I'm writing this on July 5, 1998. Last viewing: at least 8 months ago

Why is this ranked so highly? Well, I liked the first few episodes somewhat. The next few were better. The next few were better. They concluded extremely well. The series started high, and just got better. That's all there is to it.

So just what was so good? Typical anime characters in big robots blowing things up. Nothing different about that, right?

Well, before this one, I hadn't really seen all THAT many typical mecha shows. And it really is a good one. The characters are interesting enough, though certainly not a really strong point until rather late in the series (but they do get to be rather well-rounded and you can really care about them by the end).

A few strong points throughout: a very interesting enemy who you can really respect, who always has this mysterious air about him; and when things are revealed, they're really cool. The soundtrack was outstanding throughout, and in some of the battle sequences, I was wowed. Especially since, it also just kept getting better. Very little re-use of soundtrack. Extremely impressive. Even the love interest/triangle had a sense of mystery, which got resolved in a really good way. Not many shows seem capable of carrying everything through to the conclusion.

This one did, so it's one of my favorites.