B't X

PEGASUS RYUSEerrr, I mean, MESSIAH FIST!!!

Written by Masami Kurumada after he finished Saint Seiya prematurely due to the insistence of his publishers four years ago,^[when?] B't X has a similar premise but with a different setting and execution. Some people consider it Saint Seiya WITH SCIENCE!!!

The story begins with Teppei Takamiya, as he travels to China after years of living quietly in the fictional Kamui Island. He attempts to reunite with his brother Kotaro, who left Germany five years ago to study robotics at a university. Unfortunately, no sooner than his brother begins an exhibition about an advanced form of machine, he's kidnapped by a Humongous Mecha in the shape of a wasp and a servant of the Machine Empire. Teppei starts a chase, using a gauntlet known as the "Messiah Fist" to hold onto the wasp as it travels to a secretive base in the Gobi Desert which serves as the Empire's headquarters.

Getting thrown into a garbage heap and facing a cyborg he somehow is familiar with, Teppei's blood awakens a relic from the past; a kirin-type B't known only as "X" which, five years ago, was considered the most powerful B't in existence. Both are equally stubborn, although quite different in many ways, and after a few initial squabbles, X resolves to help Teppei in his quest to save his brother.

Along the way, we find out quite a bit about Teppei's past, the reasons Kotaro was kidnapped, and the Machine Empire's plans involving a home-grown Cosmic Horror of Devil Gundam proportions.

Both the manga and the anime have been licensed in America.

Tropes used in B't X include:

A Boy And His Kirin
Action Girl: Teppei's teacher Karen, who had been one of the Empire's Four Knights up until five years ago. Aramis is another example.
Air Jousting: A lot of fights take place in the air.
A Mech by Any Other Name: In this case, a B't.
Anticlimax Boss: Teppei faces two of these. One because his opponent wasn't an actual Machine Empire soldier and was using a jerry-rigged machine. Later on, due to a dying X activating its Super Mode previously, Teppei beats the 6th Point soldier without noticing him.
Armor Is Useless: averted for the most part. Foh, Hokuto, and Ron rarely use theirs simply because they either hate fighting (Foh and Hokuto's reason) or they're just that good. (Ron's reason)
Arrogant Kung Fu Guy: Ron. He has amazing skills to back him up, however.
The Atoner: Foh, who almost let his best friend kill him over the whole Dead Little Sister thing.
Batman Can Breathe in Space: Applies to everyone with a B't. Except for instances involving the B'ts' Weaksauce Weakness (see below), a B't's protective "Guard System" enables it and its rider to withstand anything ranging from magma to the void of space.
Badass Grandpa: Kaos. BIG TIME
Badass Longcoat: Hokuto.
Badass Normal: Karen could wipe out entire attack teams single-handedly and went a few rounds with Raphaello on foot.
Battle Aura: X's Prism of Aura, which doubles as a Super Mode.
Bittersweet Ending: The world is saved, and very well... the main cast, not so much.
Broken Bird: Salome until Teppei helps her.
Calling Your Attacks: All the time.
Came Back Strong: BT'X and Teppei after the former was reduced to scrap and the latter utterly damaged.
Cast Full of Pretty Boys: It was made by Kurumada, after all. Also total Mr. Fanservice.
Chekhov's Gun: Foh's bible and Raphaello's cell.
Cosmic Horror: Raphaello in every sense of the word. For a good part of the series, the Empire has to move heaven and hell to keep it under control. And they fail miserably at it.
Creepy Child: Misha. Nasha's also there, but she's essentially just his Morality Pet.
Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Made apparent with the cyborg named Metalface, who considers sacrificing his own flesh and blood for an immortal robotic body to be an obvious choice.
Dark Is Evil: The Death God and his Bat BT are a very straight example
Dark Is Not Evil: Karen creates a black version of X, Shadow X, that is just as powerful, a girl, and good.
Dead Little Sister: One of the most brutal and nerve-wracking moments in the series... Along that one that makes you want to strangle Foh. When his village was bombed and most of the adults were killed, he, his best friend Quattro, and Quattro's sister were three of the few survivors. Lilly, who had a strong sense of religious faith, had a crush on Foh but was upset that he had become an atheist since he couldn't hear the "Song of Angels". When Lilly began to grow ill, Quattro begged Foh to at least restore her will to live and let her know he could hear the "Song of Angels", which Foh refused. It hit its worst point when Foh, at Lilly's deathbed, coldly told her it never existed and she nearly died on the spot. For the record, however, Foh did learn his lesson and had no qualms when Quattro nearly beat him to death when they fought in the series.
- Played very ambigously, as religion is not really portrayed positively in Kurumada's mangas, which can also be seen in the theme running through both Saint Seiya and B'tX: villains often play for God and it ends badly for them, while the hero believing in himself and his friends despite many hardships and sacrifices brings him victory, even if it's usually at a big personal cost.
Deadpan Snarker: At least in the Tokyopop manga, the narrator pulls this off in the recap of the previous volume, complete with Lampshade Hanging various issues such as Teppei's Vitriolic Best Buddies status he eventually gets with Foh and company, the fact that Juggler's real face looks just like a clown face anyways, etc.
Defector From Decadence: Karen and the other guardians after learning the true intentions of the Machine Empire.
Defeat Means Friendship: Averted. Teppei never actually defeats Foh in a fight and the best he does against Ron is fight him to a draw. he also never duels either Karen or Hokuto. However, they all eventually side with him.
Distaff Counterpart: Karen's new B't made from spare parts, Shadow, is a female black Kirin.
Dub Name Change: Teppei is named Marlon, Foh is changed to Falcon, Hokuto to Homer, Karen is named Lourdes and so ford. The only ones that remain somewhat the same are Kaos and Metal Face.
Evil Clown: Juggler. He gets better in the manga, however.
Evil Twin: Meimu, who is Hokuto's brother.
Enemy Of The Week: more a case of two or more weeks.
Expy: Pretty much everything in this series can be tracked down to Saint Seiya:
- Teppei looks very much like an older Seiya.
- Ron looks a lot like Shiryu. This, however, doesn't apply to his personality.
- Foh also looks a lot like Hyoga. Then again, it doesn't apply to his personality as well. He can also be seen as the unholy child of Saga and Shaka, with a dash of Lyra Orpheus thrown in. With Shion's hair.
- Adding to the "Huh" factor of the look-alikes, Kotaro looks an awful lot like Shun, if he grew up and cut his hair real short.
- Hokuto is pretty much like Mu with Shaka's aloof personality.
- Karen is basically Aioros, since both are labeled as traitors despite having the best intentions and have a great deal of an impact on the main characters.
- And last, but not least, the B'ts and Battle Gears. Subverted in that they don't split-up to form an armor for their owner.
The Faceless: We do not see the Machine Emperor in person until the final volume, and never once in the anime.
Faceless Mooks: the regular soldiers from the Machine Empire.
Filler: three episodes dealing with the Dark Knights (while in the manga they were defeated all together and very anticlimactically), along with encountering an old member of the Four Knights and also a reclusive scientist.
Filler Villain: Chaos and the three Dark Knights. Chaos plays an important role, however, coining the phrase "Buddy", which is used a lot in the remainder of the series, and furthering Teppei's Character Development. The Dark Knights serve to Foreshadowing Teppei's connection with the Sun, and the potential he has.
Five-Man Band: Teppei and the Four Knights
- The Hero: Teppei and X
- The Lancer: Foh and Je T'aime
- The Big Guy: Ron and Raidou
- The Smart Guy: Hokuto and Max
- The Chick: (Action Girl Variety) Karen and Shadow
The Four Gods: The B'ts used by the Four Knights, replacing Byakko with a Kirin.
Four Is Death: Subverted. The Four Knights are, naturally, four in number, and they all eventually resolve to help Teppei. The seven Demon Knights, however, are all out for his blood.
Grappling Hook Pistol: One of the main funtions of Teppei's Messiah Fist, his "Shining Knucle" attack is the power enhanced version of this function.
Gratuitous English: "X! Omea wa ore bahdie!"
Heel Face Turn: Plenty, especially when people realize how dangerous Raphaello really is.
Heroic Sacrifice: Again, lots of people. Metalface managed to pull it off twice. Once sacrificing a means of safely travelling a minefield to help out a young Karen years ago which caused him to require his cyborg parts, and once again to secure the force that would destroy Raphaello at the cost of his body
High Heel Face Turn: A noticeable aspect in this series. Pretty much every female character who serves in the Machine Empire, such as Salome, Karen, and Nasha, will end up having the brains to help Teppei by the end. Too bad that all of them die in at least one version of the story with the sole exception of Karin. In addition, of all the Devil Knights, the sole female Salome is the only one to decide to help Teppei once she regains her faith in humanity. Unfortunately, Juggler had different ideas.
Hollywood Atheist: As a child, Foh lacked tact.
Hot-Blooded: Teppei and Ron.
Hyperspace Armor: The fighters summon their armor out of thin air.
Idiot Hero: He grows out of it eventually, but Teppei's VERY MUCH this trope for a good chunk of the series. It takes a double whammy of him almost getting X killed and Fou telling him how much of a fucking loser he is for him to wise up.
Ill Girl: Nasha.
Incurable Cough of Death: Hokuto suffers from radiation poisoning. During at least one point in the series, it catches up to him at the worst possible moment.
Kick the Dog: Misha violently blows up a mooks helmet because he was a bit too insistently asking for orders.
Kill'Em All: the manga kills off a lot of people, and in the end pretty much the only two protagonists, both human and B't, that survive are Teppei and Kotaro. In the anime, the last scenes implies that everybody died, including Teppei and Kotaro.
Kill It with Fire: Teppei's initial Finishing Move in the anime is "Break On", a pillar of flames. He ditches that later on.
Lady of War: Aramis, a high-ranking Machine Empire general and in fact the renowned and undefeated Rose Knight. During her fight against Juggler, she struts her stuff and trounces him.
Mad Scientist: literally with Dr. Poe, who suffers from multiple personality disorder.
Make Me Wanna Shout: Je T'aime's high-pitched screeches exploit a B't's sound-based vulnerabilities.
Meaningful Name: "B't" is pronounced like "beat", as in "heartbeat". Appropriate considering blood is required to activate one. Raidou, Ron's B't, and Je T'aime, Foh's B't, are other instances.
- Blind Idiot Translation: In the Spanish localization, however, B't was turned into Beta, deleting any meaning of the original name.
Mecha-Mooks: The Ryukans, which are piloted by generic soldiers.
The Medic: Hokuto, a very literal one.
Mid-Season Upgrade: After X dies for the first time, Hokuto repairs him. Among other things, Teppei's armor changes and he gets a new attack.
Mighty Glacier: Hokuto's B't Max is infamous among the Empire for having unparalleled defense. This doesn't stop Dr. Poe from destroying all of her except for her head. In terms of actual people, Amigo fits this.
Mook Face Turn: Karin, Karen's younger sister who calls it quits fairly early and spends the rest of the series taking care of the kids at Foh's orphanage.
Musical Assassin: Foh uses a violin bow as a weapon to go along with Je T'aime's attacks.
Must Make Amends: Marcellos does a lot of very, very stupid and amoral things, striving him to do everything he can to help Kotaro when that time comes. In the anime, his knowledge of the tower's layout is utterly crucial.
My Country, Right or Wrong: Deconstructed with the remaining guardians after Karen's supposed betrayal.
Nietzsche Wannabe: Gai is the philosopher of the empire, but also a firm believer that Humans Are the Real Monsters.
Nuclear Weapons Taboo: Averted. Hokuto's radiation sickness was triggered by being just outside the direct killzone of a nuke that destroyed his home and family and he's got the burns on his back to prove it. Aramis also tries to kill Raphaello by loading Rosemary up with every nuclear warhead she can find and performing a Heroic Sacrifice, but Raphaello's power makes it a Senseless Sacrifice.
OVA: B't X Neo, also known as episodes 26-39.
Overtook the Manga: The anime entirely skips the last four Demon Knight battles and revamps the final battle against Raphaello.
Phlebotinum Rebel: The Titular B't X.
- The Messiah Fist as well, at least in the anime. Turns out it was reverse-engineered from a sample of Raphaello's cells.
Physical God: In the manga, Gai technically doesn't exist, is immortal, can make an infinite number of copies of himself, and has possibly unlimited firepower.
Pirates: There's a guy named Captain Hook, and is one of Teppei's first enemies for essentially no reason.
Pocket Protector
Power Fist: The Messiah Fist.
The Power of Love: The only reason Foh was able to defeat the Demon Knight Gai. with his bowstring broken and Je T'aime's speakers destroyed, he used his bows and she used her wings to resonate at the frequency of a baby crying out for a mother's love and defeated him.
Punctuation Shaker: Played straight with "B't", but justified with Je T'aime, which is French for "I love you."
Redemption Equals Death: Many, many people, especially in the manga. Juggler, Marcello, Amigo, and Aramis just to name a few. Misha and Nasha also die in the anime after each makes a Heel Face Turn.
Red Oni, Blue Oni: Teppei and X fit this dynamic quite well, and it's taken to almost Vitriolic Best Buddies-level proportions.
Rescue Arc: Essentially the entire series.
Retired Badass: Kaos (Caos) from the anime.
Shapeshifter Mashup: Raphaello.
She's Back: Karen, now sporting a Black female version of BT' X.
Ship Tease: Metal Face implies Karen had feelings for Foh, though he inmediately rebuffs this.
Secret Test of Character: What the battle with Kaos ultimately amounts to.
Signature Style: The inclusion of a kirin. In many of Kurumada's other works, a kirin (or occasionally a pegasus) has something to do with the protagonist.
Spell My Name with an "S":
- Is it Ron, Lon, or Long?
- And Foh, Fou, or Phoue?
Suicidal Overconfidence: Teppei suffers from this early on. It takes X essentially dying for him to start realizing he can't act stupid, if only for the sake of others.
Super Robot: The B't.
The Stoic: Foh and Hokuto don't smile that much.
Third Line, Some Waiting: You have a number of plots going on at the same time. The three big ones are:
- Teppei's Rescue Arc
- Foh and the other members of the Four Knights trying to determine if Raphaello is indeed an evil that has to be put down and if they should help Teppei.
- Kotaro's adventures in ~~Wonderland~~ Underhell where he tries to figure out Raphaello's weaknesses.
Utopia Justifies the Means: The Machine Empire's subordinates believe they are fighting to bring about an end to war. Some of them are more dogged in this belief than others.
Viewers Are Geniuses: Hokuto vs. Dr. Poe... plus any time Kotaro is writing formulas.
We Can Rebuild Your BT
Weaksauce Weakness: B'ts are vulnerable to certain sound frequencies that damage fragile parts of their systems.
What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Teppei initially views X as a tool to help him rescue Kotaro. It takes a while for him to realize X has his own thoughts and feelings. This also applies to Metalface, although his realization came too late.
What Measure Is a Mook?: The juggler uses mooks as People Puppets, to which Teppei is horrified despite having killed hundreds of them by that point. Interestingly, once he manages end his Villain Override of them, their helmets harmlessly blow up and reveal their faces.
You Fail Logic Forever: Deliberately invoked by Hokuto at one point to distract an enemy.
You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Aramis is eventually demoted due to her efforts to suppress Raphaello's growth. Evil Clown Juggler takes over for her
You Killed My Sister: The reason Quattro wants to kill Foh. Foh has no objections.
You Shall Not Pass: In the anime, when at death's door, Amigo wraps his arms around metal pipes and blocks a door with his body, which stalls the enemy mooks long enough for Teppei to arrive and finish them off.
You Will Be Assimilated: Raphaello's shtick. It provides gallons of Nightmare Fuel.