FULL SPOILERS FOR GURREN LAGANN AHEAD
Turning 20 next year, Gurren Lagann (Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann in Japan) is a memorable anime series partly because of its grandiose animation, larger-than-life characters, and breathtaking score, but also because it’s an epic series, both in the modern sense of the word and because it’s a literal “epic.” The story of Gurren Lagann continually defies expectations and tells a grand narrative where hope and perseverance define the human condition.
If an epic requires an extraordinary character to accomplish extraordinary deeds and change the world, then Simon’s role in the battle between the Spiral and Anti-Spiral, unbound by time and space certainly befits the label. He went from an orphan living underground, drafted to dig further down and away from the Earth’s surface, to forging a new evolutionary path for the entire universe, rocketing away toward the stars in the opposite direction.
What Actually Happens in Gurren Lagann?
Before examining the elements of Gurren Lagann and why it qualifies as a modern epic, you need to have an understanding of what actually happens in the series, the world, and the people who bring it to life.
From Studio Gainax, director Hiroyuki Imaishi (previously worked on Neon Genesis Evangelion, FLCL, and Dead Leaves, later directed Kill la Kill, Promare, and Cyberpunk: Edgerunners), and writer Kazuki Nakashima (who wrote Re: Cutie Honey), Gurren Lagann is the story of humanity, fractured and picking up the pieces, on a futuristic Earth.
Lordgenome rules the Earth, forcing everyone to live in isolated underground villages: no contact with the surface, and no contact with each other. Simon is a 14-year-old orphan living in Giha village, forced to dig and expand his settlement further underground.
One day while digging, he finds a drill-shaped key, a Core Drill, and a small Gunmen mecha. Around this same time, a Gunmen from the surface attacks their village. Alongside his 18-year-old mentor figure and spiritual brother, Kamina, Simon uses his Core Drill to activate the Gunmen he found (which Kamina names Lagann), defeat the invading Gunmen with his drilling-based ability, and reach this fabled, never-before-seen surface.
Quickly, Kamina hijacks his own Gunmen (Gurren) and combines it with Simon’s to create Gurren Lagann. Their heroics inspire others to do the same and join them as they defeat Lordgenome and free humanity from their underground prison.
Before Simon defeats Lordgenome with his Core Drill, he warns Simon:
"When the land overflows with a million apes, the moon shall become Hell's messenger and completely destroy the world of the spiral."
It’s an ominous warning that comes to fruition after seven years of human development and evolution. As the population reaches that one million mark, aliens called the Anti-Spirals emerge with a message: the moon is coming to wipe out the planet, preventing humanity from evolving to the point where they destroy the universe in an event called “The Spiral Nemesis.”
The First Spiral War
Now existing as a bio-computer, Lordgenome tells Simon and company the truth of the world and why he kept them underground.
Around 1,000 years ago, Lordgenome was a Spiral Warrior along with other humans, engaged in a universal war against Anti-Spirals. Humans are just one of many Spiral Beings, entities with double-helix spiral DNA that can evolve. Anti-Spirals, who cannot evolve, feared that if taken to its limits, this evolutionary potential would create an apocalyptic event where the universe collapses into a massive black hole: The Spiral Nemesis,
There was an intergalactic war between Spiral Beings and the Anti-Spiral, and after their victory, the Anti-Spiral installed Annihilation Systems on worlds with Spiral creatures. If the above-ground population ever exceeded a set limit, the system would activate and destroy the Spiral life-forms present. The Annihilation System for Earth, Cathedral Terra, was disguised as the moon.
Lordgenome fought in this war, lost, and then served as the protector of Earth against complete destruction, before he lost to Simon.
The Second Spiral War
Before Simon can try and stop the moon’s collision, Anti-Spiral mechanical enemies try to stop him, to no avail. Simon stops the collision and merges Gurren Lagann with Cathedral Terra before slipping through dimensions to fight the Anti-Spiral at their homeworld. The Anti-Spiral have multiple ways to stop Simon and other Spiral Beings, but Simon continually defies logic, surviving, making the impossible happen with his Spiral Power.
Gurren Lagann evolves further into Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (Heaven-Piercing Gurren Lagann), only to be stopped by the Anti-Spiral King (the collective consciousness of the Anti-Spiral) and his multiversal abilities. Unshaken, Simon rejects fatalism and harnesses the Spiral’s limitless power, merging with every possible Simon across infinite universes. Again, he rejects this reality and makes his own.
Soon, Simon’s Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann reaches a size in the billions and trillions of light years, but the Anti-Spiral King still fights back. Eventually, the clashes wear them down until it’s a straight-up fist fight between Simon and the Anti-Spiral King. Now, Simon uses his Core Drill in a final attack and wins.
The Anti-Spiral is finished, and entrusts the prevention of the Spiral Nemesis to Simon, the personification of the indomitable human spirit. The nihilistic threat is gone, and Simon soon passes on his hope to the future.
“Epics” and Where Gurren Lagann Fits
You understand now that Gurren Lagann is fantastical and fanatical, a series that understands the gravity of what it’s dealing with. Instead of positing groundbreaking ideas, it’s laying out a larger-than-life, universal argument:
Don’t let your doubts and limitations define you. Instead, acknowledge them and believe in your potential to push past them. Continually improve every second, minute, and day. Believe in the you that believes in yourself.
The constant symbol of the drill in the series further exemplifies this idea of perseverance. Also a double-helix spiral, the drill represents humanity’s unbreakable will, the ability and drive to push past and break through even the most impossible obstacles
Gurren Lagann repeatedly proclaims that life, being human, is all about evolution and growth. Optimism and forging hope amidst despair run through the entire series as Simon, Kamina, and the rest of their team repeatedly and summarily exclaim, in no uncertain terms, that fate and the laws of the universe are secondary to their own will and desire to live freely and forge their own path.
“Libera Me From Hell”
I can’t talk about Gurren Lagann this much without also mentioning the music. While there’s no specific, definitional way a score makes something an epic or not, the score and the lyrics can further accentuate the theme, and that’s exactly what “Libera Me From Hell” does.
In the most basic understanding of music theory, the song’s steady increase in pitch and tempo creates anticipation and excitement. Like a spiral, the song keeps building on itself, but that’s not the only way it reinforces the themes.
Composer Taku Iwasaki combined an orchestra with Kasahara Yuri’s operatic vocals and Tarantula’s rapping. Simon says that a drill creates a helix out of past and future hopes, of those who have fallen and those who follow. That statement and theme are exactly what Iwasaki hearkens back to with the “Libera Me From Hell’s” combo of music’s past and future, of opera and rap.
The lyrics in the song itself repeatedly emphasize humanity’s capacity for evolution and growth, with Tarantula repeating:
“Do the impossible, see the invisible
Row! Row! Fight the power!
Touch the untouchable, break the unbreakable
Row! Row! Fight the power!”
The operatic Latin throughout sounds like a lament, but Tarantula’s lyrics and perpetual energy stand in defiance. Opera and rap battle back and forth, with Tarantula’s words winning in the end, resonating in the ears and hearts of every viewer.
“Epic” in the Literal Sense
Qualifying what is and isn’t an “epic” doesn’t depend solely on a major universal theme. There are multiple defining characteristics that must work together to create something deserving of the label “epic.”
Some of the most famous epics throughout history, like Homer’s Odyssey, Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Seven Samurai (1954), and Titanic (1997), all share some similar markers like:
- Character growth through tragedy and tragic flaws
- High stakes
- Consequences and sacrifice
Character growth and overcoming tragic flaws? Simon is extremely shy, timid, and does not see himself as a brave hero. He regularly needed those around him to inspire him to fight and be brave, especially his mentor figure, Kamina.
High stakes? If Simon never beat Lord Genome, humanity would still be underground. If Simon didn’t fight back against the Anti-Spiral? Humanity would be gone completely, and the cosmos would forever exist under the subjugation of the Anti-Spiral.
Consequences and sacrifice? Early in the series, Simon’s jealousy and self-doubt create the situation where Kamina dies. Later, even knowing that his destruction of the Anti-Spiral will cause his love, Nia Teppelin, to fade out of existence, he accepts it. It’s a sacrifice that lays the foundation for the future.
One of the only things holding something like Gurren Lagann back is its short length at just 27 episodes, while one of the main signifiers of an epic is its length. They typically need to be longer to paint an accurate picture of the world-shaking events in the story, but I’ll argue that Gurren Lagann was able to circumvent this marker because instead of seeing the ripples of a world-shaking event, we directly go into the cosmos and see Simon’s actions shaking not just the world, but the entire cosmos and multiverse.
There’s still so much discourse today across academia about definitions and what an epic is, making it difficult to attach the label to something new. With that said, I feel confident in proclaiming Gurren Lagann an anime epic. Simon has all the markers of an epic hero, and the story of evolving from an orphaned digger in Giha village to uniting humanity and defeating the greatest threat to existence, the literal embodiment of nihilism, is epic.
