Shin Getter Robo: Ascension ADV 75 minutes English/Japanese English Subtitles 10/23/2001

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As much as I love Getter Robo, Go Nagai and Hironobu Kageyama with the entirety of my heart, there's one thing that I can't get behind. That's the flagrant abuse of Eskimos (or Inuit, if you prefer) by bio-organic-metallic alien goo people from the Moon. For shame Shin Getter Robo production crew, directors, and writers. The Inuit have long been the forgotten minority of our vast and multicultural globe. I wouldn't have figured that the likes of you would have been the ones to single them out for this kind of horrid abuse. Otherwise, though, I guess your show's still holding out pretty good.

 

These next three of episodes of the show that was my favorite in the entire world before it was even conceived continue to hold their own with the introduction of another fun loving Getter robot piloted by the man that very well could be the archetype for the original super hardcore ultra-badass. That man is Ryoma Nagare who, unsurprisingly, wasn't destroyed in the giant missile explosion that he was at the epicenter of those long thirteen years ago. Such is the whimsical nature of giant robot physics. Blah blah blah. There's some sort of plot involved in this show, I'm sure, but it takes a backseat to your general "Getter Beam"-ery and giant spiked knuckles punching into piles of black goo that once was your beloved brother or pet. My only real problem with this series of episodes is that the bleeding heart character that is almost one of the ten commandments of Robo-dom rears their ugly head. And, to my terrible unfathomable despair, it was the one I least expected. It was freaking BENKEI.

Oh man, oh man. Of anyone why did it have to be Benkei? I would've loved for it to be Hayato, just to give another reason to kick him to the curb but, man, Benkei, even the little girl whose brother go turned into goo and subsequently had his face smashed in by Getter spiked knuckles put on a tougher facade than you did when it came time to bust up some buildings and maybe kill a few innocent people in the process. Hey man, collateral damage knows no bounds where robots are concerned. That's a lesson you might want to consider learning one of these days. Anyway, not only is Ryoma still alive, but he gives new meaning to our own meager existence with the very first time his strained vocal cords bellow out "GETTA TOMAHAWK!" You know, I find myself more and more enamored with this dub as time goes on, it seems to me it's just the sometimes horrid script that's holding them back (Dr. Saotome in particular totally kicks me in the throat). Nothing big, you know, just one of your standard weird ADV semi-hack jobs from the turn of the millennium. I dunno, I come from a time when Manga had no issues changing "little girl" to "semen drenched lolita whore", or something to that effect. And, I mean, damn. There are people before me that grew up with Tobor: The 8th Man. As far as things go, we could do worse!

 

Besides, it's ROBOT anime. Is there a single person out there that cares whether or not the script is 100% true to the intent of the original creators? I guess if Andrew watched it he might have some concerns, but I imagine he would've collapsed from anaphylactic shock long before that. The powers of robot anime are a wide and mysterious thing. For the rest of us not slowly slipping into a brain dead coma, Shin Getter Robo delivers what it delivers and it delivers it in spades. When the kids are booted out the door so that the real Getter Team can get back into action and totally kick some alien doctor behind, sans Hayato Jin, it's like a resurgence of the best feeling the world has ever known. You know, I hardly think going without Hayato can be considered a bad thing. There's one lady in the show already.