A 3 episode OAV based upon the shoot'em'up series with the same title plus the Gradius games (that are sets in the same shared universe?) where a war against eldrichtian space monstrosities known as "bacterian" is on the loose between two forces from the Planet Gradius and Lotus, as been introduced in the second OAV. The show pace is good, maybe a little too long and stretched in the first episode, the characterization is... Decent, i must say, but with the original source (that i don't know at it's best, sorry) i don't know what to expect, there's be only starships and aliens, and the "original"characters done are good and doing their job well, they act like cardboards characters sometimes but it's not a massive problem to me, thanks to the story pace and especially the character design, made by Haruhiko Mikimoto of Macross fame, a artist i really enjoy his works.

Animation is good even if a little stiff in some rare moments, the music is good and uses classical pieces with game BGM in a pretty good orchestral version.

The only part i didn't fully enjoyed is the first OAV, with some weird decisions in the plot leading to a finale that i didn't fully understood the reasons this happened and the slow, sluggy pace of the story, but it's a cool show from the 80s overall.