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Posted by Tom:
Gravion

   There's a genre of anime that focuses on giant robots that combine in
   midair to form even larger giant robots, often to the strains of some
   sort of theme song mentioning justice. I had thought that this was
   lost to short parodies, like Gekiganger in Nadesico or the funny one
   in one of the Galaxy Angel series. But then along came Gravion, which
   once again places the super-robots at the center of attention (even as
   it mixes them with elements of a maid anime).

   The story focuses on Eiji, who infiltrates a castle to try to rescue
   his sister. He doesn't immediately find her, but is instead roped into
   piloting the G-Attacker, a plane that combines up with various other
   drills, planes, and small giant robots to form a large giant robot
   that can use the power of gravity and shouted attack names to fight
   monster from space. Along with Eiji, pilots include Luna, a girl who
   lost her father to an alien attack; Ena, a maid; the large-breasted
   Mizuki; the mysterious girl Leele, and Toga, a boy who was raised in
   the castle and trained to pilot the core Gran Kaiser. Other characters
   include the rich Sandman who owns the castle where everyone lives, his
   sidekick [DEL: robin :DEL] raven, and the various maids who maintain
   the robots or the people in them.

   It's an interesting choice to tell the story from Eiji's perspective,
   as it's Toga who pilots the core unit. IIRC, Eiji winds up forming one
   of the legs/feet of the combined robot.

   I think the problem with Gravion is that it introduces the elements of
   what could turn out to be an okay show, but then utterly fails to
   resolve any of them. There's a monster of the week, but we never learn
   what the monsters are after (apart from them wanting to destroy
   humanity). Eiji doesn't find his sister. We learn that one of the
   non-Toga characters can pilot the Gran Kaiser, but then he or she
   never does it again.

   There is the occasional good bit. I got quite the chuckle out of the
   battle that they fought on a beach in Okinawa, in which they
   re-animated all the stock footage so the characters were in bathing
   suits. But overall, this show smacked of wasted potential.

   Now, I could change this after seeing the second series (Gravion
   Zwei), which could actually resolve some of the outstanding series.
   But for now, I'll call Gravion just okay.