Kiddy Grade



""Ta-daa!""

~Éclair

""A lady should really be more elegant... * sigh* ""

~Lumière

In the Star Century year 0165, humanity has long spread across the galaxy and brought all it's old problems with it. Crime rates in the future are still as high as ever. An agency of the Galactic Union called "Galactic Organization of Trade and Tariffs" (GOTT) has its own special way of dealing with these problems - it dispatches duos of superpowered enforcers referred as "ES Members" to deal with galactic law breakers. Among their number are two who... tend to stand out a bit: Éclair and Lumière. Behind their appearance of just your run-of-the-mill, happy-go-lucky C-class agents lurks a far more sinister past soiled with blood, desperation, and bitter conflict with the very world order they are now charged with protecting.

Does the above sound like a bit like Dirty Pair to you? No surprise, seeing how Kiddy Grade was probably intended as its Spiritual Successor of sorts. However, despite its lighthearted, Lovely Angels-themed start, this show gets progressively darker and moodier, dipping into such difficult themes as problems faced by an immortal and person vs. society and socioeconomic conflict. Kiddy Grade is a true production tour-de-force, starting with the design, directorial and dictational talent of production team gímik, throttled by the GONZO animation prowess and impressive voice acting (yay for Aya Hirano and Colleen Clinkenbeard), rounded off by an impressive musical score by Shiro Hamaguchi. This will make the series worth taking a look at even if you stay indifferent to the questions raised in it.

The show originally aired in Japan in 2002-03. A sequel series was announced in 2006, to be animated by asread rather than GONZO, and while a pilot DVD was released, little info was revealed until February 2009, when it was re-announced under the official title Kiddy Girl-AND, now to be animated by Satelite and set 50 years after the original. In the interim, the series had been re-run on TV in Japan and re-released as a DVD box set, and also released to selected theatres as three cut-down movies.

Note: Kiddy Girl-AND has its own page, so please don't put tropes relating to that show here.

The show provides examples of:
"Lumière: "They're the Nouvlesse. They're arrogant because they can afford to be.""
 * A.I. Is a Crapshoot
 * Aristocrats Are Evil: With a few notable exceptions, most of the Nouvlesse are selfish, vainglorious assholes who are blatantly contemptuous of all citizens of non pure Earth-bred stock in the galaxy.
 * As You Know: Introduction of the original series.
 * Back for the Finale
 * Barbie Doll Anatomy: While the frequent panty shots can be quite detailed, the full frontal nudity featured in episode 12 showed nipples (in the DVD version that is) - yes, even Lumiére - but no genitalia. This scene was even re-animated for the movie version of the show, with another similar scene added.
 * Blood From the Mouth: When Éclair receives a seemingly fatal injury in the third episode and again after being clotheslined by in episode 14. She's also been known to cut her own lip as a lipstick substitute.
 * Boobs of Steel: The most powerful female ES-members tend to be rather well-endowed, Éclair included. Viola and Lumière are the notable exceptions.
 * Bowdlerise: Averted. The English version has been accused of watering down Lumière's wine, however, the original script also refers to it euphemistically as "Grape Juice" (萄ジュース).
 * Brainwashed and Crazy: thanks to a program called "Hashish".
 * Catch Phrase: See the opening quotations.
 * Cloning Blues:.
 * Conspicuous CG: Averted. By GONZO!
 * Cool Starship: La Muse; Every other ES team has their own.
 * Costume Copycat: . They couldn't copy the voices, though.
 * Credits Running Sequence
 * Curtains Match the Window: Several characters, but particularly Lumière, in both her purple- and teal-haired iterations. Crosses over with Hair Colors.
 * Delayed Explosion: Practically all the spaceship combat scenes and a few more besides.
 * Disney Death:.
 * Energy Absorption: Alv and Dvergr.
 * Evolving Credits: The credits get updated.
 * Expy: Side-character Mad Bad Bull oddly resembles Nosferatu Zodd.
 * Extraordinarily Empowered Girl: A bunch of them.
 * Eyecatch: Each episode featured a different artist providing the eyecatch.
 * Fan Service: And how, though some found Lumière's fanservice disturbing...
 * Frothy Mugs of Water: Lumière's "grape juice" is actually fermented grape juice, a.k.a. wine (usually, high quality, and thus expensive, wine).
 * Which at one points even gets used.
 * Gainaxing: Éclair.
 * Good Bad Translation: Armblast was supposed to be named "Armbrust", after the German word for "crossbow", but... eh, close enough (the real reason was that the mistake was discovered too late in the dubbing).
 * Go Out with a Smile:.
 * Go Through Me
 * The Government: GOTT.
 * Gratuitous English
 * Gratuitous French
 * Gratuitous German
 * Gunship Rescue: Done beautifully.
 * Hammerspace: It's not like Éclair's outfit has pockets, but there is literally nowhere on her person that Lumière can stash her wine bottles.
 * Hand Blast: have this as their main attack. Ironically, this is not one of Armblast's abilities.
 * Hollywood Cyborg
 * Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Cesario and Viola.
 * Humongous Mecha / Transforming Mecha:   .
 * Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Except for the finale, it uses the for [Word]/[Usually related word].
 * Image Song:
 * Lumière's is "Hikari no Umi" ("Sea of Light"). It has an appropriately staid theme and plays during her flashback episode.
 * Éclair's is called "Tsubasa". Her lullaby also possibly counts.
 * They also have a duet called, appropriately, "Girls Power 〜史上最高〜" (all-time high) and sing a duet version of the ending theme.
 * Immortal Life Is Cheap
 * Impossibly Cool Clothes: How that bare-skinned cross on Éclair's stomach retains its shape is anyone's guess.
 * Improbable Weapon User: Éclair's lipstick whip. Lumière's "wine bottles" also qualify. Armbrust's briefcase has also been used in this manner.
 * Irony, dramatic:
 * Karma Houdini:
 * Kill All Humans:.
 * Killed Off for Real:.
 * Laser-Guided Amnesia:.
 * Logic Bomb: The Hashish virus.
 * Lovely Angels: Éclair and Lumière.
 * Made of Iron: ES members bleed, but little things like bullet wounds don't cause them any other problems - unless required by the plot.
 * Magic Feather: Éclair wears lipstick whenever making use of her full powers.
 * Perhaps justified, as it seems to function as.
 * Meganekko: Mercredi and Vendredi. We don't know much about Vendredi, but Mercredi.
 * Nanomachines: That's what's behind many ES "superpowers".
 * New Powers as the Plot Demands: It's surprising how many ES members have a classified second power that nobody had ever mentioned.
 * Not Quite Dead: One-shot antagonist Mad Bad Bull, episode 4, after being crushed by a crate when Éclair plays around with a ship's Artificial Gravity.
 * Not What It Looks Like: Lumière at one time wakes up to find.
 * It's telling though that Lumière is not at all upset.
 * The Nth Doctor: A rare animated example:.
 * Off-Model: In distance shots, characters often have weirdly glowing eyes, which disappear again at close range--especially Éclair.
 * Older Sidekick: At least, Éclair looks that way.
 * Ominous Latin Chanting
 * The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Uttered by.
 * Opposites Theme Naming: Two agents are named Dextera and Sinistra (right and left hand, respectively).
 * Panty Shot: Éclair, several times per episode.
 * One of the post-body switch Eyecatch images has a heavily blushing Lumiére doing this trope, even though she's not the usual provider of Fan Service in the show.
 * Qipao: Éclair in episode 3, and Lumière also in an omake from the first movie.
 * Rank Inflation: C, S, and.
 * Really Seven Hundred Years Old: Well, almost.
 * Recap Episode
 * Red Eyes, Take Warning: The "eyes" of turn red when infected with the Hashish virus. Tweedledee and 'Dum also have red eyes.
 * Roboteching Beam Spam: The Deucalion.
 * Robot Girl: Actually, they are cyborgs.
 * Screw the Rules, I Have Money:


 * Shoo Out the Clowns: Right around episode 8.
 * Shout-Out: In episode 9, in a sign on an office, the address below GOTT is 'GONDO DIGI', as a reference to Gonzo Digimation.
 * Sleep Mode Size: When Lumière.
 * Spiritual Successor: To Dirty Pair.
 * Stern Chase: Ocurring after.
 * Storming the Castle: Episode 15.
 * Sucking-In Lines
 * Super Prototype: The Caliope has at least a few of the abilities that are present in the more specialised production model La Muses (the Thaleia's Resonance Explosion, Polymnia's Reflection Field and Clio's Hedgehog), albeit in a weaker form.
 * Super Speed: Foxy Fox. Éclair as well.
 * Super Strength: Éclair.
 * Tear Jerker: This series has its fair share of very sad moments.
 * Terraform
 * Theme Naming: All of the partners have some theme to their names, the most obvious are the twins Tweedledee and Tweedledum.
 * Éclair and Lumière: French for "lightning" and "light" respectively; the latter is "translated" as late in the show
 * Dextera and Sinistra: Latin for "right" and "left."
 * Alv and Dvergr: Nordic for "elf" and "dwarf."
 * Tweedledee and Tweedledum: From Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass.
 * Un-oh and A-oh: Japanese names for the two Buddhist Deva Kings.
 * Viola and Cesario: Female name and male pseudonym for a character from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.
 * Armbrust and : German for "crossbow" and "arrowhead."
 * Mercredi and Vendredi: French for "Wednesday" and "Friday."
 * Token Mini-Moe: Viola.
 * Lumière could fit this description as well.
 * Trademark Favorite Food: Viola loves Italian pasta. Cesario prefers Chinese. This is a common point of (albeit playful) argument between the two.
 * Tron Lines: when under the influence of Hashish.
 * Turn in Your Badge:.
 * Wine Is Classy: Lumiere's favorite drink is "grape juice".
 * Wham! Episode: Episodes 11 and 15.
 * Whip It Good: Éclair's lipstick attack.
 * Who Wants to Live Forever?:.
 * Wonder Twin Powers: Viola's power requires that she hold hands with her partner Cesario. Tweedledee and Tweedledum also have a combo ability.
 * Your Head Asplode: