There is a clean line between a reference and an homage. References are the domain of Family Guy and Robot Chicken, they’re quotes, little acknowledgements, small jokes–not always made respectfully. An *homage* is something a bit different. More involved, more subtle, generally affectionate nods towards one’s influences. Anime has a rich, multi-layered history of homages. In the so-called “Daicon Lineage” alone you can trace a clean line through the original DAICON III and IV shorts through to Gunbuster, FLCL, Diebuster, Gurren Lagann, and Kill la Kill (this leaves out many, many smaller branches of this family), and it is just one of the more well-known families in the west, of which there are dozens. The homage has a well-earned place in the medium, and I’d argue that perhaps more than any other, many anime would not be what they are without wearing their influences on their sleeve.



SSSS.GRIDMAN is one such example. While the through-line in GRIDMAN specifically is clearly more indebted to tokutsatsu–the TV and film submedium that gave the world everything from Godzilla to Super Sentai (who you may well know as the Americanized Power Rangers)–the principle is the same. GRIDMAN lives and breathes kaiju, but there’s merely liking something a lot, and there’s loving something enough to want to contribute to it.

Let’s back up here. GRIDMAN’s reference-heaviness is not new information. Most abundant and well-documented is its overflowing plethora of Transformers references–everything from the main cast having color schemes based on the relatively obscure Shattered Glass subseries to shots carefully, lovingly nicked from the frequently (and perhaps unjustly!)-disrespected Transformers Armada. As a lifelong transfan, these are the things that have stood out most to *me*, but GRIDMAN is an entry in the franchise of the same name, and it should come as no surprise that it goes even harder on that affiliation than on anything outside the franchise.

Initially promoted as a reboot, SSSS seems to have wormed its way to stealth sequel status, tying together the original GRIDMAN as well as portions of the common-at-the-time heavily Americanized chop-job Stateside version; Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad. It does this subtly (see this twitter post), almost as a background element, and it is by no means a necessary factor to enjoy the show. I was only dimly aware of the franchise’s existence before SSSS, and am loving it now more than ever, but it’s telling about the obvious passion going on behind the scenes at Studio TRIGGER here. This is director Akira Amemiya’s first full-length for the studio (the previously produced Ninja Slayer From Animation is….an odd thing, and hard to classify), and whether it’s a case of long-honing one’s craft (the fellow is certainly not new to the industry, having been an animator on various projects for over a decade, and occasional director on some smaller ones) or simply pure love of the art, Amemiya threatens to here eclipse primary TRIGGER brain Hiroyuki Imaishi as the studio’s most skilled director.

Intrastudio GOAT conversations aside, it’s really quite amazing how the essence of homaging is woven into GRIDMAN’s actual plot itself. Main villain Akane Shinjo is quite the lonely otaku archetype.

We haven’t learned all the details yet–my hunch is they’ll come out in the last few episodes–but Akane is clearly lonely, deeply disconnected from society, and prone to burying herself in her hobby which is here, a pervasive love of all things Giant Rubbery Monster that I imagine is inspired in no small part by Amemiya himself. Akane is of course also the antagonist (at least for now), and her sociopathy–to the point of quite gleeful kaiju-delivered murder–is a pretty straightforward stripping-bare of the darker parts of the otaku psyche (or at least, that of the stereotypical otaku), and true to the show’s form, one or two of her more overtly “psycho” moments have been framed in visual language traced from Neon Genesis Evangelion. Her interests purvey all parts of her character, very much not in a way that’s healthy. As a nerdy megane who also has problems committing to a regular cleaning schedule myself, I can in some way relate.

This is in contrast to our protagonists, who have their own interests of course (obligatory glasses’d boy Shou Utsumi is no small nerd himself, and the two in fact share a conversation about kaijus–among other things–in the most recent episode) but also a healthy social life. They have interests, but are not consumed by them, as Akane, who literally lives in an apartment filled with trash bags, is.

So what does all this mean? It’s hard to say right now. GRIDMAN is at a very exciting place narratively where it could go just about anywhere, and as someone who is enthralled by novelty, I live for that sort of situation in my anime. Will Akane kill a member of the main cast? Will Alexis Kerib finally get off of Skype to fight GRIDMAN himself? Will Akane and Rikka make out? (Probably not, but, a girl can dream) Who knows! But wherever it is, it will probably be a thrillride both on a base “holy shit that robot just punched that big fucking lizard into a building” level and on a “going back and pausing to see if that’s really a shot homage or if you’re just hallucinating” level, and really, that’s a pretty damn good thing for an anime to be.