NoaIzumiAnime Review: Gate Keepers
May 8th 2009 14:35
Gate Open!
The year is 1969, and Japan is experiencing an economic boom. But a grave threat to humanity has reared its head. The Invaders can appear anywhere, as anyone, and are almost invincible. Only a team of teenagers, the Gate Keepers, stand in defense of Earth.
One (hyphenated) word describes Gate Keepers: Retro-cool. It’s not just set in 1969, the tone and feel makes it seem like it was made in 1969. The characters, plot, and animation are complex enough for a 21st century audience, and the animation is up-to-date (somewhat lacking in CGI, but you don’t need CGI to tell a good story), but there a lot of great old-school elements. Gate Keepers has teenagers with special powers, a secret base underneath the high school, a worldwide organization (AEGIS) that fights the aliens, cool gadgets and transforming vehicles, all kinds of neat stuff. The music also contributes to the nostalgic feel.
The Invaders are easily the best part of the whole series. They infiltrated human society years before, so they appear as human (shades of Invasion of the Body Snatchers), and on a signal, they gather together and transform into these men-in-black with suitcases that shoot energy beams, and they can combine to form giant equipment or monsters. (So cool!) Their origin is a mystery, and remains so throughout most of the series, although it is explained to a certain point by the end. They’re pretty much invulnerable to conventional weapons, so it falls to certain people (the Gate Keepers) who have the power to channel extra-dimensional energy (the Gates) to fight them (Gate attacks turn Invaders into harmless crystals).
The Invaders
The characters are well-written. There are about a half dozen core characters, and the series has enough time to develop them fairly well. The two leads (and the first two Gate Keepers in Japan) are Ruriko and Shun, who turn out to be childhood friends, although they haven’t seen each other in years. Shun has room for development, since his father died under unknown circumstances, and Shun has not forgiven him to leaving the family. The other characters have a fair amount of time as well, some of them getting episodes of their own, and their personalities as well as their Gate powers have a lot of variety (Big Boss is probably my personal favorite). It also turns out that not all the Gate Keepers are good guys.
No complaints about the story, either. Many of the early episodes focus on finding new Gate Keepers, and later the Invaders adapt and change strategies, forcing the Gate Keepers and AEGIS to rise to the occasion. Gate Keepers also shows a serious side when friends and mentors are found to actually be Invaders, forcing the kids to fight against people they know. On the lighter side, there are a few one-shot episodes that come straight out of regular high school comedies, such as the one about the ghost that haunts the girls’ dormitory.
The Gate Keepers
The romance arc between Shun and Ruriko is rather conventional. Not only does it take almost the whole series for them to admit their feelings for one another, another Gate Keeper has eyes for Shun and is not shy about it, making a classic love triangle. But, even if we’ve seen this pattern before, the writers still manage to keep it fresh, and the romantic angle plays a key role in the finale.
Unusually for anime, but fitting the setting, there’s also an anti-communist vein to Gate Keepers. One of the Gate Keepers is Chinese, and in a flashback, we see that her brother and grandfather were taken away by the Communist authorities (reference to the Cultural Revolution, perhaps?).
Probably the biggest complaint about the series is the DVD organization. Each disc only has three episodes, and some light extras. It seems like the producers could have put four or five eps on each disc without cutting anything out, so instead having to make room for eight discs in your collection, you’d only have to make room for five or six. There’s no box set, either. Fortunately, all of the discs are fairly inexpensive even at full price, and good bargains can be found with a little searching.
Great Moments: Several candidates, including the mecha playing piano and Big Boss’ Gate awakening. But the winner has to be Ruriko’s afro wig in episode 4, with Shun’s reaction to the secret base a close second.
Geeking out: It’s most likely sheer coincidence, but Megumi’s Gate power (an energy shield) is very similar to Violet Parr’s superpower in The Incredibles, and the two have similar personalities as well (at least at first).
Extras: Art galleries, special opening and closing.
Summary: Great fun, and an excellent mix of humor, romance, and drama, with an old-school feel. Grade: A minus.
Age rating: 13 and up. Some fan service and violence, but Invaders are the only ones killed.
The cover of the second DVD
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