https://youtu.be/flRzHu94_bc

It's about time I review an anime in this book. And it's only fitting that I start by reviewing my favourite anime, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Gurren Lagann has everything: mechs, battles, fanservice, aliens, everything an anime fan could want. Is it awesome? Yes. Is it my favourite anime? Yes. Does it have flaws? Oh yeah. Let's get right into it.

The main characters of the show.

Background and BTS:

Gurren Lagann was made by Studio Gainax, the same people behind Neon Genesis Evangelion, Kill la Kill, and Panty and Stocking. It was also co-produced by Aniplex, the producers of Fullmetal Alchemist and Black Butler, as well as game developer Konami. It was directed by Hiroyuki Imaishi, the co-founder of Studio Trigger, and written by Kazuki Nakashima, a veteran playwright and novelist. A manga adaptation was published by ASCII Media Works in Japan, and Bandai Entertainment in North America. There's also a videogame for the DS that was only released in Japan, and two animated films, as well as a Japanese stage play. The series also inspired some North American media, such as Transformers Animated, League of Legends, and some fans speculate that one of Reinhardt's skins in Overwatch was based on Gurren Lagann as well.

Gurren Lagann's final form. 

Plot Summary:

The story begins in the underground village of Giha, where the main protagonist, Simon the digger, finds a drill-shaped key. He also meets up with his friend, Kamina, who's the leader of a gang called Team Gurren. Team Gurren wants to use Simon's drilling abilities to break out of the underground and reach the surface. The others are skeptical that there even is a surface, but Kamina insists that he saw it with his father. They nearly reach the surface, but they're stopped by the village chief. The rest of Team Gurren apologizes, but Kamina refuses, and gets arrested. Later, Simon finds something else underground: a robotic head. He breaks kamina out of prison to show it to him, but they're caught by the chief once again. Before they can both be sent to jail, a massive robot breaks through the ceiling. Kamina takes the chief's sword and challenges the robot, but is distracted by a new face... and boobs. This is Yoko, a girl from the surface. She tells Simon and Kamina that the robot is something called a Gunman, and that they come from the surface. Simon realizes that Gunman were the source of the earthquake that killed his parents. They use the robot Simon found, which is powered by the drill-shaped key, called the Core Drill, to defeat the Gunman, and Kamina names it Lagann. As they destroy the robot, they also drill through the ceiling and finally reach the surface. Yoko explains that the Gunman aren't sentient, but are actually driven by Beastmen, humanoid creatures under the rule of Lordgenome, the Spiral King. Lordgenome is also responsible for forcing the humans underground. Along with Leeron, a member of Yoko's village, they go on a journey to defeat Lordgenome once and for all.

On the way, they meet some other cool characters. First, they meet Viral, a Beastmen commander who almost immediately forms a rivalry with Kamina. Kamina also hijacks a Gunman, and names it Gurren. During a fight with Viral's Gunman, Kamina and Simon combine their mechs to form Gurren Lagann. By hijacking a Gunman, Kamina inspires other humans, like Kittan, Kamina's other main rival, to steal their own Gunman and join Team Gurren, which Kamina renames Team Dai-Gurren. Finally, they reach the Beastmen base of operations, a massive Gunman fortress. Before they challenge it, Kamina and Yoko admit their feelings for each other, much to Simon's dismay. The next day, the battle begins, and Team Dai-Gurren seems to be losing. Kamina is unfortunately killed by one of the four Beastmen generals. Before he dies, he and Simon combine into Gurren Lagann one last time to perform their finishing move: Giga Drill Break. Team Dai-Gurren is victorious, and the fortress is taken over. Despite Kamina's death, the humans have won.

Simon falls into a deep depression, until he meets a girl named Nia. Nia is literally the best. Eventually, it's found out that she's Lordgenome's daughter, and the rest of the team mistrusts her. It's only when they realize that she was abandoned by her father that they begin to trust her, and even let her join the team. Nia helps Simon get over Kamina's death, and helps him realize his true potential. Simon becomes the new leader of the team, and they defeat the other Beastmen generals, eventually coming to Lordgenome's palace. The palace turns out to be another Gunman called Lazengann, which fights the rest of Team Dai-Gurren. Finally, Simon defeats Lordgenome by jamming the Core Drill into his chest.

7 years later, humanity thrives on the surface once again. Dai-Gurren become the world's government, Gunmen based on Gurren Lagann are used in the military, Yoko becomes a school teacher, and Simon plans to propose to Nia. One day, the world's population reaches one million, and an alien race called the Anti-Spirals comes to Earth. They use Nia as a vessel to announce that the moon is on a collision course with Earth to prevent the evolution of the Spiral Race (creatures possessing DNA of any kind). Lordgenome is resurrected by the humans as a bio-computer, and they learn that he was once part of a team of intergalactic warriors that fought the Anti-Spirals before. Just as humanity is loaded onto a spaceship to escape Earth, Simon, along with Viral, prevent the moon's collision. They also realize that this isn't the real moon, and that the moon was actually placed into a pocket dimension by the Anti-Spirals. They retrieve the moon, and use the artificial moon, which used to be Lordgenome's flagship, to find the Anti-Spiral homeworld. After many of Team Dai-Gurren's members are killed in battle, and after a number of dream sequences, they finally rescue Nia, and battle the Anti-Spiral. What results is LITERALLY THE BEST THING IN ANY ANIME EVER. Gurren Lagann combines with every Gunman in Team Dai-Gurren, becoming Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, a robot LITERALLY BIGGER THAN THE UNIVERSE. Then the Anti-Spiral forms a robot the same size, and the two massive robots fight. Simon gives a kick-ass speech, and then defeats the Anti-Spiral once and for all.

After coming back to Earth, Simon and Nia get married. But unfortunately, Nia's existence was tied to the Anti-Spiral, and without it, she can't exist. She begins to fade away and die nearly immediately after the wedding. Simon is surprisingly cool with all this, and leaves to become a lone traveler. What a friggin' bad ass.

Yoko, AKA the Queen of Fanservice.

Characters:

Every main character in Gurren Lagann is memorable in their own way. Kamina especially leaves a huge impact, even after his death. Nearly every great quote from the series comes from him. Ever heard anyone say "Kick out logic and do the impossible" or "believe in the me who believes in you"? Yep, that was Kamina. Then again, Simon, the real protagonist of the series, is pretty great too. He's alright at the beginning, but he doesn't get awesome until after Kamina's death. Up until then, it seems like Kamina's the main character, and the story mainly focusses on him. But after that, Simon becomes his own character, and stops being dependent on Kamina. Then there's Yoko. If you've never seen Gurren Lagann, you've probably seen Yoko on body pillows or in rule 34 on the internet. She's been known as the queen of fanservice for good reasons. In the show, she's pretty awesome, especially at the beginning. Like every girl in anime, though, she suffers from "this character was written by a dude" syndrome. Hey, my female characters often suffer from the same syndrome, I'll admit it. Like I said, another character I like is Nia, who at first was just the typical ditzy cute girl, kinda like Starfire from Teen Titans (which is appropriate, since Nia's English voice actor is Hynden Walch, Starfire's voice actor). A lot of her best scenes are when she's with Simon. Even after the timeskip, she's pretty great, though she's only in the series for a few episodes after that. Viral's your typical cool edgy rival. Imagine Shadow the Hedgehog in human form. Well, Beastmen form at least. All the characters fill a certain anime archetype, and the series does nothing to hide this. Rather, it embraces it. And that's why it's so awesome. Wow, I've used the word "awesome" a lot.

Oh yeah, there are other characters too. Like... the twins with red and blue sunglasses... or the dude with the big lips... or the green hair dude... or the blonde lady... uh... I'm sure they did something too.

Oh yeah, and Squidward appears as a background character. No joke.

See? I told you.

Good and Bad:

The story of the series is great. You can tell it was written by a veteran author. The animation is great, like most Gainax shows. The quality is somewhere between Neon Genesis Evangelion and Kill La Kill. Similar to Kill La Kill, which is a parody of magical girl anime, Gurren Lagann is a parody of mecha anime. Like I said, it embraces everything that makes mecha anime ridiculous; the larger-than-life battles, the overuse of fanservice, the over-the-top characters, everything is crazy, and Gurren Lagann embraces that craziness perfectly. The character design is really good as well. Those who have read my Godzilla Warriors series may notice that the design I made for Godzilla was inspired by Kamina. Also, everything is beautifully drawn. The artists and animators know what they're doing. There are some exceptions, however, as some episodes have guest animators. We'll talk about them later. And do I even have to talk about the music? Holy crap the music in this series is amazing. My favourite songs are the intro song "Sorairo Days", Viral's theme "Nikopol", and one of the end credits songs "Minna no Peace". Okay, I've hyped up this series enough. Let's talk about some of the flaws.

First of all, the side characters are super forgettable and hastily introduced. I barely remember most of their names. And yet, we're still supposed to care when they get killed. I dunno, maybe it's just me, but I can't really get attached to characters who barely and an episode to introduce them. Besides that, like I mentioned, there are a few episodes with guest animators and writers, and those episodes aren't very good. Like, at all. They're usually just filler, but they occasionally contain crucial plot points which make them hard to skip. Also, even though I'm okay with a little fanservice now and then, the fanservice in Gurren Lagann is a little crazy. Like I said, Yoko suffers from "this character was written by a dude" syndrome. And it really shows. But then again, there's worse fanservice in anime out there *cough cough* Kill La Kill *cough cough*. Also, while I like the over-the-top nature of Gurren Lagann, I can see it turning some people off, especially people who have never seen an anime before. Gurren Lagann is the sort of anime you have to build yourself up in order to watch.

Nia, honestly one of my favourite characters in the show. Maybe because she's friggin' adorable. 

Final Verdict:

I think I've made it perfectly clear already, but Gurren Lagann is my favourite anime. I love it, but it's definitely not without its flaws. But the flaws are masked by the insane amounts of awesomeness in the rest of the series. If you're willing to look past the flaws and give into the awesomeness, you're in for one hell of a ride.

Final Grade: 

A+ 

As long as you don't mind stuff like this, you'll probably like Gurren Lagann.