Review of SSSS.Gridman

SSSS.Gridman was a shocking success for me. Before deciding to watch this, I'd never heard of Gridman the property, and from the experience I have with Studio Trigger anime, was fully prepared for this to be just more of Trigger doing as Trigger does. Narrative focus has never been their strong suit, always feeling like an after-thought in favor of action, humor, and "the cool factor." So color me blown away when I watched Gridman to find, by God, an intimate, character-driven low concept drama draped in the typical Trigger fashion?!! Yes, as shocking as that may seem, this show is very mucha tight, smart seriocomedy focusing on just five characters and their feelings and relationships, reacting to each other and the changes they go through, using giant monsters and alien robots as merely a backdrop to set the stage. More important than the focus being on the narrative, though, is that it is also done WELL?! Now you must be doubly surprised. Yes, I'm glad to say that the characterization is the perfect balance between the typical simple, silly fare one might expect from Trigger, but with great attention to making them have real, human thoughts and feelings and reactions, subtle enough to organically understand them without needing to be over-the-top, shoved in your face oversimplifications or leaving them shallow and one-dimensional. It never goes so far into being brooding melodrama, but has enough seriousness to also not be kiddy, mindless schlock. Gridman is the ideal for what I think trigger should be striving for in terms of narrative focus.

That said, if you come to this show seeking action, or even if you don't, you will still find the actual fighting to be underwhelming. It feels mostly inconsequential exactly how the fights go down (until the last few episodes) and it's easy for your mind to wander during the combat scenes. It's a shame that the individual characteristics of the large majority of the kaijus have no bearing on the narrative and diminishes the gravity they ought to convey. Now, as much as I appreciate attention to the narrative, I'm not a complete condescending 2deep4u snob. I like me some kickass action, too, just not when it's mindless punch kick explosion garbage without purpose. Thematically, the kaiju *are* just props, but they are also the impetus for the plot and having them be indistinguishable from each other beyond appearance emphasizes how underutilized the whole framing device of the show is. The action is typically relegated to the last five minutes of the episode and during that time feels almost severed from the character development going on for the bulk of the screentime.

The last two or three episodes really drive this home (while at the same time showcasing the potential for the interweaving of action and story.) I really don't want to spoil anything but there's a certain kaiju in the 10th episode iirc that embodies the narrative themes of the current situation and while it's going about its course, the action AND the story coalesce into a perfect exemplar of having everything on screen matter without a single wasted thought. It's really hard to convey what I mean without spoiling it so I hope that got through. Because the last two episodes have the opposite and what I'd consider the lowest point of the action, where it does just devolve into brainless bang and boom, and a lot of that I think can be attributed to the fact that this show is not entirely an original production.

If you weren't aware, which I wasn't until halfway through watching, SSSS.Gridman is an adaptation, to some degree, of a 90's tokusatsu show (google that term if you don't know it because I'm sure you will be familiar with the genre, just not the name for it.) I don't know to what degree it adapts the 90s show and how much is original, as I've never seen the live-action series and know nothing beyond my post-watch cursory googling.) But in regard to the last two episodes, and some other aspects of the show, a good deal of it is clearly simple reverence on the anime creators' parts to pay tribute to it. The ultimate battle largely untethers the fighting from the core character-centric story you've been watching before and only deals with the superficial plot elements. While all the threads that have been developed throughout the show DO pay off, some of them suffer in terms of quality directly because they need to reconcile the overarching plot with the characters that have been building up in the show. I will say most of it is satisfactory, but some of the pay-offs are clearly leagues above others. Also, this is a minor spoiler but I think it's prudent to mention to other viewers going in blind: there is a character introduced in I believe the sixth episode who seems completely non-sequitur, but they are an allusion to the original show, being the successor to a one of the characters. Just keep that in mind, I think you'll know by the end who I'm talking about. Without prior knowledge, that character is at best totally unexplained, but potentially detrimental to your understanding of the narrative. There are many artifacts of homage to the original that detrimentally affect SSSS.Gridman as a self-contained experience, unfortunately. That and the excellent build-up of the narrative elements having disparate pay-offs in terms of quality are the greatest points against Gridman and what stop it from being a 10/10.

But those are the critiques and forewarnings. As you can see, I still enjoyed this greatly and whole-heartedly recommend this show to all. I hope this review can serve to urge those on the fence about whether this is worth the time or not into giving it a go.