One of the things I enjoy doing when playing Super Robot Wars games is going back and watching many of the shows featured in the games. It’s how I’ve come to appreciate amazing shows like Godannar, Overman King Gainer, and Macross. Since I began playing the VXT30 series into Y, I’ve been making a point to watch more shows I haven’t seen before, particularly Aura Battler Dunbine as that was featured in X, T, and Y. I’ve also watched Heavy Metal L-Gaim, Getter Robo Armageddon, and am in the process of watching Getter Robo Arc. I’ll write some about those later.
Airing from February of 1983 to January of 1984, Aura Battler Dunbine tells a story of Show Zama, a Japanese motocross hopeful who is whisked away from his home to a world called “Byston Well”, later described to be the place where the souls of “Upper Earth”, where Show is from, go upon death. This balance apparently has been altered significantly at some point by the introduction of many Upper Earthers to Byston Well, and a man named Shot Weapon began to build fighting robots using his knowledge of technology on Upper Earth, for one of the Land of Na’s many feudal houses, Drake Luft. Drake’s goal? Conquest of the kingdom, and then neighboring kingdoms. These robots, dubbed Aura Battlers, run on “Aura Energy” which appears to be all around the land. Drake was using a fairy known as an Ferrio named Silky Mau to summon Upper Earthers to fight as aura battlers in his army. Show initially observed his army and ambitions alongside another Upper Earther named Todd Guinness, but seeing the cruel and destructive nature of Drake, Show defected to House Given, a rival house who is mounting a resistance against Drake, and begins to work alongside its leader, Nie, compatriot Keen, and another Upper Earther, Marvel Frozen. Piloting the Dunbine, Show exhibits exceptional power and use of it, and continues to improve as the show goes on.
Being someone who is into a lot of old animation and cartoons, especially western animation from the 80s and 90s, I wasn’t put off by the roughness of the animation in this show. It’s remarkably no different than some of the stuff you saw on Nickelodeon during that time, and it might’ve been the same animation studio. A lot of these shows were done on the cheap with Korean studios, but this being a Sunrise and Tomino show, presumably it was done within Japan proper. The animation does smooth out a bit as the show goes on, as evidenced mostly by how they animate Marvel throughout the series. But even with other characters, they do put some effort into them when it’s needed for the plot.
Two things you have to get used to though with this show are the old-school FLASHING SEIZURE LIGHTS and the SFX of the aura noise when the battlers are moving. Both happen frequently and intensely. It can get a little annoying after awhile and you kinda wish someone told the sound department to dial it back a bit. But it is part of the charm.
Characters, a lot of range here. You have your shoot-from-the-hip bravado Show who gets himself into shit others have to bail him out on often. Marvel, who kind of waffles back and forth as the wingman and the love interest. Nie and Keen, who also put themselves into trouble too often before taking a back seat to the heroes. You have your assortment of antagonist archetypes, from the rival Todd, noble but arrogant Bern, straight arrogant Todd, Allen, and Jeryll, and later on the princesses Elle and Ciela. Like most shows of the time and length (49 episodes), most of the episodes end up being a scenario of the week with little individual characterization, however everything does build to a satisfying conclusion, albeit the usual “kill em all Tomino” ending. That’s not quite a spoiler since we’re talking a show as old as myself here, but I won’t spoil how you get to that if you want to watch the show yourself.
The most interesting aspect of the show is the Mi Ferrio and E Ferrio. Cham Fau, voiced by Kawamura Maria whom also voiced Quess in Gundam Zeta and both Lilith and Leccee in Heavy Metal L-Gaim, largely sticks next to Show for most of the series and even has her own battler suit when going into battle with him. And while there is some Ferrio lore explored in the show, including characters that influenced major events in the story, it’s not particularly clear what Cham can do or how she helps with Show, other than being able to use her flying ability to scout ahead or perform minor tasks. It would seem she is largely a sidekick, which is fine, but I guess I kept thinking based on SRW games that she had some kind of ability and she was co-piloting with it.
As for Dunbine in the rabbit warez, Dunbine debuted in Super Robot Wars EX for the SNES in 1994, which got a PSX remake in 1999. It has since gone on to make thirteen more appearances in games, the most recent being the recently-released Super Robot Wars Y for PC/PS5/Switch. In most of the games, the characters and units appear in what is often called “post-plot”, meaning set after the series, and all of the major characters, Show, Marvel, Tod, and others will say the last thing they knew they were fighting over the Pacific and then they woke up here. SRWBX I think may have been one game to actually adapt the series story into it, but I’d have to verify others. In XTY, all of them are post-plot, with the first two largely just being the units appearing, good guys joining you, and the bad guys and grunt units joining whomever is the antagonist faction. Y does expand this out a bit, including some of the show’s universe elements like Jacoba Aon and the Ferrio, Drake and his Will O Wisp carrier as a capital ship you have to beat several times, writing Shot Weapon and Posadayl together, and more. Dunbine and Billbine are also just seriously good units to use in the game. Their dodge is usually very high so he evades most attacks, and his attacks land a sizable punch. Nie and Keen are also supporters in T and Y, the latter providing Press and Accel which was very useful to me. All three games also feature characters and story elements from Aura Battler Dunbine: Tales of Neo Byston Well which was an three episode OVA series made after Dunbine set in Byston Well of 700 years in the future.
If you’re a mecha connoisseur like myself, this should most definitely be required viewing. It’s a certified hood classic for one, but for two, it is still very much watchable, unlike the 1973 Getter Robo which is just.. eh. Don’t get me wrong, it’s also a classic and not to be skipped on, but the OP tries to give me a seizure, and it’s straight up monster-of-the-week buy-all-our-playsets-and-toys. Do yourself a favor and read the Getter Robo manga, then just go watch New Getter Robo onward or whatever. Hell, I don’t think it even matters.
Final Score: Seven times people just straight up grabbed Cham like a hot dog bun out of ten times useless fucking Riml fucked it up for everyone.
