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This Week in Anime - Mecha Anime You May Have Missed


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SpideyDude



Joined: 05 Aug 2021
Posts: 37
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 9:31 am Reply with quote
Ya'll are sleeping on Kuromukuro
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kgw



Joined: 22 Jul 2004
Posts: 1066
Location: Spain, EU
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 9:43 am Reply with quote
Also, there are a lot of old mecha anime in CR (probably also in HIDIVE, but I can't watch that), like Orguss -the superdimensional series they didn't know how to fit it in Robotech.
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L'Imperatore



Joined: 24 Mar 2014
Posts: 828
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 9:49 am Reply with quote
Huh, no idea Eureka Seven was a "less well-known" franchise. I thought it was quite popular back then.
Ao, on the other hand...

Also, poor Darling in the Franxx. The only "impact" it made was tons of Zero-Two cosplayers.
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FilthyCasual



Joined: 01 Jun 2015
Posts: 2197
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 10:03 am Reply with quote
Darling in the Franxx was a fun show.

Does Gankutsuou count as mecha?
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Beatdigga



Joined: 26 Oct 2003
Posts: 4373
Location: New York
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 10:09 am Reply with quote
“Mecha is dead” is a very reductive statement given the amount of the stuff that still comes out and copies of the new Armored Core that sold. That all being said, it feels like you’re digging for the gems a bit these days. Hopefully Bang Bravern is as interesting as it looks.
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tinyirnfist0



Joined: 13 Oct 2021
Posts: 18
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 10:40 am Reply with quote
FilthyCasual wrote:
Darling in the Franxx was a fun show.

Does Gankutsuou count as mecha?


Were there any robots? Because I don't recall robots in it or at least sentient robots.
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Terraziel



Joined: 01 Jul 2023
Posts: 57
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 11:01 am Reply with quote
As a fan of Mecha anime old and new, i think part of the problem is that Mecha is still very much an anime genre, that is, there are way fewer manga and LNs for them to make ads for.

On the other side, Gundam and Macross are the big two for a reason, they cover basically all bases from the serious to the absurd, and do it well. You've got to have some serious confidence to try and compete, which is probably why people don't. I mean if you ask me to recommend some Mecha shows there are going to be a bunch of both on there.

As to the original question, Mecha anime people might have missed, well it's kind of like a previous topic on hidden gems, it's hard to say what people have watched or not. Off the top of my head... and making no claim that you can find them streaming anywhere....

Gasaraki, Patlabor (which is what Bullbuster reminds me of most to be honest), and even older, Xabungle, Vifam
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FilthyCasual



Joined: 01 Jun 2015
Posts: 2197
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 11:08 am Reply with quote
tinyirnfist0 wrote:
Were there any robots? Because I don't recall robots in it or at least sentient robots.
There was a mecha duel near the end.
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lemurs



Joined: 01 Aug 2012
Posts: 102
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 1:04 pm Reply with quote
tinyirnfist0 wrote:
FilthyCasual wrote:
Darling in the Franxx was a fun show.

Does Gankutsuou count as mecha?


Were there any robots? Because I don't recall robots in it or at least sentient robots.

The fancy one-on-one swordfighting duels were done in giant robots (implemented in Gonzo's 3DCG, which hasn't aged especially well). And being tucked inside one of those giant robots is crucial to a character switcharoo late in the series.
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Silver Kirin



Joined: 09 Aug 2018
Posts: 1122
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 1:17 pm Reply with quote
L'Imperatore wrote:
Huh, no idea Eureka Seven was a "less well-known" franchise. I thought it was quite popular back then.
Ao, on the other hand...

Also, poor Darling in the Franxx. The only "impact" it made was tons of Zero-Two cosplayers.

I've never actually seen Eureka 7, but the mecha and character designs and the first OP song seemed pretty cool, though even in some mecha circles it doesn't seemed to be mentioned that much. As for Darling in the Franxx, I also never watched because the discussion surrounding the series got so heated that, even if I never actually found out exactly what happened I decided to skip the show. I thought people were expecting something like Gurren Lagann since the show was made by Trigger, though technically the show was also made by A1-Pictures, perhaps people hyped it up a little too much.

Beatdigga wrote:
“Mecha is dead” is a very reductive statement given the amount of the stuff that still comes out and copies of the new Armored Core that sold.

It's not like mecha as a genre is dead, I think the problem is that nowadays, especially in some markets, it's more of a niche genre, and very few recent shows have managed to become mainstream, aside from some established franchises. Here in Latin America for example, The Witch from Mercury was barely talked about, even though it's one of the few Gundam shows that received a dub (though the dub itself is pretty unremarkable), in LatAm the most well known mecha shows are old franchises like Robotech, Mazinger and Evangelion. The only "modern" mecha shows people still mention are Gurren Lagann and Code Geass, and I've seen plenty of people mentioning Geass is not a mecha show in the traditional sens, it's a thriller/war/supernatural/school series that just happens to feature mecha. I think the stereotype that mecha shows focuses only on the mecha still drives people away.
Though recently I've been watching the brand new Neutral Spanish dub that Anime Onegai made for Giant Robo: The Day the Earth Stood Still. It's cool that it got dubbed 25 years afters it ended. Though it was barely talked among fans compared to other shows they accquired
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Beatdigga



Joined: 26 Oct 2003
Posts: 4373
Location: New York
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 1:38 pm Reply with quote
The “unlike other mecha shows, this one focuses on the characters!” statement is an infuriating one for numerous reasons. The first being that any good mecha series does focus on the characters and the mecha are tools to help get that across, the second being that the solution to that in so many godawful shows (The awful Voltron remake, the second season of Gen:Lock which is equal parts pretentious, fatalist, and racist) is to not use the mecha at all, which is more often than not, boring, It’s frankly annoying that it sticks around so much (apparently the head of Gen:Lock’s writing team had the paraphrased statement on a plaque above his office!) when it’s patently false.
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Hal14



Joined: 01 Apr 2018
Posts: 668
Location: Heart of africa
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 2:03 pm Reply with quote
Isn't the issue mainly that sci-fi as a whole isn't that popular compared to other anime genres like fantasy and romcoms? And mecha is a sub-genre within it (although we have some fantasy ones like Granbelm) so it's even less common. Even sci-fi Isekai aren't nearly as popular as their fantasy counterparts
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tywhoppity



Joined: 09 Sep 2019
Posts: 200
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 2:09 pm Reply with quote
Captain Earth, anyone? I know a lot of people hated it, but I thought it was fun...... Very Happy
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Nate148



Joined: 24 May 2012
Posts: 470
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 2:14 pm Reply with quote
kgw wrote:
Also, there are a lot of old mecha anime in CR (probably also in HIDIVE, but I can't watch that), like Orguss -the superdimensional series they didn't know how to fit it in Robotech.
Orguss was done by big west i.e the company that hg DIDN'T go to so it never on the table
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Nate148



Joined: 24 May 2012
Posts: 470
PostPosted: Tue Oct 24, 2023 2:14 pm Reply with quote
tywhoppity wrote:
Captain Earth, anyone? I know a lot of people hated it, but I thought it was fun...... Very Happy
Star Driver did it better so...
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