation style of the late 80's- might not be for you. But I give it the OG seal of approval in regards to Gainax's other works in the genre and give in a 8.8/10- mainly because of themes of time dilation and coping with that fact and giant manly robots piloted by females.
Now on to the sequel- Diebuster- set 12 thousand years after most of the events of the first Gunbuster (the two OVAs do entwine in the last few minutes of this film.) Now update Gainax's crazy into the new millennium and make it right around the time that FLCL came out and before Gurren Lagann and that pile of crazy.
Pretty much its FLCL meets Gurren Lagann- which is not entirely a bad thing- with how the main characters Lar'C (spelling is up for debate) and Nono are our replacements and similar characters from Gunbuster.
So the setting is all FLCL- weird goofy looking monsters, desert like Mars. Shout Outs to FLCL (Vespa, the entire plot about losing powers when you hit puberty) Gurren Lagann gives the giant robots (Nono is actually the Solar System defense system put in a robot body. And she's Diebuster- though that is her large form. And she can create mini black holes, teleport, and pretty much wreck any enemy's day- except this development got the Gunbuster treatment and this fact didn't come out much until episode 4. And she's really goofy.
Actually a whole lot of the plot happens in the later half of the series. I do have to give the special props for colors and overall amazing battle scenes. Except for one thing: the Conspicuous CG that plagues the series (Gunbuster was all animated and I prefer the completely animated style because in a way it doesn't date itself- CG looks bad after a decade or two when looking back in hindsight.
And pretty much Diebuster is Gunbuster for the modern anime viewer- we get thrown into action, sadly there is a short attempted rape scene which came out of nowhere and blindsided me in episode 5- Nono gets almost raped by a now useless member of Topless- the mental power users (There is a reference to the original where the especially awesome moments with robots had the MC rip her shirt and not wear a bra because the robot followed all of their movements. That happens twice (Episode 1 and 6)
And the super huge monster that they fight by throwing Titan at it- didn't work- spamming mini black holes, and trying to ram the Earth into the monster- to name a few ridiculous moments in the show. Said monster uses the scream that Ramiel uses in the Rebuild of Evangelion movies.
Is Diebuster as good as Gunbuster? Yes and no- I love the characters of Lar'C and Nono- but I was never a huge fan of either FLCL or Gurren Lagann- Gurren Lagann's too one upmanship on themselves and FLCL is really confusing without much of a plot that makes sense outside of maybe an abstract thought on adolescence. In Diebuster, I found the perfect medium of crazy modern Gainax and a nice, quiet show in terms of hype level- Diebuster is not well known (none of my friends seem to know it) and Gunbuster is one of the studio's first works as a professional studio. I give Diebuster a 7.2/10- mainly because the CG was a bit dated and a lot of the technology was never explained- and until the last few minutes of the final episode- there was little chance of connection to how this fit into Gunbuster's 12,000 year timeline due to the time dilation. And it felt too much like FLCL for my liking.
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