a: if the rights holders had wanted to they 100% had grounds to sue, and they would have probably won
b: the getter emperor is so cool! and someone should have told the people at gainax “if you’re going to do getter emperor, the manifestation of colonialism and genocide as the natural extremes of directionless shonen hotblooded spirit and humanities endless potential for evolution, you need a stronger argument than “nuh uh” when saying ‘actually this is a good thing. it’s good to forever grow and become more powerful and kill everything in your way’”
if i ever rewatch it i’m not going to be able to see team gurren as anything other than evil. seeing kittan’s sacrifice and shaking my head like “he succumbed to the corruption of the getter. sad!”
or maybe i’m wrong and it has a satisfying response that goes beyond “actually i’d just be chill about this whole thing,” but i really don’t remember that
a) I’m pretty sure Gainax were pretty upfront with how TTGL was basically Imaishi’s giant love letter to all of Mecha as a genre. There’s homages to other shows there, pretty sure Mazinger, Getter and Gundam are included.
b) Counterpoint: Team Gurren’s triumph over the Anti-Spiral is the ultimate triumph of the Proletariat over the forces of Reaction, and ending the process of Dialectical Materialism as laid out in Marxism-Lenninism-Giant Drillism.
We evolve beyond the person we were a minute before. We advance a little further with each revolution. That’s how a drill works!
The Anti-Spiral oppressed the Spiral races due to a failure of imagination- it simply couldn’t imagine a better world. Simon promises to steward the galaxy with giant drill FALGSC at the end of the show, using Spiral power for the benefit of the galactic proletariat.
Edit: Also, Spiral power’s not the manifestation of colonialism and genocide- it’s the rrrrrrrevolutionary (GIANT DRILL) spirit of the Proletariat as it evolves from national liberation (first half of the show) to global liberation (second half of the show). (Rossiu is a right revisionist who almost derails the revolution with a misguided coup attempt.) That revolutionary spirit is one and the same as the Hotblooded Shonen spirit and Humanities endless potential for evolution.
a) obviously they pulled from a variety of sources and weren’t only influenced by getter, and even if they were only stealing from getter i do not actually think they should have been stopped. you should be allowed to steal from whatever when writing a story. but have you read getter? the getter manga. like, getter robo go, shin getter robo, getter robo arc? because it’s so blatantly stealing that stuff visually, thematically, plot beat by plot beat, in ways that don’t really show up in the various getter anime as i understand it. the entire antispiral plot, and the reasons behind lordgenome’s plan are just ripped straight from getter robo. spiral energy is just getter energy. it even gives you the eyes! also it was written by kazuki nakashima, whose wikipedia page describes as “In addition to working on Getter Robo, he is a fan of Ken Ishikawa. He took pride in being a “Getter Person”,” so the influence is undeniable
b) going to ignore the “ah team gurren are marxist revolutionaries” stuff because i just don’t think this is a serious read of the show. the anti-spiral say “you are going to destroy the universe, you are constantly striving for expansion and domination over your foes, evolving until you’re so massive you consume everything in existence,” and team gurren says “nuh-uh!” and then just continues expanding. this is how the getter emperor happens! gurren lagann does not meaningfully change any details, they just say “it’s good now.” simon says he’ll steward the galaxy, but that’s not any different from what the anti-spiral was worried about! he just says “yeah i’m going to do the thing you’re mad about but i’ll just handle it” and the show just says he’s right
spiral power isn’t the manifestation of colonialism and genocide, but getter rays are. and if you are going to so blatantly one to one lift the manifestation of hot blooded shonen spirit turning into colonialism and genocide you need to change it up more or have a stronger reason why it isn’t going to be like that here. as is it’s clearly a response to getter but it doesn’t actually have anything to say beyond “getter robo was cool, but what if the getter emperor was the good guy?” and it doesn’t have enough distance for that to not be dissonant to me
e: obviously none of this is to say you can’t enjoy gurren lagann, or that it’s an evil show that’s pro colonialism and genocide. i’ll probably still rewatch gurren lagann and enjoy it! just that it’s kinda dumb about taking elements from a better, more thoughtful work
I actually am legit kinda serious about Team Gurren being Marxist revolutionaries (or rather, that TTGL has leftist themes). I’m a little hyperbolic in the previous post but I racked my brains for years trying to figure out “But why a Giant Drill though?” and the only answer that satisfied me was that it was a visual metaphor (well, more like a dumb visual pun) for revolution.
(Also, like, everything Imaishi does after TTGL at Trigger ends up kinda based, I do legitimately think he has leftist sympathies.
)For the record I haven’t read Getter, so I can only focus on Gurren Lagan here.
spiral power isn’t the manifestation of colonialism and genocide, but getter rays are. and if you are going to so blatantly one to one lift the manifestation of hot blooded shonen spirit turning into colonialism and genocide you need to change it up more or have a stronger reason why it isn’t going to be like that here. as is it’s clearly a response to getter but it doesn’t actually have anything to say beyond “getter robo was cool, but what if the getter emperor was the good guy?” and it doesn’t have enough distance for that to not be dissonant to me
If we’re getting into metatextual stuff- TTGL is at it’s heart a response to Evangelion: that internalised, individualised pain isn’t all that life offers and that it’s possible to build towards a better future with the people around us one turn of the drill at a time.
Within the text itself, Spiral power is always liberatory in nature, and Simon doesn’t use it to colonise or oppress but to emancipate. Even if Gurren Lagann is wholesale importing visual imagery from Getter, I don’t think it’s fair to either show to impart the same meaning between them when their respective texts are doing (what sounds like) diametrically opposite things.
Like, TTGL is ultimately about the triumph of the human spirit over an unthinking, uncaring universe (which is why it’s also about communism) so of course it’ll be dissonant if you attribute things to it from a previous text that it has repurposed to tell a different story.
i can kinda see it, but i think in order to really make that argument there would need to be some kind of evidence that they were building a communist state, which really doesn’t seem to be the case in my memory. (also since this post was really about getter robo i will say that, given all the other extremely obvious inspiration i think the drills are at least partially because the getter 2 uses a drill in the exact same way as the gurren lagann)
idk, i’ve seen people say that but i’ve never really seen it. like, kinda in the first half, but it isn’t really engaging with those ideas at all in the back half (the part that i’m mostly talking about with the getter comparison).
i mean, the anti-spiral’s entire argument is that it isn’t liberatory and will in fact destroy everything. but really to me this is like how witch from mercury brought in all the utena imagery. i’m not like, mad that the gurren lagann doesn’t just become the getter emperor, just like i don’t wish witch from mercury had just done a beat for beat recreation of utena. but they bring in all the imagery and plotlines from these older works and (in my eyes) don’t do anything interesting with them. if gurren lagann had done a really compelling rebuttal of the ideas surrounding the getter emperor i would have loved that! but it brings in the imagery and themes, has the anti-spiral make all these arguments that are made in very interesting ways in getter robo, and then it doesn’t have enough of a response to satisfy me
like, i don’t think that in reality human spirit is inherently going to lead to these evil things! there is room for a work that engages directly with getter and the getter emperor that disagrees! but if you bring in the imagery and themes and direct plot beats from the horror story about the indomitable human spirit leading to evil and disagree but don’t go beyond “nuh uh! we’ll use it for good!” that isn’t compelling to me
but i’ll be honest this post was mostly an excuse to say ‘seeing kittan’s sacrifice and shaking my head like “he succumbed to the corruption of the getter. sad!”’ because the thought popped into my head and i found it funny. while i do have some problems with the way gurren lagann uses that imagery it doesn’t necessarily make it a bad show, i just have criticisms of this bit
(also since this post was really about getter robo i will say that, given all the other extremely obvious inspiration i think the drills are at least partially because the getter 2 uses a drill in the exact same way as the gurren lagann)
Ah, like, I meant why the drill was used as a story beat/macguffin and recurring visual theme in TTGL specifically, I know Super Robo loves it some giant drills.
i can kinda see it, but i think in order to really make that argument there would need to be some kind of evidence that they were building a communist state, which really doesn’t seem to be the case in my memory.
I mean, my guess is Imaishi was getting away with what he could at the time. From what I remember the state Simon ends up being the leader of wasn’t explicitly capitalist either. 2nd half of TTGL only started making sense to me when I started reading it as “Actually Existing Socialism vs Nihilism, Entropy and the Heat Death of the Universe”
but if you bring in the imagery and themes and direct plot beats from the horror story about the indomitable human spirit leading to evil and disagree but don’t go beyond “nuh uh! we’ll use it for good!” that isn’t compelling to me
Yeah, that’s fair. I dunno, to me when Simon yells “No, that’s YOUR limitation! You sit here in your closed-off universe locking away other lifeforms like you’re some kind of king! That’s nobody’s limitation but your own!” at the climax of the fight, after everything they’ve been through and especially after the dreamworld episode which spelt out exactly how much the entire cast sacrificed to get to that point by showing us their false consciousness possible lives that they had to give up… that was enough of a refutation of what the Anti-Spiral was saying (to me), because the crux of the matter really did seem to be a failure of imagination- after all, the entire preceding show was about how humanity keeps breaking through barriers by building on past successes (like, literally, there’s a matryoshka doll of Giant Drill Robots now) and row row fighting the powah, so why wouldn’t they be able to overcome what the Anti-Spiral feared? They overcame everything else to get there in the first place, at that point it kinda was just self-evident.
Like, when one sides position boils down to “A better world isn’t possible”, do you really need a more cogent response than “GIGA DRILLLUUUU BREEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKAAAAAAAAA!!!”?
(Also tbc this is just my reading of the Anti-Spiral in TTGL, I dunno Getter at all so I can’t comment on if the arguments made there are a lot more thoughtful/persuasive.)
but i’ll be honest this post was mostly an excuse to say ‘seeing kittan’s sacrifice and shaking my head like “he succumbed to the corruption of the getter. sad!”’ because the thought popped into my head and i found it funny.
No please continue shitposting about Gainax it’s funny
Ah, like, I meant why the drill was used as a story beat/macguffin and recurring visual theme in TTGL specifically, I know Super Robo loves it some giant drills.
yeah i got that, i just meant as an additional watsonian layer, you know?
if you want to have fun with that read that’s fine, but the story can just as easily be read as about capitalism being good, some facile anti-communist screed where the anti-spiral want to make everyone conform but team gurren is all about rugged individuality. in fact team gurren IS at least a little about rugged individuality. it doesn’t have to be perfect as a political test for you to like it, you know?
after all, the entire preceding show was about how humanity keeps breaking through barriers by building on past successes (like, literally, there’s a matryoshka doll of Giant Drill Robots now) and row row fighting the powah, so why wouldn’t they be able to overcome what the Anti-Spiral feared? They overcame everything else to get there in the first place, at that point it kinda was just self-evident.
i mean, that’s what the anti-spiral are saying! they’re saying “you’re constantly growing bigger and stronger and we are going to try and stop you before you destroy the universe” and team gurren says “no! we will grow bigger and stronger than you!” and then they just do that and win, and it just feels unearned to me
Like, when one sides position boils down to “A better world isn’t possible”, do you really need a more cogent response than “GIGA DRILLLUUUU BREEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKAAAAAAAAA!!!”?
yes! because the position isn’t just “a better world isn’t possible,” it’s “a better world isn’t possible because you won’t stop doing the giga drill break!!!” it’s like people saying “we can just use fossil fuels forever and constantly grow and expand and nothing bad will happen” in the face of criticism of capitalism or climate change.
idk, i never thought about this before reading getter robo, maybe it just poisoned me against this. but i would definitely recommend reading it, it’s cool as hell. i make it sound kinda downbeat and depressing here but it’s got so many sick things going on
some good images from getter robo
Damn those panels do go hard.
the story can just as easily be read as about capitalism being good, some facile anti-communist screed where the anti-spiral want to make everyone conform but team gurren is all about rugged individuality. in fact team gurren IS at least a little about rugged individuality.
I dunno, that reading is the kind that we make fun of chuds for having. “Don’t believe in yourself! Believe in the me who believes in you!” is the total opposite mantra of a rugged individualist, and everything only happens due to the collective effort of everyone on the cast because they combine (more of Imaishi’s stupidly sincere puns) their efforts together.
it doesn’t have to be perfect as a political test for you to like it, you know?
I know, because TTGL is really special to me. I was a really depressed young liberal when I watched it, and it helped me a lot with getting through that rough patch, and I liked it enough back then. But it was this show’s really dumb “Drill revolves = Revolution” pun in the movie that started getting enough stones rolling in my head to get me to question my thinking at the time.
What I’m saying is that this reading isn’t a post-hoc justification to retrofit my politics into a piece of media I like. This is me saying that Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann was that piece of media that hit me at the exact right time of my life to completely change my worldview, and that coming up with this reading was formative in shaping my current politics by giving voice to a lot of ideas I couldn’t articulate for myself back then.
(And honestly it’s kinda embarrassing to admit that. Just how fucking privileged do I have to be to say that a Japanese cartoon had a huge impact in making me a leftist?
)yes! because the position isn’t just “a better world isn’t possible,” it’s “a better world isn’t possible because you won’t stop doing the giga drill break!!!” it’s like people saying “we can just use fossil fuels forever and constantly grow and expand and nothing bad will happen” in the face of criticism of capitalism or climate change.
Ok, say for the sake of argument we reject any Marxist reading of the text (which I’m gonna put my foot down and say it’s just not possible, but anyway)- TTGL is still an extremely Humanist story. It would be one thing if the show presented the Anti-Spiral as having a point, like if Spiral Power visibly corrupted or the universe got worse every time a Giga Drill Break was used or if Simon started abusing his power- but those things never happen inside the story and aren’t implied at all in the epilogue. (And also, Simon in the show never pursues power for it’s own sake, it’s in order to protect his loved ones and liberate them.)
So what the Anti-Spiral’s arguments end up being in the show is a fear of a possible future. Like, maybe Imaishi is just straight up ripping off Getter to create a visual/narrative shorthand, but within the text of TTGL that still only represents a possible future, not a certainty. Just because things played out that way in Getter Robo doesn’t mean it’ll play out that way in TTGL.
The result of the Anti-Spiral’s fear of a possible future is an endless now, a status quo oppressively enforced from above, where people are reduced to digging through dirt looking for scraps just to get by- the state of the cast at the start of the show. It’s police states and sanctions and, when the Spiral races finally break though that first struggle, it’s genocide. Even if Spiral power was the analogue for capitalism (or the productive forces) and unlimited growth, the Anti-Spirals answer isn’t sustainability, it’s Malthusianism. They don’t plan to ever actually tackle the problem, just to kill enough people to kick the can down the road. It’s pessimism and nihilism and the shuttering of the human spirit.
The Anti-Spiral are letting the fear of a possible future paralyze everything into an endless now, but you can’t overcome those fears and create lasting solutions by freezing in place and not allowing yourself/life to grow. The only path forward is in believing in people’s ability to work together to chip away at the problem, one turn of the drill bit at a time.
“Mark my words. This drill will open a hole in the universe. And that hole will become a path for those that follow after us. The dreams of those who have fallen. The hopes of those who will follow. Those two sets of dreams weave together into a double helix; drilling a path towards tomorrow. That’s Tengen Toppa! That’s Gurren Lagann! My drill is the drill that creates the heavens!”
“You struggle in vain!”
“That may be, but I still believe. In the me that I believe in. In humanity. In the future. I believe. My drill is my soul!”
-Anti-Spiral dies
“If it has to be this way, protect the universe at all costs…”
“Oh course we will. Believe in us, too. Have faith in us humans.”
To me, in the face of nihilism and utter annihilation, the only rational response kinda is to punch it in the face screaming “Nuh-Uh!”. After all, we’ve overcome so much hardship just to get here in the first place, it’s more irrational not to have faith in humanity. That’s why I can’t separate a Marxist reading from this show, because the inherent humanist optimism of “A better world is possible” is foundational to leftist politics- why can’t Simon the Digger and Team Gurren overcome the Getter Emperor?
but i would definitely recommend reading it, it’s cool as hell. i make it sound kinda downbeat and depressing here but it’s got so many sick things going on
You should have just lead with the Dinosaurs, I’ll read anything with Dinosaurs in it.
(But also if it has a downer ending like Devilman Crybaby or Mawaru Penguindrum I’ll probably bounce of it, for reasons articulated here hahahaha)
I dunno, that reading is the kind that we make fun of chuds for having. “Don’t believe in yourself! Believe in the me who believes in you!” is the total opposite mantra of a rugged individualist, and everything only happens due to the collective effort of everyone on the cast because they combine (more of Imaishi’s stupidly sincere puns) their efforts together.
i mean, sure, but kamina’s final words go against that in favor of direct individualism. “believe in the you that believes in yourself.” “who the hell do you think i am” etc.
(And honestly it’s kinda embarrassing to admit that. Just how fucking privileged do I have to be to say that a Japanese cartoon had a huge impact in making me a leftist? )
i mean revolutionary girl utena had a huge impact on me and my politics, so i get how an anime can have that kind of importance to you! but that’s a show that directly engages with ideas about oppressive systems and how they function, how they perpetuate themselves, and how to escape them, while gurren lagann is. like, i guess it can be read that way on an allegorical level but it fundamentally does not have any interest in how anything works, you know?
also the city they build sure just seems like modern capitalist japan from what we see
It would be one thing if the show presented the Anti-Spiral as having a point, like if Spiral Power visibly corrupted or the universe got worse every time a Giga Drill Break was used or if Simon started abusing his power- but those things never happen inside the story and aren’t implied at all in the epilogue. (And also, Simon in the show never pursues power for it’s own sake, it’s in order to protect his loved ones and liberate them.)
i think the thing that breaks the whole story apart is the bit where simon fights that anti-spiral mech and blows up the entire city? like that seems like the moment where the show shows us very clearly “hot bloodedness and willpower isn’t going to just work every time, that will break shit” and then the show forgets it ever happens once simon gets out of prison and they immediately go back to shonen spirit will always win! what happens if the other guy has more spirit than you? don’t worry about it. when your shonen spirit kills thousands of innocents just keep going and have even more spirit! i’m not saying “the anti-spiral were the good guys! they should have won” obviously that would be a complete misread of the show, i just think the show should do something with that
the more i think about it the less satisfied i am with gurren lagann. and it isn’t just “well in getter robo this is evil so i can’t like gurren lagann anymore,” it’s that gurren lagann just doesn’t have answers to the questions that it keeps bringing up. like, yeah in the text of the show they can just keep going with hot blooded willpower through any obstacle without problems. i don’t like that! not that i’m opposed to that on its own merits, but if you bring in people saying “hot blooded willpower will not solve this problem, in fact hot blooded willpower is CAUSING the problem” and the heroes just go “no! we will use hot blooded willpower to fix everything forever and forever grow and get stronger! and it simply will not be a problem for us, don’t worry about it!” that is supremely unsatisfying to me. engage with the problems you set up!
like, getter robo is about this. in getter robo some of the characters go “we can just hot blooded willpower our way out of this!” when faced with the getter emperor, but some characters try and find other ways of living and fighting. getter robo ends ambiguously because the mangaka passed away, but it ends in a place where there is firmly hope, there are people trying to stop the getter emperor from coming into existence without all of humanity dying, there are people taking the gurren lagann approach of “don’t worry about it constantly using hot blooded shonen willpower to solve our problems will never go wrong,” and they come into conflict over it. getter robo is always thinking about and meditating on the problems it has set up, while always being sure to show some of the coolest mech action i’ve ever seen. cannot recommend it enough
some more cool bits i liked from getter
you’ll notice some of these are in a very different art style, that’s because there was a 20 year break in between getter robo g and getter robo go and ken ishikawa’s art style completely changed
.
actually i just figured out another piece of fundamental disconnect between me and gurren lagann
it’s all about masculinity, all about drill = penis, all about what it means to be a real man, rossiu is punished for not performing masculinity well enough, simon needs to grow into a true man like kamina, there is only one way to be a man and it’s to try and be as close to kamina as possible etc. and i’m fucking running from all that shit
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
the anti-spiral say “you are going to destroy the universe, you are constantly striving for expansion and domination over your foes, evolving until you’re so massive you consume everything in existence,” and team gurren says “nuh-uh!” and then just continues expanding.
And do they destroy the universe or consume everything in existence? No, they throw off the chains of whatever eco-fash argument the anti-spiral is operating on that had them living in strictly population-controlled literal holes in the ground, and they build a functioning society
the charge wasn’t that they’d immediately destroy the universe, it was that they would do so someday. maybe team gurren will successfully lead humanity to a functioning society, but like. if someone goes “you have too much hot blooded determination! it is going to destroy everything!” and the heroes go “that doesn’t matter! i have hot blooded determination!” and then just win you understand why that might not be satisfying?
getter robo is about this exact thing. that’s why i made the post. in getter robo the anti-spiral analogue show the heroes that if they continue their hot blooded determination they will create the getter emperor, who will destroy everything. the heroes go “well we can figure it out with our hot blooded determination!” and then this attitude leads to them creating the getter emperor because they did exactly what the villains said would lead to the getter emperor happening. in gurren lagann they do the exact same thing except it’s fine
I guess the question is, is there any validity to the belief that humanity thriving will necessarily lead to the destruction of the universe? Where does that belief come from? I see them, as I implied, as an analogue to the eco-fascists who tell us that modern society is a mistake and we’re going to destroy the world unless we smash all our TVs and return to hunter-gatherer tribes. There are always unsustainable and unethical ways for humanity to thrive, such as capitalism, and for humanity to continue to expand down this path will result in the destruction of the planet we live on. But it’s not the only way for humanity to thrive and expand, and we don’t have to return to monke in order to avoid destroying the world.
So if an eco-fascist were making that argument to me, my response would probably be something analogous to Team Gurren’s answer to it. Fuck you, we don’t have to destroy the world just to live well. I’ll have my cake and eat it too.
sure, but you need to have a fucking plan! they don’t have any plan for it, in that climate metaphor they’re much closer to a capitalist saying “you can’t restrict us! we’ll keep growing and using fossil fuel forever!” because THEY KEEP USING SPIRAL ENERGY TO DEFEAT THEM. they are never shown to find any other way, they just keep using spiral power and growing bigger and stronger. if they were shown to find an alternative that wasn’t going to lead to the destruction of the universe that’d be great! but they just keep using spiral power!
anyways this post was originally about getter robo and how it’s good and it does things that i think are interesting and compelling and makes me think about gurren lagann differently than i used to. i’m not trying to say i actually think the anti-spiral are the good guys or something, just that when gurren lagann is so clearly invoking the legacy of getter robo it’s disappointing and unsatisfying when it doesn’t actually do anything with that
Gainax and Trigger works have really high production quality, but are the very pinnacle of “anime made by anime fans who totally missed the point” lol
not always! sometimes they do a very good adaptation of a very good manga. but the more i learn about classic anime and manga the more i go “damn gainax truly invented nothing.” the “gainax pose” is just from getter!
not that originality is the end all be all of quality, but also they mostly just do it worse than the things they were inspired by
the “gainax pose” is just from getter!
I’ve been on a super robot binge and I genuinely forgot that Gunbuster existed lol.
i do need to watch gunbuster, but like. getter robo did it in 1974! i remember seeing people on forums in like 2010 talking abotu gainax as the end all be all of super robot mecha and though i’ve learned to never trust anime fans it’s still wild looking back and realizing how wrong they were. i guess giving them the benefit of the doubt maybe the getter manga just hadn’t been translated? but like, the way they talk about it you’d think gurren lagann had invented the idea of a robot with a drill (and of course that evangelion invented the idea of someone not wanting to pilot a robot or that a robot could be fucked up and have cosmic horror)
Gainax in shambles!!
infamously yeah, lmao. haven’t made anything in a decade
Certainly you have ensured that they never will again
Nah nice post :)
this is what did it, not the decades of financial mismanagement and fraud and driving off of all the talent lmao
bang bang bang
How could Studio Trigger do this?!
you’re right, i shouldn’t blame gainax for my own actions. i have to accept responsibility for killing gainax
![i read all of getter robo in 2 days and i don't know how they were allowed to make gurren lagann [spoilers for both]](https://hexbear.net/pictrs/image/22aa4bdf-d922-4420-ae6a-dc76754113c5.png){kind=link}