Dai-Guard



"Office workers saving the world!"

This is the motto of Dai-Guard, an extremely non-traditional Humongous Mecha Anime. Set in the year 2030, the show focuses on three employees of the 21st Century Defense Security Corporation, a company that owns a giant robot named Dai-Guard. Dai-Guard was originally built by the military to protect the world against Heterodynes (no, not those), aliens from another dimension that show up to destroy everything they can get their hands on. However, the first and only attack occurred 12 years ago, and when the series starts, Dai-Guard has been retired and is seen as little more than an overblown corporate mascot.

When a new Heterodyne suddenly appears, the protagonists -- young and brash Shunsuke Akagi, rational and hard-working Ibuki Momoi, and aloof and cynical Keiichiro Aoyama -- activate the dormant robot and defend the populace. They become instant heroes, but there is the small matter of dealing with the Board of Directors, who are real sticklers for the paperwork involved in using and maintaining an 80-foot-tall robot. Then they have to figure out who's going to pay for all this collateral damage. Then they have to get some weapons that are not Awesome but Impractical. Then they have to smooth things out with the military, who want the robot back now that it's actually useful. Then they have to figure out where on the Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism they're supposed to stand. And when they finally get things relatively ironed out, things get political. How do you classify a Kaiju attack? Invasion? Disaster relief? Weapons that can beat giant monsters could kick serious ass on the modern battlefield - how does the world's last empire handle a rival having them? What is the purpose of such a military in peacetime, anyway?

Dai-Guard plays a lot of standard trope arrangements from both ends. It takes a Real Robot and drops it in alongside the standard crazy monsters from another dimension. It uses common character arrangements, but avoids many anime stand-bys, employing relatively little Fan Service or UST. It alternates its focus between the day-to-day "realities" of a company utilizing a giant robot and said giant robot punching things in the face.

As you may have guessed, this is the namesake of a certain bot on All The Tropes.

General tropes:

 * A House Divided: Surprisingly, the Heterodyne are a serious threat for only the first nine episodes... out of twenty-six. At the end of episode nine, the behavior and weaknesses of the Heterodyne have been figured out, and one gets one-shotted for the first time in a repeatable fashion... only for Shirota to stab the team in the back and assist in the military's attempt to hijack the operation. It takes four more episodes to iron out the mess, after which they pull off a perfect Heterodyne elimination with zero collateral damage... only for the company executives to screw things up in an even more spectacular manner. Four episodes after that, just as they get that ironed out, things go international; Eagle Land purposefully interferes with a Heterodyne attack in the hopes of capturing one for study, then spins the resulting near-attack on their spy plane into an attempt to shut down the entire operation. While a Heterodyne is wandering around that can freeze entire cities solid. This arc only lasts two episodes, as it barely dodges a Space Whale Aesop about Japanese militarization. Safe to say, the Dai-Guard team spends at least as much time arguing with egotistical authority figures as they do fighting monsters.
 * And the Adventure Continues...: It seems that the Heterodyne will never stop appearing. Like earthquakes and hurricanes, monster attacks are now a fact of life in 21st century Japan. Now that they've developed the tools, skills, and attitude to handle them, the story is over.
 * Armies Are Evil: A variant version where the army feels it's the only ones qualified to battle the Heterodynes, despite having no Humongous Mecha piloting experience, and only cares (strangely, for The Evil Army) about civilian casualties and not their quality of life, willing to destroy hundreds of homes so long as nobody dies.
 * Ascended Fanboy: Akagi. He's wanted to pilot a Humongous Mecha his entire life, to the point of taking an otherwise useless college course to learn how to do it and spending years in a dead-end job just to be around the only one in existence.
 * Attack Its Weak Point For Massive Damage: Hitting a Heterodyne in its its central Fractal Knot instantly destroys it and causes its body to dissolve.
 * Badass Normal: Dai-Guard's pilots may only be Public Relations office workers, but they eventually prove themselves to be better than the military's pilots.
 * Combining Mecha: Justified within the series. At first, Dai-Guard has to be carted to the battle site in pieces and assembled. Eventually the pieces are outfitted as vehicles in their own right, presumably to avoid this hassle, but they have to transform back to their "parts" form in order to assemble, and are demonstrated to lack weapons or any other non-transportational functions.
 * Cool Big Sis: Ooyama is specifically called out in this role during the Recap Episode.
 * Da Chief: Subverted -- the main characters' boss, whom they call "Chief," is actually friendly and just as put-upon by the higher-ups as they are. The actual Da Chief is military liaison and "tactical advisor" Special Agent Shirou Shirota.
 * Darkskinned Blonde: Tanigawa.
 * Deadpan Snarker: Secondary co-worker Irie.
 * Deconstruction: In many ways even more than Eva.
 * Arguably, more of a Reconstruction as for everything it tears down it builds back up bigger and better.
 * Decon Recon Switch
 * Dude, Where's My Respect?: When not saving Japan from giant, extra-dimensional monsters, the heroes are buried in endless paperwork.
 * Gadgeteer Genius: Rika Domeki.
 * Glass Cannon: Dai-Guard in both the series and Super Robot Wars Z 2 can dish out a lot of pain, but it gets damaged extremely easy and isn't very fast.
 * Guns Are Worthless: Dai-Guard uses only physical melee weapons, stemming from the limitations that A) the 21st Century Defense Corporation isn't the military or the police (and this is Japan) and B) Heterodynes can only be destroyed with an accurate strike to their Fractal Knot, which melee weapons are better at.
 * Handsome Lech: Aoyama. Subverted in that his flirting always seems to have a business purpose behind it. Then, when the office suspects he has a girlfriend because he's always talking on the phone and disappearing,.
 * Heel Face Turn: Shirota eventually loosens up and comes around to the protagonists' way of thinking.
 * The same happens with  and.
 * Hero Insurance: Lampshaded and averted in turns. The insurance requires ridiculous amounts of paperwork, and the damage cause by Dai-Guard still ends up costing the company a buttload of money. In fact, the aversion fuels a lot of the show's non-monster conflict.
 * Hidden Depths: Turns out Shirota's really good at decorating cakes. Everyone's pretty surprised, not least Shirota himself.
 * Honor Before Reason: Akagi insists on using Dai-Guard at every opportunity and refuses to accept that sacrifices must be made. Shirota hates this, but it usually works out anyway.
 * And by "works out," we mean nobody dies. Dai-Guard frequently ends up getting beat to hell and back.
 * This tendency is lampshaded in one episode where Akagi doesn't want to destroy a Heterodyne that is sitting quietly and not hurting anyone. Everyone is pretty surprised.
 * Hot-Blooded: Akagi...oh, Akagi.
 * Hot Springs Episode: Subverted. Tanigawa and Ijuuen visit one just in time to be interrupted by a giant balloon Heterodyne, but little skin is shown and in Tanigawa's words, they had "separate rooms and boring conversations".
 * Humongous Mecha: Strangely, it's the rare Real Robot that looks like a Super Robot; Dai-Guard was designed for the very specific purpose of getting in close enough to a Heterodyne to destroy its Fractal Knot.
 * I Just Want to Be Normal: It takes Aoyama a long time to get used to piloting Dai-Guard; in episode 3 he quits the company, and in one pre-episode recap, he asks the viewer if they want to fly a giant robot.
 * Indy Ploy: This is all Akagi does, much to the horror and annoyance of his coworkers.
 * Jurisdiction Friction: The Evil Army and the 21st Century Corporation are frequently at odds about who should really be using Dai-Guard.
 * Kaiju: The Heterodynes
 * Monster of the Week: The Heterodynes again, although they are more of a Framing Device for the main conflict.
 * Nobody Can Die: Everyone is always evacuated before the Heterodyne (or Dai-Guard) can start smashing the place up. No one's ever caught in the crossfire, and the few times someone does get trapped under falling rubble or somesuch, don't worry, rescue crews will be along shortly. Justified as Japan is known for having a really good disaster alert and response system to begin with, and within weeks of the pilot episode they've isolated the warning signs that precede the arrival of Heterodynes. Episode 8 is simply A Week In The Life of the Dai-Guard team during which they get nothing but repeated false alarms... and have to stay at their posts for hours on end waiting for the threat to emerge to no avail.
 * No Indoor Voice: Akagi, to the point of misunderstanding the correct manner of using a TV mic with deafening consequences.
 * No Social Skills: Domeki. She means well, and she's generally nice enough in person but she doesn't seem to understand social interaction, and doesn't seem to notice or care when she screws up.
 * Non-Lethal Warfare: Because it's operated by an insurance company in Japan, Dai-Guard doesn't use ordnance of any sort. This has the side effect of keeping collateral damage to a minimum (in theory!).
 * Nuclear Weapons Taboo: The first Heterodyne was destroyed by an "O.E. Weapon", which stands for "Over Explosion". (It's never actually confirmed to be nuclear in nature - and appears to be some other type of explosive - but its use will leave an area uninhabitable for a period of time in addition to the massive collateral damage.)
 * Only Sane Man: In one of the early introduction episodes, Aoyama remarks on Akagi and Ibuki's unstable nature and heroic tendencies and declares, "I am the only sane person on this robot, and there's nothing I can do about it, except hang on and enjoy the ride."
 * The pilots of Dai-Guard and most of the more ethically inclined members of the 21st Century corporation wind up being this compared to the trigger happy military types and the more corrupt executives,
 * Our Monsters Are Weird: The Heterodynes. No two are quite alike in design, shape and abilities, but are all based on the same basic composition which is equal parts fungus and octagon-shaped crystal (the "Fractal Knot"). They then form a body out of surrounding matter, making no two quite alike. They can move freely (some even fly), are usually attracted to EM waves and often have odd powers to defend themselves. That's about ALL they have in common.
 * They are considered straight-up monsters by the general population, but specialists consider them tantamount to natural disasters, as they don't have a particular purpose or capacity for thought.
 * Post Episode Trailer: Complete with the page quote as "On the Next Episode of..." Catchphrase.
 * Power Trio: Akagi, Ibuki, and Aoyama.
 * Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: All of Public Relations Division 2.
 * Real Robot: One of the most credible Real Robot series out there, Square-Cube Law aside.
 * Alternatively, a deconstruction of the Super Robot Genre.
 * Running Gag: Early in the series, Dai-Guard loses an arm in basically every fight.
 * And to effectively use most of its weapons it has to give up at least one usable hand. Later in the series a new weapon is developed that takes away both hands.
 * Aoyama even comments on this once: "It wouldn't be a fight if we didn't lose an arm."
 * Salaryman: The main characters -- even though they frequently protect the country from Heterodynes -- and their co-workers.
 * Scary Shiny Glasses
 * Ship Tease: Akagi had this with Ibuki but has much more teasing with Ooyama, the final shots of the cast in the final episode even has the two of them standing rather close together as Dai-Guard is repaired. Nakahara is also teased with Aoyama.
 * Square-Cube Law: Ultimately abused but recognized in early episodes where simply walking around too much could threaten to shake Dai Guard to pieces and punching Heterodynes only broke his own arms.
 * Super Robot Wars: Making an unexpected debut in Super Robot Wars Z 2.
 * Tall, Dark and Snarky: Aoyama.
 * Talking to Himself Aoyama with Lockon Stratos in Super Robot Wars Z.
 * Theme Naming: The pilots and some other characters are named after colours. Akagi- Red, Aoyama- Blue, Momoi- Pink, Shirota- White, etc.
 * Tokyo Is the Center of the Universe: No mention is ever made of Heterodynes appearing not in Japan.
 * Justified in that the dimensional warp is caused by unique tectonic action in Japan.
 * It's mentioned in the comic that there are Dai-Guards stationed around the world, as the warps are related to earthquakes - Japan just happens to have a lot of them.
 * Twenty Minutes Into the Future: The series is shown in the 1st episode to take place in 2030, with the first Heterodyne appearing in 2018.

Tropes applying to individual episodes:

 * Christmas Episode: One with a decidedly western feel to the holiday.
 * Daddy's Girl: We see in one episode that Ibuki used to be one until her father died in the first Heterodyne attack. When she realizes her biological father only studied the Heterodyne For Science!, she has a Heroic BSOD in the very next battle. When she realizes her stepfather's heroism is real, she's one all over again.
 * Flash Back
 * Hey, Wait!: "Your lens cap is on."
 * Heroic BSOD: Ibuki after.
 * Never Tell Me the Odds: Inverted when the odds are so bad, Saeki refuses to tell the pilots what they are.
 * The Only One: For several episodes, the military replaces the normal pilots with three "simulator jockeys," as Aoyama calls them. They turn out to be utterly useless in a fight because they don't understand teamwork or have the proper intuition to pilot Dai-Guard.
 * Averted once the military realizes that idealism is not for kids. Akagi's mecha piloting teacher and classmates are right there with them kicking ass in the final episodes.
 * It doesn't help that the "simulator jockeys," in the same episode where Akagi wants to leave the sleeping Hetrodyne alone (which turns out to be a very good idea, since if it's destroyed ) they decide to . If they were heroes, we've have had a fun big-time case of Nice Job Breaking It, Hero.
 * Ramen Slurp: Domeki usually does this while hunched over in her Hacker Cave, analysing the newest Heterodyne or designing parts for Dai-Guard.
 * Recap Episode
 * Right Behind Me
 * Rocket Punch: Not an actual mechanical ability, but the next best thing: Dai-Guard takes off its hand and throws it at the monster.
 * Faithfully recreated in Super Robot Wars Z 2 as part of the drill arm's animation against air units.
 * Taking You with Me: A hilarious subversion: a Heterodyne falling into the ocean grabs Dai-Guard's hand. Akagi just detaches it.
 * Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right: In the series finally
 * Ten-Minute Retirement
 * Theme Tune Cameo. Cellphone ringtones. Baa, ba ba Baa, ba ba Baa, ba ba Bara rara rara ra...
 * This Is a Drill: And drills are Awesome but Impractical. Ever heard of "torque", Domeki?
 * It's even Lampshaded. After their first attempt at using it everyone's reaction was "Why the hell did we think that would work?"
 * Very Special Episode: When Ibuki finds out the truth about her father.
 * Who Wants to Live Forever? (the line, not the trope): Akagi whips this one out when it looks like Dai-Guard will plummet three miles to Earth and certain death. Ibuki and Aoyama protest that they would very much like that.
 * You're Insane!: An affectionate hero-to-hero use.
 * Or not. Ibuki and Aoyama tend to get really pissed at Akagi's repeated use of the Indy Ploy.