Back in the 1970's, Go Nagai made a couple of giant robot series including Getter Robo and Getter Robo G. Then, in the 1990's, he went back to all his original series from the 70's and turned them into warped anime with cursing, nudity and plenty of violents. Getter Robo Armageddon is no exception.
The story takes off right after the Moon Wars (which was originally a CD drama). The three original Getter pilots have all disolved, but a new group of Invaders come back to Earth and now it's up to Ryoma, Hayato and Musashi to combat them, while at the same time fighting their mentor, Dr. Saotome. The easiest way to describe the story is just wierd and violent. Most of the stuff in these 13 episodes don't make any sense at all, but, frankly, it doesn't have to. 70's mecha shows didn't have to make a lot of sense and they did fine. Getter Robo Armageddon trully understands what 70's giant robot shows were all about before Gundam rolled along.
The animation is smooth and very vivid and the soundtrack is done perfectly featuring some nice guitar. Action-wise, you should be pretty impressed with Getter Robo. There is always atleast two kick-butt fights an episodes. In fact, the last episode is nothing but action. The best part about all this is that it never gets boring. It's always insane and intense no matter how many times you watch it.
f there's one thing that must be said about Getter Robo, it's that this show moves. If not for the fact that you can hear the audio, you'd think you were watching on fast forward. Fight, flashback, fight in flashback, fight now, rush to save someone, fight, non-sensical explanation, fight. That's about how this show goes.
But is it bad? Not really. It's quite retro, with the robots and character designs straight out of the 70s. It's clearly the sequel to an older series from that era, and the source of some of its incoherence is the expectation that the viewer has seen that show (I haven't and would have been scratching my head if the show left enough time to ponder over things).
There is one issue I had: the English dub is probably the worst ADV dub I've heard in a while. The characters yell all the time, and more than a few have particularly annoying voices. It all eventually blends into the show, so as to become almost (but not quite) unnoticeable--if you were rushing around this much, you'd probably yell all the time, too. Despite its problems, the dub's not really the reason for my 3 star rating.
Ultimately, the lack of coherence is what prevents this from being a great, or even particularly good, show. Getter Robo does achieve its obvious goal: action. It doesn't do *anything* else at all--it doesn't even try. If all that hasn't scared you off, the version I'm reviewing, the Power Pack, contains all 4 DVDs at a hefty discount, so Getter Robo is a good value if you appreciate pure, inexplicable action.
ADV took great care into bringing this series to the US. There are a lot of good extras on the discs including textless openings and closings, LD covers and inserts, production sketches and interviews with the dub cast. It looks like the guys at ADV had a lot of fun working on it. And when the fans are having fun and the guys who work on it are having fun, you've got a perfect title.
So should you buy it? If your a mecha fan, yes. If you like tons of action, yes. However, if you want a well told story with lots of character development, look somewhere else. This ain't no Gundam. Overall, Getter Robo is the mecha fan's ultimate anime. Especially to those who were big fans of the original 1970's series.
BEAST
FROM 20,000 FATHOMS is available from DVDEmpire.com
VALLEY
OF THE GWANGI is available from DVDEmpire.com
THE
BLACK SCORPION is available from DVDEmpire.com
