Anime Review: SSSS Gridman
Yuta has amnesia, that’s true, yet somehow Tokyo doesn’t seem quite right to him. Was it always so foggy in the city? And why is he the only one who can see kaiju (giant monsters) just casually hanging out in the distance? And did old model computers have superheroes talking directly to people from the monitor screens? The whole thing seems…off, somehow.
A few answers are forthcoming when a kaiju attacks and now everyone can see it. The hero Yuta’s been seeing is Hyper Agent Gridman, and Yuta can combine with him through the computer Junk to become a monster fighter in the real world! Yuta’s classmates Sho (fan of old TV series about heroes fighting giant robots) and Rikki (whose mother owns the junk shop/coffee house that Junk is in) assist as best they can from home base. Gridman defeats the monster, yay!
When the high school students wake up the next morning, all the damage from the kaiju attack has vanished. Was it all a dream they shared? But then they discover that people who were directly destroyed by the monster stay dead…except that now everyone other than our heroes remembers them dying years ago. What on definitely real Earth is going on here?
This Trigger Studios anime is a sequel to 1993’s Denkou Choujin Gridman (adapted to the U.S. market as Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad, a tokusatsu (special effects) series loosely tied to the long-running Ultraman franchise. That’s not immediately obvious as it first appears to be a reboot, but by the end you can tell.
The one behind the kaiju is quickly revealed to be Yuta’s classmate Akane Shinjo. She creates models for possible monsters and then her alien “servant” Alexis Kerib brings them to life to punish those Akane feels have wronged her. Akane is the prettiest and most popular girl in school, so it might seem that she’d have better things to do. Her motivations are part of the mystery of the series.
Four oddballs in suits show up, calling themselves the “Neon Genesis Junior High Students” (only one of them could pass for the right age.) They turn out to be other Hyper Agents whose role is to provide assist weaponry for the heroes.
Joining the other side is Anti, a kaiju with an alternate human form but who is utterly clueless about human society. Akane made him with the mindset that Gridman is Anti’s personal archenemy, which becomes a problem when Anti keeps getting stomped and starts needing to have another purpose in life. Honestly, Anti has the most satisfying character arc in the show.
By Trigger standards, this is a sedate show that doesn’t go over the top as much as their more famous creations. In between battles with giant monsters, the emphasis is on quiet interactions between characters and the unraveling of the setting’s mysteries. Sometimes it’s more unsettling if the villain isn’t a cackling madwoman but someone who calmly explains that you like her because she deliberately made you that way.
The CGI for heroes and monsters works well, but it’s a huge boost when the hand-drawn moment comes out.
The amnesiac hero thing is a bit cliche.
Overall, an okay show. I enjoyed it, but I also took a long break in the middle to watch other things.
Here’s the opening song of the original series!
