small girls, BIG EXPLOSIONS
As you may or may not have already inferred from the pitiful sounds I made upon resurfacing, I've been sick as a dog for a couple of days. To keep my head from imploding from the sheer Do Not Want, I watched every sufficiently lighthearted movie I could find. So now I've watched more chick flics/romcoms in the span of a week than I had in the previous twelve months combined. Some were nice, some induced sweet, blissful sleep, some just made me roll my eyes.
But those aren't what this post is about. No, this post is about what came before and what came after. This post is about something I think should be a far more common ingredient in fiction of every kind and everywhere: girls, often small ones, causing HUGE-ASS EXPLOSIONS! :D
Gunbuster and Diebuster are 6-ep OVAs, about teams of female pilots and their epinomous "buster machines". They're set in the same universe, but a long time apart - and I mean a looooooooong time. I won't tell you how they're even connected, because that would ruin the surprise. Gunbuster stars Noriko, a clutz whose father, a famous space fleet admiral, was killed by a space monster. She rather sucks at piloting, but for some reason she's picked to be one of two cadets from her school who gets to go into space and fight the space monsters, along with Ahmano, a talented senior she looks up to like no other. Diebuster stars Nono, an eternally optimistic robot girl who also wants to become a space pilot. She unfortunately lacks the special "Topless" power that's needed to be one, but established pilot Lal'C takes a liking to her and lets her tag along to give it a shot anyway.
The buster girls throw bombs built from planets and make it snow in space. They get to break all the known and made-up laws of physics because they and their machines are just that awesome. Also some really interesting themes centered about real scientific concepts. I can't say too much without giving spoilers, but wheeeeee! This is why I love mecha. If the end of Gunbuster doesn't make you cry, you have no heart. NO HEART, I tell you. There's a ton of nudity in both Gunbuster and Diebuster, but it aside from a few obnoxious pantyshot scenes in ep 1 & 2 of Diebuster, it's all totally casual, which I have no problem with. Make of that what you will. :P
But anyway. Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha! Ingvild told me the director actually wanted to make a mecha anime when he got this project, and boy does it ever show. It's made up of three series totalling about 52 episodes. The most prominent mecha-ish aspect in the first two series are the absurd firepower held by the magical girls, Nanoha and Fate in the original, plus the Wolkenritter in the sequel, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's. Nanoha's Starlight Breaker attack makes Libra's main cannon look like a glowy toothpick. SO AWESOME. The third series, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS, is centered entirely around a military organisation - staffed by yet more highly explosive magical girls. And a stray guy or two, but this is mostly the girls' story, for a change, so let's just focus on them.
You know a series is good - or at least I do - when it can make you get teary-eyed over the fate of everything down to a magic marble. Nanoha also seems to have finally broken through my subconscious "hurt a fictional animal and I'll hate you forever, but go ahead and be as horrible as you like to fictional kids, I don't care" stance. KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OF THAT LITTLE GIRL YOU CREEPS. Hurt little Vivio and her mamas will blast you. GO MAMA! GO OTHER MAMA!
My favourite characters are Fate, Vita, Signum, Agito and Nanoha herself, but I love all of them. It's always refreshing to have a cast full of nice people. Nanoha is the type of story that shreds your heart into little pieces, but also puts it back together with utmost loving care. You just end up loving it more for it. Also, I ship Nanoha and Fate like a very happy and validated shipper. <333
And now, time for Gundam ZZ!
But those aren't what this post is about. No, this post is about what came before and what came after. This post is about something I think should be a far more common ingredient in fiction of every kind and everywhere: girls, often small ones, causing HUGE-ASS EXPLOSIONS! :D
Gunbuster and Diebuster are 6-ep OVAs, about teams of female pilots and their epinomous "buster machines". They're set in the same universe, but a long time apart - and I mean a looooooooong time. I won't tell you how they're even connected, because that would ruin the surprise. Gunbuster stars Noriko, a clutz whose father, a famous space fleet admiral, was killed by a space monster. She rather sucks at piloting, but for some reason she's picked to be one of two cadets from her school who gets to go into space and fight the space monsters, along with Ahmano, a talented senior she looks up to like no other. Diebuster stars Nono, an eternally optimistic robot girl who also wants to become a space pilot. She unfortunately lacks the special "Topless" power that's needed to be one, but established pilot Lal'C takes a liking to her and lets her tag along to give it a shot anyway.
The buster girls throw bombs built from planets and make it snow in space. They get to break all the known and made-up laws of physics because they and their machines are just that awesome. Also some really interesting themes centered about real scientific concepts. I can't say too much without giving spoilers, but wheeeeee! This is why I love mecha. If the end of Gunbuster doesn't make you cry, you have no heart. NO HEART, I tell you. There's a ton of nudity in both Gunbuster and Diebuster, but it aside from a few obnoxious pantyshot scenes in ep 1 & 2 of Diebuster, it's all totally casual, which I have no problem with. Make of that what you will. :P
But anyway. Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha! Ingvild told me the director actually wanted to make a mecha anime when he got this project, and boy does it ever show. It's made up of three series totalling about 52 episodes. The most prominent mecha-ish aspect in the first two series are the absurd firepower held by the magical girls, Nanoha and Fate in the original, plus the Wolkenritter in the sequel, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's. Nanoha's Starlight Breaker attack makes Libra's main cannon look like a glowy toothpick. SO AWESOME. The third series, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS, is centered entirely around a military organisation - staffed by yet more highly explosive magical girls. And a stray guy or two, but this is mostly the girls' story, for a change, so let's just focus on them.
You know a series is good - or at least I do - when it can make you get teary-eyed over the fate of everything down to a magic marble. Nanoha also seems to have finally broken through my subconscious "hurt a fictional animal and I'll hate you forever, but go ahead and be as horrible as you like to fictional kids, I don't care" stance. KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OF THAT LITTLE GIRL YOU CREEPS. Hurt little Vivio and her mamas will blast you. GO MAMA! GO OTHER MAMA!
My favourite characters are Fate, Vita, Signum, Agito and Nanoha herself, but I love all of them. It's always refreshing to have a cast full of nice people. Nanoha is the type of story that shreds your heart into little pieces, but also puts it back together with utmost loving care. You just end up loving it more for it. Also, I ship Nanoha and Fate like a very happy and validated shipper. <333
And now, time for Gundam ZZ!