Getter Go, Shin Getter & Getter Arc - Manga Analysis

[Mechanical Flesh]

Ahh, it's been a while.

Disclaimer: since there was no manga section in the forum I thought this was the next best thing, the 3 story arcs I'm going to cover were written between the early 90's and the early 2000's. They certainly do not belong among the classic, but I felt they needed to be discussed nonetheless.

So, I've already taken a look at the first Getter mangas, which covered the Getter Robot and Getter Robot G arcs, originally written and illustrated back in the mid 70's. Now it's time for Ishikawa's second wave, or second generation of Getters, which he worked on until his death in 2004. Only one volume, the second half of the Getter Arc manga, is left to be published here in Italy, which will presumably come out during December. I've already acquired all the previous volumes, so I think the time has come for me to start reading, re-telling and analizing them.

It will be a pleasure to discuss with you guys about some of the topics these mangas will bring up. Bye for now 

[TheMazingerZ]

Oh man! I've really been missing your manga reviews a lot!!! Please, do share them here bro, and thanks for hooking us up.

}D

[Mechanical Flesh]

Getter Robot Go - Chapter 1


The story begins with a scene many of you might be familiar with: in the first OAV of Shin Getter VS Neo Getter, right after the opening credits, we see a random dude from the army trying to pilot Test Machine 2 and having some problems with the G-forces.. Machines 1 and 3 approach and try to perform the combination to save the poor guy, but something goes wrong and the young soldier dies in the accident. The scene in the manga is more gruesome that the one from the OAV: in the latter, Machine 2 fails to dock properly, flips and explodes in a puff of smoke, while here the jet gets crushed. Kinda like what happened to Michiru and the Poseidon Machine in the Armageddon OAVs. Ugh 


Scene cuts to a sport stadium where some athletic events are taking place. Here we see one of our protagonists, Ichimonji Go, representing his school while taking part in the various races and competitions. His teacher doesn't stop scolding him though, in his opinion Go is underperforming for some reason. And that's not just the gym teacher thinking that: ol' Jin Hayato has been observing Go for quite a while now, and has decided to see if he may be a good Getter Team member candidate. Go's strength, agility and reflexes are put to test in a brief fight against Hayato's goons, after which he manages to escape the stadium and return home.


But problems seem to have just begun for Go, cause after a few minutes a monstruously huge man is seen heading towards his house, and then.. this happens:





This mofo is not normal. Period.


He gets to Go's place, takes out a pair of machine guns from underneath his coat and opens fire on everything, thankfully Go is upstairs so he's not injured at the moment. Well, the giant starts looking for him, but Go catches him unguarded and swings a metal baseball bat to his face, with all his might. And.. not even a bleeding nose. The monster just stands there smirking, while Go keeps smacking it with his bat over and over, till it becomes a bent mess. The giant overpowers Go easily, a single punch sends our hero flying against the wall, but the kid is quick and manages to take one of the enemy's machine guns from the ground, points it at the monster and pulls the trigger. After the smoke from the burst clears, the truth is revealed: beneath the thin layer of skin, the man-looking thing is in reality a cyborg, a robotic frame with a weird alien-looking face placed at the center of the chest (reminds me a bit of Krang.. but way scarier).


"METAL BEAST" shouts someone in a van, where Hayato and some lab staff are monitoring the whole scene via satellite. Apparently, this monster shares some traits with the metal beasts from Armageddon, only this one is human-sized rather than Super Robot sized. Anyway, Go understands he can't defeat the cyborg with the weapons at his disposal, so he tries to escape the menace, running at a sustained speed of 100 meters per second! (data provided by the scientists in the van) speaking of which, Hayato decides to let the fight continue and not help Go, thinking that this will be the perfect test to see once and for all if he's fit to pilot the Getter. Man, this is even more cruel than what Ryoma and Hayato had to do back in the day to prove their worth..


At last, Go reaches a construction site, and with the metal beast still following him, he decides to stop and stand against the monster, and counterattack! He finds some steel rods, a hammer and an axe, and starts charging at the beast throwing the metal bars as if they were javelins. The giant blocks some of the rods, but a few manage to pierce it and nail it to the wall, at which point Go jumps at him screaming and, with a vertical slice, cuts the head of the monster in two. The beast is not dead yet, though: some strange tentacles come out wiggling from the wounds on the metal carcass.. and right at that moment, when all hope is lost, a gigantic fist comes crashing through the walls and pillars of the building at amazing speed, punching with a final, devastating blow the remains of the metal beast into a gory pulp. A man is standing on the mechanical limb, looking at an exhausted Go. The boy asks:"Who are you?". The man on the arm answers:


"My name is Jin, Jin Hayato. And from now on, I'll show you hell."

[Mechanical Flesh]

Getter Robot Go - Chapter 2


The second chapter opens up with an oh-so-cliché monologue from the main villain of this story, Professor Lando. And he looks even more stereotypical than you'd imagine, haha: long white beard, one-eyed, big robot horns and wierd fantasy-inspired robes. Imagine a mix between Doctor Hell and Emperor Brai from Getter Robot G, that's the evil mastermind here  as I was saying, he's dispatching orders to his subordinate and telling to himself how great he is and how good world domination will feel etc. when on the main monitor the face of Hayato appears: Jin tells Lando he's just another delusional crazy basterd, and that he'll ruin any plans the mad scientist has in mind. Heh, I feel like this lil' chat was obligatory, right? Every super robot story has one, after all.


But what happened to Go? We see him right as he regains consciousness, in a helicopter surrounded by people he doesn't know, a bunch of dudes with rifles and a young woman with a katana. They tell him there's no time for explanations, cause in 1 minute they'll reach their target: a hospital. Why a hospital, Go asks. Whoops, too late they're already there and the soldiers have started killing the patients inside. Yup. And Go is just as dumbfounded as you probably are right now. He punches one of the soldiers, takes his gun and asks him why they're doing this.. and a moment later, a kid standing behind him transforms into an alien mess.. that's the only way to describe it, claws, weird membranes and 500 teeth: basically if you saw the Armageddon OVAs you know what I'm talking about, these are the same fukers.


Heh, guess what, Go decides to help the soldiers kill the monsters. The young woman is helping too, slicing and chopping up all the aliens that come near her. She tells go that what they're fighting are not humans, but instead human corpses that have been revived with the help of cybernetic implants: zombies. In fact, some of them start growing machine guns and rotating-barrel miniguns from their chests and arms, and Go is forced to take cover in a dimly lit room.. the zombie factory. Go turns around and is horrified at the sight of dozens upon dozens of big transparent canisters filled with liquid, containing a miriad of mutilated and deformed half-robotical human bodies, even children ones.


Go goes berzerk, he swears to himself he'll kill all of these monsters and tear the whole hospital down, but after a few seconds an enormous monster head appears in front of our group: a metal beast. Go and the others get out, right as the gigantic mechanism crawls out of the depths in which it was built. The young lady contacts Hayato and asks him to launch the Getter, Jin grants permission.. until a scientist (again, the whole battle scene is being monitored by satellites) informs Hayato that Go is trying to take on the metal beast by himself. Yes, we see him clinging as hard as possible to one of the monster's tentacles with one hand, while holding his rifle in the other, all while shouting "NOW YOU REALLY PISSED ME OFF!!!". Hayato is impressed, he wants to see to which extents Go is able to push himself.


So he cancels the Getter launch.

[Mechanical Flesh]

Getter Robot Go - Chapter 3


Go runs and jumps from tentacle to tentacle, until he reaches the metal beast's cockpit. Yup, these monsters are piloted just like the old mechasaurus and oni beasts. Go tries to kill the pilot with his rifle, but the glass canopy is bulletproof and doesn't shatter.. thankfully the lady soldier has the solution, a rocket launcher! She fires one but, again, no major damage, just a small crack on the glass. But enough damage for Go to run into it head first and shatter it in a single it, hehe. The two kill the zombie pilot but, unable to operate the metal beast's intricate controls, they decide to destroy them. Unfortunately, as they soon find out, the cockpit only controlled the targeting system: each part of the beast has a mind of its own.. the giant monster starts destroying the city, and they can't make it stop.


"Get ready to launch the Getter" says Hayato. The Getter Machines blast off from the mobile launchpads (those big-ass trucks you see in the Shin VS Neo ovas) Hayato piloting Getter Machine 1, with the other 2 jets in autopilot for the time being. Jin reaches ground zero and begins the combination sequence, forming Getter 1. The robot plunges onto the metal beast, and punches its way through the armor, crushing the enemy. With that out of the way, Hayato opens the cockpit and calls Go and Sho onboard (Sho is the girl's name, in case you didn't know), apparently the battle is not over yet.


Indeed, it is not: the evil Lando has already sent a small number of bomber beasts to Japan, to take care of the new threat. Hayato and Lando have met each other before, says the professor to his subordinate "Hayato tried to ruin my plans back then, and he almost succeeded." We'll have more details about the background of these two characters in one of the next chapters. Anyway, the flying beasts have reached the mainland and have started bombing the city. With Go in the cockpit next to Hayato, and Sho sitting in the second unit, Getter Robot takes off to meet its new opponents..





Getter 1's special ability in the manga is the Plasma Sword. I think the anime version of the mecha has it too. However, Neo Getter from the OVAs has the Plasma Thunder attack instead. The energy blade slices through the mechanical enemies with ease, and the Getter returns to the base victorious. Hayato notices that Go hasn't fainted nor vomited a single time during the whole fight. Heh, of course not, replies Go: that was one of the best experiences he ever had in his life!


-


Well then, that's the end of the third chapter. Although, I'll admit I've already read up to chapter 11 (sorry, the story is so much.. better than the classic mangas that I just wanna keep on reading) but don't worry I'll try to write everything in here too, chapter after chapter    as you can see from the image above, this Getter does not look like its predecessors: there's less anime magic (or manga magic) going on, so bits and pieces that are on the individual ships stick out of the exterior of the Getter in robot form too. You can see here, cannons are visible near the wrists and missiles slightly protrude from the shoulders. The same happens with Getter 2 and 3 as well. It's a welcome change, in my opinion. In super robot history Getter Robo was one of the mechas which required shapeshifting the most, it's nice to see that the author tried to tackle this issue in one of the newer series.

[The Baron Weirwulf]

Much appreciated MF!!! This is great needed this!!