Gephyrophillia | Watch This Space #41

Originally Posted on 02/28/2003 by Jeff Harris

Today's the final day of Giant Robot Week, and what do I have to say about today's shows? See yesterday's update, because it's a encore presentation, only with Dai-Guard's opening, and yeah, they didn't show Low Brow . . . again (at least not during the allotted timeslot for GRW). Good shows and great episodes. Now that it's all over, what have we learned as a result?

- Neon Genesis Evangelion should NEVER be on Toonami. Yeah, it was cool on paper, but after Day Two's countless edits (and BOY, there were a lot of edits), it's apparent that you can't squeeze water out of a stone. Evangelion is more adult than Cartoon Network realized (could have sworn they had an adult block of some sorts), and to be honest, they should have been ashamed of themselves for even airing it on Toonami, a very kid-friendly block. They should be more ashamed of the fact that they're selling the more adult-skewering Death and Rebirth of Evangelion and End of Evangelion on the official site.

But if ADV Films wants to sell more Evangelion discs and tapes as a result of Giant Robot Week, mission accomplished! There's going to be a HUGE influx of new buyers of EVA, Dai-Guard, Robotech, and Martian Successor Nadesico discs, many of them never bought an ADV Films production, and now slowly drawn into the greatest library of anime on the planet.

- Speaking of Nadesico, we've learned that Nadesico isn't a mecha show.

Don't look at me like that, let me explain. You see, Toonami had a Giant Robot Week, and yes, there are giant robots present, but Nadesico isn't so giant-robot-oriented as the other shows during this week are. Nadesico is, plain and simple, a space comedy in the vein of Tenchi Muyo. Fun, love, war, anime fanatics, and of course giant robots make up the story, but it's foolish to just put emphasis on the giant robots. Look at the selection of the episodes chosen. Most of them were battle-driven, which certainly deviates the idea of the story. Newcomers to the series might not have been impressed by the selection of episodes we were given for this special week. Don't let that discourage you from getting more episodes.

Trust me, Nadesico is much better than you think!

- Squashed credits SUCK and should never be used again on Cartoon Network. You know, there's a reason why credits are made . . . they're there to give credit to where credit is due, namely the voice artists, creators, directors, and producers of the shows. Yeah, it sucks that ADV didn't provide Cartoon Network time-friendly end credits, like what Bandai did for most of their recent shows. Still, they didn't have to squash them down so we wouldn't see them. It was ugly and unnecessary, and I hope they never ever do it again.

- Dai-Guard and Robotech ROCKED! Probably the best days of the whole week were the days when these two shows were present. By the looks of the big board, Dai-Guard is the best-received of all the shows that aired this week, and why not? It's an anime about a trio of corporate workers who save Tokyo from huge aliens called Heterodynes in this very, very defective mecha unit called Dai-Guard under the supervision of their very paranoid bosses and the watchful eye of a military that was embarassed by them. In short, it's the perfect Toonami show! Oh, wait, did I just said that? Wonder if somebody listened (or in this case, read).

The other show that rocked was Robotech. We saw the first episode of the Macross saga and the final two episodes of the New Generation saga, the only Robotech saga that never aired on Toonami. I have my reasons why it was ignored, but considering how well-received the last two episodes were, I wonder if CN would find it in their hearts to get the rights back to the series, if not for Toonami, perhaps for that snazzy new SVES lineup they're planning tomorrow night. It could fit in along with the other old-school show the network has up there, Toonami vet G.I. Joe (it's been months now, and I still get goosebumps saying that G.I. Joe's a Toonami vet . . . wonder if I'll feel that way about new Toonami vets Nadesico and Evangelion).

Wonder why they kept those two shows for the last two days.

- Gigantor was good, but it was spaced out way too much, plus, they repeated one episode. And where the slag was Low Brow? We were promised Low Brow (it said so in the press release, and you'd think that we'd see it in the daytime along with the other Giant Robot shows, but alas, we didn't. Well, not in the 4 - 5 PM slot set for GRW. They spliced Low Brow into four parts without the closing credits (guess credits are overrated at Toonami). Kind of jarring, but it was still fun. Maybe they'll show it during The Iron Giant tonight without needless breaks.

Overall, today's grade was a four out of five, taking away a point for not showing Low Brow in its entirety but rather sliced in quarters and showing a repeat of Gigantor. For the total week, I'm giving Giant Robot a 3.6 out of 5. It's far from a perfect score, but it's little better than average. And this was in now ways an average week. Can I say it was better than Full Cycle, the 24-hour Toonami event in April 2000? Maybe, maybe not. We got nine new premiere episodes and three OTO premieres on Toonami this week whereas Full Cycle had only one premiere, which repeated four times in one day. But Cartoon Network failed to completely have fun with Giant Robot Week. They didn't take full advantage as they should have, which kind of left some fans with a sour taste in their mouths. Hope when they do this again, they'll learn what they should have done.

In short, Giant Robot Week was a little weak at the beginning, but made up for the early mistakes by the end of the week.

Until we are one, later.
Jeff Harris
CNX Creator/Webmaster
February 28, 2003