Review - Alien Defender Geo-Armor - Kishin Corps
Reviewed by Richard Brownell on 10.5.2009.
Score: 6/10
Several years ago, some friends and I decided to watch an unusual mech anime taking place during World War II. We made it about forty minutes in before giving up on it, but after long last I took my own time to delve back into it with a fresh outlook and a lot more anime viewed in years past. That anime is Kishin Corps, or as Pioneer called it, Alien Defender Geo-Armor: Kishin Corps. Despite our initial difficulty with the show's opening episode, it's not that bad.
Kishin Corps is the product of director Takaaki Ishiyama, who is mostly known for his storyboard work on classic anime like the Record of Lodoss War series and newer anime such as Naruto. Kishin Corps is based on a novel by Masaki Yamada. The anime is an OVA, released as seven episodes, all present in Pioneer's release, which may be difficult to come by these days.
The year is 1941 and World War II is in full swing. In this work of historical fiction, a number of things are different from true history. One key difference is that aliens are attacking the Earth. But even more important is that we have adapted alien technology to make it possible to create gigantic steam-powered mechs. Oddly enough, WWII's conflicts continue just as if the aliens weren't around, which is a symptom of the one of the key flaws in Kishin Corps: the aliens are completely unimportant.
There are three important groups in this story: the Kanto army, the Nazis, and the Kishin Corps. The aliens are simply extra, an excuse to have powerful technology. There are hints that they are allied with a certain group, but in all seven episodes, they barely touch on the subject. The aliens also have no communication, pose no threat in a fight, have no known motivation, and for some reason use old Tommy Guns as weapons. They simply serve to complicate a plot that could use some tweaking to begin with.
The story opens with the main character, Taishi, being entrusted with protection of a control module for a giant robot. After an eerie and relatively powerful opening, the show immediately shifts to a more light-hearted story. Taishi is in a group of children just trying to make their way in war-torn Europe. This almost hour-long opening episode is a double-edged sword for potential viewers. It feels like a fully-realized world and really sets the stage for the rest of the show. But at the same time it feels slow, painfully so. The story simply doesn't move fast. But after you get past the first episode, the rest are all about a half an hour each and feel much more like a regular TV show.
Taishi's control unit is integral to the show. The enemy wants to get their hands on it to create evil giant mechs to win WWII. The Kishin Corps are a military group of no specific country, but are made up of people from many Allied nations. They have three mechs under their power and having another control unit would certainly be nice. It's not long before Taishi joins up with the Kishin Corps, which is made up of a number of colorful characters. Most of the Kishin Corps, from the old steam engineer to one of the blonde Braun twins, are entertaining to watch and really feel like part of the story. The nazis of course are pretty much just evil nazis. And the main bad guy of the show just comes across as evil for the sake of evil.
While the characters are important, especially Taishi's progression, everything comes down to the mechs. They are what gets the Kishin Corps through its conflicts and they are the central pieces of the show. The Kishin Corps has three mechs, all steam-powered which is a nice change of pace from most mech shows. One is your standard humanoid-shaped giant mech. It is transported by a steam-powered train and is used in much of the show. The second is a submarine mech which isn't used as much but plays an important role. The last is a flying mech, which most of the time is in plane form. The steam aspects of the mechs is the most interesting part, especially regarding the one on the train. The mech battles aren't very exciting when compared to other shows in the genre. But the mechs do get the job done most of the time.
Kishin Corps is a bit of an enigma in that it's got a lot of great ingredients to make a good show, but it's like the creators used the wrong recipe. Giant robots are cool. Fighting against nazis is cool. Having a number of interesting characters, a plot that isn't paper thin, and aliens added to the mix can't be bad things. But it just doesn't work. It doesn't fall completely flat, but it's not winning any awards either. Having aliens that serve almost no purpose is the biggest bad move, followed closely by having mech battles that just aren't very exciting.
But Kishin Corps does have redeeming qualities. Taishi is a good character, as are many of the supporting roles. It's mostly the enemies that are lacking in depth. And there are a fair amount of plot twists that work well as the series goes on. The ending will probably leave many wishing there had been more to the story than what it turned out to be. But there are also those viewers that found simply having all the ingredients in Kishin Corps is enough to make it a great show despite how poorly I feel it comes together.
