Overview

As you may be able to tell from the cover art, Eureka Seven is a mecha anime which, as you may know, is not my normal genre. Despite this, I did manage to make it through the entire first series, but I did not watch the sequel series Eureka Seven AO which I hear is much worse.

In the world of Eureka Seven, mechs ride boards through the air in the same way as someone might ride the waves on a surf board. Because of this, the pilots of Gekkostate, an anti-government organization, are basically the futuristic equivalent of “surfer dudes.” And it’s no surprise that these guys who ride the waves for fun are better at piloting the mechs than their military counterparts.

To me, the major themes of this anime appeared to be anti-war and anti-establishment, which make sense when you realize the main cast is a group “chill surfer dudes” who left the military to form a resistance.

Characters

The main character is Renton Thurston. He’s a kid who loves to lift, the air equivalent of surf, and he dreams to one day be part of Gekkostate because they’re known as the best lifters around. His father also died saving the world when Renton was younger so now he lives with his grandfather who doesn’t want to lose him to and so he disapproves of his lifting lifestyle.

Eureka is the titular character and the main pilot of the first mech, the Nirvash type ZERO. She’s also a child, but has grown up in an entirely different world from Renton. Eureka is also Renton’s love interest even though she’s nowhere near best girl.

Next we have the leader of Gekkostate, Holland Novak. He’s was originally a friend of Renton’s father, but has grown to forget why he loves lifting in the first place. Because of this, Renton reminds him of himself when he was younger, which angers him and he tends to take out his frustration on Renton.

Talho Yuki is Holland’s girlfriend, although their relationship is strained at times. Like Holland, Talho is also a founding member of Gekkostate and serves as the pilot for their flagship, the Gekko. Her physical appearance changes over time to highlight her character development which is something that also happens with Eureka.

While there are other good characters such as Matthieu and Hilda, I’m going to skip over them since they’re supporting characters and move onto the primary antagonist of the show, Anemone.

Anemone is the military counterpart to Eureka and is the sole pilot of the Nirvash type TheEND. She’s crazy, she’s violent, and if there’s one thing I like other than tsundere, it’s yandere. Anenome also has an overweight badger as a pet named Gulliver because why not?

Conclusion

Mecha anime aren’t really for me so I’m sorry in advance to any fans of the genre, but Eureka Seven is a 5/10 for me. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t good either. I didn’t really like most of the main cast with the exception of Matthieu, Hilda, and Anemone, although I guess that’s because they were kind of meant to be unlikable in some situations.

I also didn’t care much about the plot. It was just about a whiny kid who wants to pilot a mech with the girl he’s obsessed with because he’s never seen a girl before or something. The music and animation were fine though so at least there’s that.