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Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann! MY TOPIC IS THE TOPIC THAT WILL PIERCE THE HEAVENS!


Chaos Warp

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Double K (and slight TTGL proper):

Keep in mind that A. Kamina seems pretty blissfully unaware of how he's affected Simon and B. Simon does have to man up 

somehow in a universe where Kamina is still alive.

Then why don't they just kill Kamina like the actual show does?

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Because he's the main character, him and Kittan. It's in the name- Double K.

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Because he's the main character, him and Kittan. It's in the name- Double K.

I guess.................Seems the concept alone dooms Kamina to OOC-ness. 

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I guess.................Seems the concept alone dooms Kamina to OOC-ness. 

 

Well its not like its terrible because of it. Kamina was always a bit oblivious of the fact that he was kind of a twat.

Edited by Azure Yakuzu
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Well its not like its terrible because of it. Kamina was always a bit oblivious of the fact that he was kind of a twat.

 

 

As much as he's like that, one thing that I think he would never do is abandon Simon's side. 

Which is exactly what he did in Double K.

Edited by Chaos Warp
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Well like I said, I don't see it as a bad thing. Especially since Kamina & Simon were together for most of the original series and Kamina's relationship with the rest of the cast was kind lacking.

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He didn't really abandon Simon, though. He's just ecstatic making a new friend- he doesn't realise he's sidelining Simon. Different contexts, etc.

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Yea, he didn't exactly say "I don't want to be partners with you anymore, Simon" moreso just having a good time with his new bro, and its having the unintentional side effect of alienating Simon. 

 

I'm really glad someone brought to attention how similar Kamina & Kittan were, and that had he lived past the eighth episode they probably would have struck up quite the friendship. Insults, physical violence, the manliest of friendships.

Its one of the touches I liked about the second movie actually in a particular scene.

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Gurren Lagann.  Man, oh man.  I think my favorite thing about this show was how unrelentingly gratifying the escalation of the plot was.  There was never a true status quo or fixed objective.

Once the very protagonist himself is killed off, all bets are off as to where the story can go at any time.  And when you put things into perspective, there's something amazing about watching a society evolve from a danky underground cavern to an ad-hoc resistance to a metropolis to a space army to collectively piloting a machine large enough to use fucking GALAXIES as SHURIKENS.  And seeing as the show's theme is evolution, that direction is definitely apropos.

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It was a good show, I enjoyed watching it, but am I the only one who felt like the show was a bit plotless until the 7th episode?

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One thing I never got about TTGL was how people mistook Kamina to be the main character. It seemed like it was obviously Simon from the start. Here we have a scrawny little kid who has absolutely no sense of self-worth paired up with a mentor figure who's the person he comes to want to be. Simon had the development arc from the get-go indicating his main character status, while Kamina really had no future development of his own other than being a stepping stool for Simon in his growth as a person.

I always viewed Kamina more as a plot tool than a character with room to grow.

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One thing I never got about TTGL was how people mistook Kamina to be the main character. It seemed like it was obviously Simon from the start. Here we have a scrawny little kid who has absolutely no sense of self-worth paired up with a mentor figure who's the person he comes to want to be. Simon had the development arc from the get-go indicating his main character status, while Kamina really had no future development of his own other than being a stepping stool for Simon in his growth as a person.

I always viewed Kamina more as a plot tool than a character with room to grow.

Because Kamina had the majority of screen time, development and character interaction between the 2nd and 8th episodes.  In most monomyth-style stories, the "mentor figure" doesn't get the spotlight for an entire quarter of the narrative.  He already had a rival AND love interest, it seemed evident he was going places.  Obviously he's not the main character for the WHOLE series, but I don't think anyone was expecting him to be a stepping stool until he actually passed the torch to Simon.

Edited by Stingray 64
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One thing I never got about TTGL was how people mistook Kamina to be the main character. It seemed like it was obviously Simon from the start. Here we have a scrawny little kid who has absolutely no sense of self-worth paired up with a mentor figure who's the person he comes to want to be. Simon had the development arc from the get-go indicating his main character status, while Kamina really had no future development of his own other than being a stepping stool for Simon in his growth as a person.

I always viewed Kamina more as a plot tool than a character with room to grow.

 

Well...he is kind of the reason the plot happens, and gets going before its passed onto Simon. Its not unreasonable to assume that Kamina was the main character, while Simon was the supporting protagonist.

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On the other hand, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the narration in the beginning of the episodes explicitly from the perspective of Simon from the start? "This is the story about a boy etc. etc."?

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On the other hand, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the narration in the beginning of the episodes explicitly from the perspective of Simon from the start? "This is the story about a boy etc. etc."?

 

Yes, but its an easy mistake to assume its Simon talking about Kamina. No one is denying Simon was the protagonist, just that Kamina was the main focus at first.

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I suppose. I just never thought Kamina was the protagonist, even when I went in not knowing anything. Between the narration, the fact he got the first mech, the way the ending animation focused on him, and how in most group shots he was always in the middle, Simon was always clearly the main character to me.

EDIT: I mean, just from this opening and ending, who's the obvious main character?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k23K1fEVbgg

Overly large analysis scene-by-scene because I felt like it:

Scene one- Simon's drill


Scene two- the Gurren Lagann, and the groupshot of the protagonists. Yoko is the one on the middle so... wait, the camera is focusing on Simon.
Scene three- title
Scene four- Simon flying on the Lagann, being the first one focused on (been a while since I watched TTGL, his was the Lagann and Kamina's was the Gurren, right?)
Scene five- Kamina piloting the Gurren, being the second one focused on
Scene six- Yoko shooting things, being the third one focused on
Scene seven- Group shot of various other characters indicating them as an extended/secondary cast
Scene eight- Group shot of another bunch of characters, establishing them as a separate bunch of secondary cast
Scene nine- Group walking at the sunset, Simon and Leeron in focus
Scene ten- Ominous shot of Viral and the Gunmen, establishing the villains
Scene eleven- Gattai, initiated by Simon's drill
Scene twelve- Gurren Lagann surrounded by enemies
Scene thirteen- Gurren Lagann punches everything, ends with drill
Scene fourteen- Main cast is reshown, on opposite order this time- Yoko, then Kamina, then Simon.
Scene fifteen- Group shot in front of the Dai-Gurren Flag, with all the characters appearing behind Simon, who is in the middle, establishing him as the focus
Scene sixteen- Repetition of scene two, thematically- the group awakens, in the same display as scene two, then goes to sleep, and we focus specifically, again, on Simon laying down looking at the drill and the sky




 

And this one? It's entirely about Simon walking to the left to meet the rest of the cast.

 

I don't know how else they could've said Simon was the main character from the start :P

Edited by Captain Harlock
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Not really, his Shinji era is after Episode 8.

Edited by Captain Harlock
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IDK, the way the show plays it up, it seems like they are going to be dual equal protagonists, considering how they pilot Gurren Lagann together and according to both of them they can't function well without the other. (that is of course until

Simon mans up after Kamina dies)

 

Edited by Chaos Warp
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Yea, that's actually a lot more reasonable. They both seemed like Co-protagonists at first, they both pilot the titular mecha, and are the founding members of the team.

Edited by Azure Yakuzu
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Kamina took up most of the screen time? The first several episodes were through Simon's point of view.

TTGL happens because of Kamina, sure, but the original Star Wars happens because of Obi-Wan. I'm sure it was a huge shock for Kamina to die, but I've seen other characters like him and it seemed kind of obvious to me that he was meant to be the mentor figure. Role model characters generally are never front and center when there are characters like Simon present, I think Kamina just seemed that way because he was kind of an attention whore.

Even if I watched it at the time and was just as surprised at Kamina's death as everyone else, I don't think I would have been surprised that Simon was the focus and not Kamina.

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So do any of you have a favourite episode/favourite scene or anything?

Episode 6 and 12 have obvious appeal to the...................................."heights of the male spirit" so they get honourable mentions, but I think my actual favourite episode is Episode 15. I really like the fight scene with Lord Genom/The Spiral King, any villain who can tear Lagann's arms off with his bare hands is a badass in my book. Plus the way Simon piratically shoves what are his car keys through his chest to kill him was really awesome. As for post-time skip, I actually really like Episode 22. I don't really know why, maybe it's the fact that it's Team Gurren's first space battle? IDK.  And of course the final episode will never not be awesome. 


 

Edited by Chaos Warp
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My overall favorite episode was the next-to-last one where

Simon and co. are trapped in the Anti-Spiral's maze and Kamina's spirit come in to wake everyone back up (Well, Simon and Yoko, anyway). That last time you see Kamina was just way too epic to me, for some reason.

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Ah fuck, Gurren Lagann was just about the coolest thing in the world to me when it came out. It was the first anime I really watched beyond anything on Adult Swim, basically launched my interest in the medium and I was pretty obsessed with it for a while. That said, while it holds a special spot in my heart, the fact that six years later, people are still just discovering it and consequently thinking it's the coolest thing in the world, is kind of grating. The "manliness" and "hot blooded spirit" or whatever such got me pumped too when I was twelve years old but I guess I'm just a crotchety old man who doesn't find the same appeal in the show he used to.

 

That's not to say it's bad; it's fucking fantastic and it's an incredibly fun ride. The cast is wonderful, the music is some of the best anime has to offer, the animation is top notch (what's episode 4), it's all around a really, really well done show. It's a great place to start wading into the super robot genre or anime in general, and it becomes even more entertaining once you come back to it with having seen the series that inspired it.

 

Not much to complain about. People seem to like to take issue with the first few episodes being "dull" or Kamina being built up as so important, or with those episodes where the writers forgot this wasn't NGE, even complain about the timeskip, I dunno man I thought there was really nothing wrong with it, I wouldn't agree with any of those criticisms. The first episodes did their best at setting up the world and characters, Kamina got no more or less spotlight than necessary, Simon's depression made sense, I suppose the timeskip's quality compared to the former half of the show is arguable but it's nothing devastating.

 

Favorite scene? Don't know how anyone could pick any other than Simon's big comeback speech, it's far and away the crowning achievement of character development in the show. You couldn't help but share in all of that excitement, it was fucking exhilarating seeing him come to terms with everything, break out of that depression, see that there's more to life worth living. The movie excels even more because jesus christ that animation.

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Ahh a Gurren Lagann Topic thank you for making this.

 

I love this anime, it's pretty much my most favourite anime in the world, there may be better written shows, with better animation quality but this, this show just hits all the right notes (except ep 4, I like the director but that sure felt out of place). I remember when the show was first announced I only followed it because well it's Gainax, makers of FLCL and other assorted shows which may or may not have torn my heart out (mahoro..) thing is it aired during a time where I was really down in the dumps, a lot of factors left me as an unmotivated pile of bleh and Gurren Lagann was like a shining beacon of hope! It didn't change my outlook immediately but it sure did help get the train going. It's ups and downs had me looking forward to it each week and the pure and simple message of doing the impossible regardless of the barriers in your way just spoke to me as cheesy as that sounds.

 

Also not to mention the kickass mechs and amazing finishing attacks, it's such an artform that if you mess it up the attack just comes off forced and lame but oh the cast and crew of GL smacked it in the face and rode it into the sunset.

 

As for favourite scene, I have to go with Noivern on this one,

the moment Simon does his first speech, it's not grand in any sense but it shows that he's become his own person and is willing to grow past his bro. It's a huge moment in his development so seeing him rise from the depression and basically shine like the sun in front of all those who doubted him just makes it a great scene to watch. I especially love the movie version of the scene where it goes hand in hand with the broadcast across the planet making it ten times more epic!

 

Man I really do love this show. It also opened up my eyes to the people who work behind the scenes, two people Imashi and Yoshinari have pretty much become huge inspirations for me in the animation field!

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