破邪大星弾劾凰 [ダンガイオー] / Great Planet Evil-Destroyer Dangaio / Hyper Combat Unit Dangaio

A 3 episode lesson on how to design Animé.

Just so that we have a variety of OVAs in our humble blog, we'll move on from "so bad it's good" to "so good it should have had more episodes".

Hyper Combat Unit Dangaio (破邪大星ダンガイオー Haja Taisei Dangaiō) is an anime OVA series produced and animated by AIC and Artmic and released in Japan in 1987. The remaining episodes were released in 1988 & 1989  respectively. Dangaioh featured character designs by creator Toshiki Hirano, mechanical designs by Shoji Kawamori, and animation direction by Masami Ōbari. Moreover, much of the production crew from Fight! Iczer-1 worked on this series as well, on top of this, Mayumi Sho voices the protagonists of both series.

Disclaimer: Today's review is based upon the latest officially available edition from the OVA, that is, the Blu-Ray released in Japan in 2016, which contains the original three episodes in Japanese language only, without the wrong subtitles from the first VHS edition by U.S Renditions, released in 1990 with only the first episode. After the demise of U.S. Renditions in the mid-1990s, Manga Entertainment re-released Dangaioh in 1996 as Dangaioh: Hyper Combat Unit, which was an English-dubbed compilation of episodes 2-3. For reasons unknown, episode 1 was omitted from this release. This incomplete version was re-released on DVD in 2003 and you can find it for around $60 dollars in used markets. However, my humble recommendation is that you look for the 2016 Blu Ray Japanese import edition, because it's simply the best in quality.

Beautiful heroic ladies.

Beautiful heroic mecha!

If you Google Dangaio, the first thing you'll notice is that is misspelled "Dangioh". The second thing you'll notice is that most of the available reviews are based on the 1990 VHS tape, with poor subtitles that clearly spoil the experience, for even the mos enthusiast fans. Third, most of the reviews state that the series lacks heavily in the plot department, which again, has to do with either early import versions, or poor fan subs. Now, if you're like me, watching the official Japanese edition, things change drastically in terms of experience, so don't be fooled into thinking this little 80's gem is nothing but a piece of shit, because it isn't.

The story is pretty straight forward: 4 cybernetically enhanced random people with psychic powers wake up in the middle of a war, knowing nothing but the fact they want to get out of there as soon as they can. Little do they know, they were specially trained to pilot the Dangaio, the ultimate space robot. 

Character wise, internet people have complained they're underdeveloped, and that we never learn anything from their lives. Wrong! fucking wrong! maybe paying attention and learning to read will improve the experience. Mia Alice, the leader of the team has psychic powers that could easily scare away the X-Men's Phoenix, yet she hates violence, and doesn't want to have anything to do with it. Pai Thunder, is her opposite, a very strong woman with fighting skills that would make a great match for She-Hulk. Lambda Nom, the youngest and weakest member of the team. She hardly remembers how to summon her kinetic energy powers. And last but not least, the only man in the gang, Rol Kuran, gifted with kinetic super speed. Altogether, they fly the coolest airplanes that can form the Dangaio super robot. As every episode goes by, they meet different people from their past, so they do have moments where they remember where they come from or what they used to do or work for in the past. Doctor Tarsan, is the scientist behind the group, and while he works for the bad guys, he always finds a way to let his children be free and use the Dangaio for dealing with evil doers (his own bosses). 

Fuck you!

Teamwork.

Plot wise, our four heroes have to either escape or face the Bunkers led by Yoldo and his minions (they all seem to have been designed as homage to 70's/early 80's super robot villains). Out of all of them Gil Berg (who looks exactly like Roy Fokker) is the one that stands out, and has a hidden agenda towards Mia Alice. Unfortunately, with only three episodes, I really felt had they made more episodes, the overall rating of this greatly underrated OVA would have been very different. To put it in simpler terms, we all want to cum, so when we're about to, it's not nice to be left there hopeless.  

A new 13-episode series named Great Dangaioh ran from April 5, 2001 through July 5, 2001 on TV Asahi in Japan. The series was created and directed by Hirano, and produced by AIC. Hirano's wife, Narumi Kakinouchi, was the animation director. Originally perceived as a completely different story, the series was revealed halfway as the sequel to the OVA series.

The series was licensed in North America by Viz Media, featuring an English dub produced in the Philippines by Telesuccess Productions.

Music wise, I'd say the soundtrack is a clear "throwback" to the 1970's super robot Animé shows, therefore, it could be again misunderstood by younger audiences who'd prefer to stick to 80's synth wave, basically because this is an OVA from that decade. Homage is a good thing kids. "Cross Fight" by Mitsuko Horie & Ichiro Mizuki is the opening theme for the first two episodes, while  "Cheap Thrills" by Hidemi Nakai, is the more updated rock theme opening the last episode. "Kokoro no Honesty (Honesty of the Heart)" and "Who's Gonna Win" are the ending themes by Mitsuko Horie and Hidemi Nakai respectively. The official soundtrack was released on CD in 2007.

The original 1990 U.S. Renditions VHS tape.

The fantabulous Blu Ray set!

The animation style and mecha design is perhaps one of the best I've seen in my 36 years of life. You can tell the show has Shoji Kawamori all over! Even some of the designs are hints at what he'd do in future Macross sequels. The color palette is also brilliant! You can see the 80's vividly alive and well in this OVA. Moreover, the HD remaster is easily a top 5 of all the classic Animé that have received the same treatment in the last 10 years. Strangely enough, the third episode is not as pristine as the first two. Probably, producers lost the original reels, or they were damaged at some point so they had to work with what was left. Anyway, the art made for this OVA could easily be a 101 lesson on how to design classic Animé characters/Mecha, and no, I'm not biased, just honest. 

Hyper Combat Unit Dangaio is an 80's homage/update of the original super robot Animé genre from the 60's & 70's where you used to have a team of young members that had unique skills that allowed them to control a fantastic giant robot. Usually, the bad guys had demonic looks and would be hidden far away in a super secret planet/fortress. On each episode the heroes would face a "villain of the week" type of enemy until the series would reach its climax and get into the real final battle. Since Dangaio is only three episodes, we don't really get the luxury of seeing our heroes face the big bad guy. Instead, we're given an unexpected revenge that leaves an open ending, suggesting there could be more episodes in the future. Obviously, none of this happened, and the 2001 remake series is only 50% a sequel that also failed to have an ending since it was cut short from 26 to only 12 episodes due to poor ratings.

The most powerful robot in the universe!

Mia Alice may look weak but...

Overall, don't let other people ruin the experience of witnessing forgotten history. Dangaio is the second OVA ever to be brought to the USA by the late U.S. Renditions (the other being Gunbuster). The artistic work by Shoji Kawamori is reason alone for you to get the fantastic Blu-Ray release of this underrated , and clearly not seen by many online reviewers, super robot homage adventure. Moreover, here you have a story with a lot of pros: Great voice acting (the original Japanese actors, that is), awesome movie-like quality character designs, great animation, giant robots, and the overall look of the whole story makes me think this is an A+ OVA series in my book. 

The cons? there are no cons! save for you not running to find a copy of it!

The opening for the first two OVAs, with the highly criticized by "overnight experts" dated theme:



Same opening but in stunning HD as taken from the Blu-Ray release:



"Kokoro No Heart" the song used in the opening for the third OVA (I didn't find the opening, sorry): 



The ending:



A fan made AMV to push you into craving for some Dangaio:



Manga Entertainment's Dangaio trailer:



The Dangaio action figure set: