Following Mobile Suit Gundam, Yoshiyuki Tomino turned his many talents toward a new series, Space Runaway Ideon. While Gundam had opted for a greater degree of realism, Ideon was more like a classic super robot show. However, that’s where the similarities stopped, as Ideon was a dark and brutal anime.
Set a few centuries in the future, humanity is exploring the cosmos and has colonized various planets, such as the planet Solo in the Andromeda Galaxy. However, we are not alone and an alien race known as the Buff Clan, that admittedly look just like us, stumble across our humble colony on Solo and conflict inevitably ensues.
This is because the Buff Clan are searching for the power of the Ide and think that it might be buried on Solo. Unfortunately for humanity, the Buff Clan are right but not before the human colonists accidentally activate three ancient machines that combine into a giant mecha, the Ideon.
From this point on, the conflict between the Buff Clan and the humans with Ideon escalates to a terrifying degree. With the humans constantly trying to flee the Buff Clan with the Ideon and their Solo Ship, the carnage that ensues claims the lives of many and a fair few planets along the way.
You see, the Ideon is not your typical mecha. It’s not even your typical super robot. This is because it is hugely, in fact infinitely powerful. The power of the Ide is behind this potency and what activates it is often mysterious.
Once the Ideon unleashes its potency, either with the terrifying Ideon Gun or the planet cutting Ideon Sword, you really begin to understand that this can only end in one truly tragic and brutal way, which it entirely does.
In many ways, Ideon was the series that in part earned Tomino his “kill em all” nickname, as the body count is as excessive as the Ideon’s limitless power. Showing that absolutely power corrupts absolutely and, in this instance, results in an enormous amount of death and suffering.
This is what makes Ideon as an anime so fascinating and compelling, it really is unlike anything else before or since and it’s status amongst anime fans, at least in Japan, is somewhat legendary as a result.
Like with Tomino’s later series Aura Battler Dunbine, Ideon also utilized the wondrous talent of Tomonori Kogawa for the characters and who also ended up directing the animation for a large chunk of the series.
Kogawa’s styling gives a sense of maturity to the characters that definitely fits very well with the bleak tone of the series.
However, the mecha designs definitely counter-balance this maturity with Yuichi Higuchi of Studio Submarine having penned the suitably chunky Ideon. Though, the Buff Clan ships and mecha are fascinatingly alien and actually juxtapose the Ideon quite nicely. For me anyway, the Ideon still looks like the God of GMs and in a way, that seems fitting.
What's more, Koichi Sugiyama of Dragon Quest fame also composed the music in Ideon and his score, like in the Dragon Quest games, underpins the immensity of what is happening and also the awful tragedy of the various events that unfold.
As for Ideon’s influence across anime and games, where do you begin really? It’s well known that Hideaki Anno was partly inspired by Ideon when it came to the creation of Neon Genesis Evangelion but its impact didn't stop there, as many other Gainax anime were influenced by Ideon as well.
However, when it comes to games, Ideon’s impact is far-reaching. With the Super Robot Wars series, Ideon as a unit was a terrifying prospect in Super Robot Wars F Final but it was in Super Robot Wars Alpha 3 that captured the bittersweet aspect to its horrifying power. Wiping out entire maps with the Ideon Gun was oddly gratifying but doing that too often resulted in the bad ending, where everyone dies horribly.
Then there is the Gundam manga crossover, Counterattack of Gigantis, where Amuro, Char and Judau try to stop a newly awakened Ideon from destroying everything yet again. This was a noteworthy manga, not least because of the fact it was penned by Yuichi Hasegawa who would later go on to write Crossbone Gundam a few years later.
So to have Ideon in its entirety on Blu-ray is something I think that is entirely necessary at this point and I definitely appreciate the fact we now have it more widely available outside of Japan, if only to understand its cultural impact.
As for this Blu-ray, it is taken from the recently remastered version that was released in Japan a while back. That means, even though this is an anime from the early 80s, it looks and sounds pristine.
Admittedly the animation is quite dated but the scope of this anime is such, that you don’t notice that when planets are being cut in half.
This set includes the entire series as well as the movies Contact and the finale Be Invoked. You also have a collection of promos included.
This release also lacks an English dub but the original Japanese audio is accompanied with some solid English subtitles.
Overall, Ideon is an anime I never thought that would ever be released outside of Japan, so to have the remastered Blu-ray release with not only the series and movies is genuinely fantastic. This is not an anime for everyone though and while it isn’t a gory show, it can be quite brutal and violent in places. However, if you persevere the journey is worth it, even if it is heartbreaking.
Space Runaway Ideon is now available on Blu-ray and can be purchased from Sentai Filmworks.
Disclosure: Maiden Japan sent me a copy of this set for the purposes of this review.
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