Jaianto Robo: The Animation - Chikyuu ga Seishi Suru Hi

Witness now the dawning of our tomorrow. Shining brighter than the daybreak of light is the brilliance of the Shizuma Drive. Our only reliable future of energy, which includes dependability in every home and the Earth's only answer to the waste of atomic and oil energy.

But beware, for our shining future has also cast a dark shadow of revenge - BIG FIRE, an underworld organization, who's only goal is absolute world domination!

Do not panic, for we are protected by the international police organization formed by the Experts of Justice, keeping our world safe from the evils of Big Fire. Amongst their ranks is the bravery of one boy who commands the mightiest robot of all - a young boy called Daisaku Kusama. ..

The set up and intro may sound cheesy, but it's far from it. I am shocked - nay, stunned that it took me this long to get around to watching this series. Everyone should immediately drop whatever they are doing at this moment and watch Giant Robo. It's that cool.

The more observant of the crowd might notice that GR looks a LOT like a series called Johnny Socko and his Flying Robot. Or one might dismiss it out of hand as just another "Giant Mecha fighting" series. Giant Robo is neither. It is very loosely based on that Johhny Socko - but very, very loosely, and it is SO much more than just Big Robots beating the hell out of each other.

The plot revolves around the last sample of the prototype Shizuma drive, Big Fire's efforts to obtain the sample, and the Experts of Justice's attempts to keep it out of their hands. Along the way, villains turn out to be not quite what they appear to be, good guys die, the golden egg that is the Shizuma drive isnt quite the blessing that everyone expected - basically the plot undergoes so many twists and turns, that the view ends up is nowhere near where they started. It's like Babylon 5, but animated - and better.

The animation is a cool retro look, like the animated Batman series. The music is a grand symphonic score, worthy of John Williams, the story - I cant get enough of it. It's a bit confusing when characters get introduced in waves - you cant tell 'em apart sometimes without a score card. But stick it out - this series is WELL worth the trouble.

It's a nearly all ages film - no sex or nudity, plenty of violence - but it's all cartoon-ish, and way over the top (like a Jackie Chan movie). Some swearing, but not excessively so.

Giant Robo should have really sucked. It had a retro-futuristic style (think Astro-Boy), it has some really cliched characters and the story doesn't start out in any exceptional way. Except... as the story progresses, these things start to change. Characters lose their one dimensionality and start to have human motivations. Plot twists drive shake everything the narrative has led you to believe. There are times when it appears the story just can't get any bigger, but it does!

What makes this series great is giant cast of characters (each with unique abilities, some of which are very original), the twisting of convential anime plot lines and that it doesn't rely purely on shock value or huge explosions to keep you interested. Having seen a lot of the MD Geist-style anime (read: very very bad anime in regards to plot or characterisation), it is great to see a series that doesn't insult my intelligence.

There are some negatives to this series - the whiny boy who controls Giant Robo, the voice acting for some of the characters (I saw a dubbed version), there are some really cheesy moments and some anime conventions are still followed religiously (eg the girl (Ginrei sp?) is mostly useless... except when she isn't). A big let-down is the additional episode on the final tape - because there are 7 one-hour episodes, a filler episode called "Barefoot Ginrei" was after the final episode. It doesn't really add anything to the story, and the fact that Ginrei's feet aren't the only things that are bare may have been the reason it was included.

Despite this, Giant Robo deserves any accolades it gets. Go out and see it.

There is a lot here I do like, super Agents, evil geniuses, air ships and giant robot(s).

The characters largely come from the works or Mitsuteru Yokoyama the creater of the original Giant Robo manga but the characters are not from that manga.

Due to licencing they come from between sci-fi, fantasy and wuxia tales & fables. Martial artists, wizards, death proof detectives, swordsmen anything goes here. All the tech is a glorious retro future we where always promised but never got.

About the only bad thing is that it was many years between episodes and ends with the bad guys just starting up.

It all shouldn't work as its just all thrown in there but somehow it does but regrettably it didn't work in Asia which sadly means these 7 episodes are all we get.

It may have escaped other reviewers but ALL the characters of this show are take from other series.

Giant Robo OF COURSE is JAIANTO ROBO, but also BIG FIRE himself is BABIL JUNIOR (residing in the ruins of the Babel Tower with his three guardians...the panther, Rokuros and Poseidon) and even Lord Alberto's psychic daughter...she's Sally the Witch from 'Maho Tsukai Sally' (a 'bewitched'-influenced jap cartoon show of the late 60s). Several of the Magnificen 10 were villains in a early animated show about an antediluvian teen awakening in the present and reactivating a giant mecha from the seabed (I just can't place the name of that series but I have seen it in my youth).

All the references and homages of course work just for the Japanese and for the few (lucky?) countries which were flooded by the barrage of ALL the early Japanese cartoon series (I live in Italy and during the late 70s-early 80s we imported almost ALL of the anime which existed to that day...as a result the regular 30-ish male Italian has a passing knowledge of anime to rival that of a non-Japanese 'otaku'...limited to that peculiar period).

Well that's it, search the web and find all of the in-jokes and special appearances that literally FILL the animated series.

Last hint...director naka-joe's original character appeared of course in a boxing series but you have to take 25-30 years off his current appearance to find out 'where does he come from'.

Giant Robo has to be one of the best Anime series out there.

Giant Robo actually takes you to another time and place, where everything is different and every single person has there own idea of whats going on. It's an awesome commntary about the world that works even better now (2001) because of out energy crisis and our lack of leadership.

I've watched Giant Robo a million times and while I know who's suppose to be the good guys and bad guys, there's just so much involved that you loose sight of who's right and who's wrong, everybody's ideas make since, they all seem to be trying to save the world. Sure there are a few loose cannons that have no control, but our leads, who's right?

If you want to be a real nerd (which isn't a bad thing), watch this with friends and see the conversations it sparks.

***1/2 (9)