Gunbuster - Genre

Genre

Gunbuster follows the genre of Super Robot anime, started by the Mazinger Z series, but also contains some elements of the Real Robot genre by showing mass produced versions of the titular robot (called "Sizzlers") as well as previous smaller combat mecha called "RX" which are used along with bigger battleships in space warfare, elements seen previously in Gundam and Macross. It is notable for being one of the few anime series to deal with the concept of time dilation in a realistic way, and indeed makes it one of its central plot elements. Though the scientific accuracy of the series is variable (it posits the invention of acceleration compensators, artificial gravity and warp drives by the year 2015) it includes many hard science fiction elements, and provides a consistent technological frame if one assumes that human technological progress has been put into overdrive in order to wage war against the aliens.

Gunbuster is also notable as being a spiritual predecessor to Anno's more famous Neon Genesis Evangelion in that the themes of space opera and mecha action take somewhat of a back seat to various romances, rivalries and other relations between the main characters, made more complex by the differing speeds of their aging due to time dilation (for Noriko, the 40 year or so timespan of the major part of the series takes roughly about a year). It is also similar to the later Evangelion in that it begins as a high-school anime, with the students at Okinawa space high school for girls competing for places among the elite pilots sent to fight the space monsters. This pattern has since become something of an anime cliché. Noriko also shares many personality traits with Evangelion's Shinji Ikari, particularly in her lack of confidence in herself, and Jung Freud, a Soviet pilot who befriends Noriko and Kazumi, is regarded by many fans as a prototype of Asuka Langley Sohryu, right down to her red hair and arrogant attitude.