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Gall Force is a group of science fiction anime OAV series made starting in 1986 by the studio Artmic, with production by Youmex and AIC.
The original series concerns a Hopeless War between the One-Gender Race of Solnoids (humanoid females) and the Paranoids, who are an amorphous race that usually inhabits powered armor suits. The remaining crew of the Solnoid cruiser Star Leaf barely escape the destruction of their fleet in yet another hopeless battle, only to get caught up in a conspiracy that will have far reaching consequences for all concerned.
The original story has two direct sequels, in which Lufy is rescued ten years after being stranded in space during the original. She joins up with another replica of Catty and her team, first to prevent the ongoing war from claiming Earth and the Star Leaf's legacy, and later in a last desperate attempt to bring everything to an end other than the mutual annihilation both sides seem to be seeking.
Later, Rhea Gall Force and its sequels, the Earth Chapter revisit the story on a post-apocalyptic Earth, millions of years after the original series. The Lost Technology of the Solnoids and Paranoids have given birth to the "NME", techno-organic weapons trying to Kill All Humans, and the Identical Spiritual Descendants of the original cast find themselves fighting for survival.
The more obscure final entry in the original continuity is New Era, which has humanity rebuild from the ashes of the Earth Chapter, only to fall into conflict with a race of Artificial Humans they created. But the legacy of the "NME" is still plotting to destroy everything, and the only hope of preserving any of humanity lies with Catty's newest incarnation.
The series saw a revival in 1996 with Gall Force:The Revolution — an attempted Continuity Reboot of the franchise that replaced the Paranoids with a perpetual civil war between factions of Solnoids, and a group of rebels trying to bring that war to an end. Despite an all-star cast of seiyuu, the series was quickly forgotten, and is the only part of the franchise not released in English.
The Gall Force franchise provides examples of:[]
- Ace Pilot - Lufy, an "Attacker" with over 150 confirmed kills and a medallion to prove it.
- Adam and Eve Plot - Implied.
- Amazon Brigade
- Animal Theme Naming - Most of the Solnoids: Rabby (Rabbit), Lufy (Wolf), Catty (Cat), etc.
- Alternately, there's Rock Theme Naming in New Era.
- Artificial Human - The "new life form" from the originals; The "Yumans" from New Era.
- Auto Doc - When Lufy is brought into the analysis station operated by Spea, they just move her into a chamber and press some buttons to restart her heart from a state of suspended animation. Spea mentions offhand that there are several injuries that may require organ replacement.
- Badass - Lufy takes out the vast majority of an alien attack group while using the equivalent of her fighter's escape pod.
- Back From the Dead - Lufy was rescued to appear in the first two sequels.
- Big Eater - Rumy.
- Bizarre Alien Biology - The "new life form" grows to adulthood within maybe 20 minutes.
- The Paranoids themselves are an exceptionally bizarre race, essentially morphing slime that, aboard their own ships, shapes itself around a robotic frame to move around more easily. They enter their attack ships by being sluiced off the frame and through tubes, literally being piped into their mecha.
- Blood Knight - Lufy.
- Boisterous Bruiser - Lufy.
- Bratty Half-Pint - Rumy.
- The Constant - Catty. After another of her model appears in the original series, Earth Chapter introduces another duplicate rebuilt by Earth humanity millenia later; this duplicate also appears in New Era.
- Continuity Reboot - Gall Force: The Revolution
- Dogfighting Furballs - A smaller one occurs with The Battlestar, two fighters, three Humongous Mecha and a suit of Power Armor versus maybe two or three dozen "battle drones" (actually Starfish Aliens in Power Armor).
- Dream Sequence - In the escape ship.
- Dub Induced Plot Hole - It's relatively minor, just a bit of a characterization goof: in the dub, Lufy is nicer to Pony before the spacewalk, saying "You'll live. Promise." This line doesn't exist in the sub, and it's Rabby who encourages the tech to go across the zipline.
- Fan Service - Via Innocent Fanservice Girls and Shower Scenes.
- Earth Is a Battlefield - Actually, the moon.
- Eternal Recurrence - If the subtitle of the first movie wasn't a clue, then the lookalikes in Rhea and beyond should be a better one. New Era just makes it Anvilicious.
- Everybody's Dead, Dave - The seven crewwomen of the original OVA are the sole survivors of the Star Leaf (plus one guest).
- Face Full of Alien Wingwong - Eluza, Patty.
- Faster-Than-Light Travel - Via a jump drive.
- Fire-Forged Friends - By the end of their battle together defending the Star Leaf, Rabby and Lufy are virtually the Fan-Preferred Couple.
- Fling a Light Into the Future
- Foreign Sounding Gibberish - The text on the screens seems to have a lot of stylized Latin letters, some of which are written upside down.
- Government Conspiracy - Between the Solnoid and Paranoid leadership. The "Species Unification Plan".
- Half-Human Hybrid - Well, half-humanoid.
- Hey, It's That Voice!:
- Maria Kawamura ("Naga") as Eluza, Michie Tomizawa ("Sailor Mars") as Pony, Hiromi Tsuru("Bulma") as Lufy, Naoko Matsui("Naomi Misora") as Rabby, and Naoko "Chi-Chi or Puar" Watanabe as Catty.
- Revolution has an all-star cast: Kotono Mitsuishi as Rabby, Kikuko Inoue as Eluza, Mariko Kouda as Catty, Tomo Sakurai as Patty, and Chisa Yokoyama as
RumyRamy. Michiko Neya and Ai Orikasa round out the cast as Canon Foreigner villainesses "Shoot" and "Pfizer".
- Hope Spot - Stardust War, the finale of the original series. Captain Nebulart reveals a newly terraformed planet Embryo to the remnants of the Solnoid and Paranoid fleets meeting for an apocalyptic battle, and broadcasts a final plea for both sides to put the meaningless battle behind them. The battle stops as both sides listen to the message. Then someone gets an itchy trigger finger, and an omnicidal Blast Out ensues.
- Human Aliens - The Solnoids.
- Humongous Mecha - The Paranoid "dynamech", among others.
- Identical Grandson - The Rhea/Earth Chapter and New Era series have counterparts of the original cast, that are Hand Waved by this trope.
- It's All Junk - Lufy throws her "Attacker" medal to the floor when Rabby accuses her of not caring about her fellow pilots who died while she earned it.
- Kill Sat - The BFG of Kill Sats, it orbits a sun. The sun it's supposed to kill. The development of this weapon scares both sides of the Solnoid-Paranoid war into trying to Take a Third Option.
- Loser Daughter Of Loser Mad Scientist: Sandy Newman of the Rhea/Earth Chapter series (Rabby's reincarnation), the daughter of the scientist who discovered the ruins from Eternal Story and created the NME.
- Martyr Without a Cause - Arguably Lufy's motivation for her You Shall Not Pass Heroic Sacrifice in Eternal Story.
- Mecha Mook - The Solnoid "cyborg soldiers" who appear starting in the second installment of the original series.
- Names to Know In Anime - Kenichi Sonoda was responsible for the original character designs.
- Not Good with People - Pony, the only crew member able to communicate with the OX-11 mainframe, but a Shrinking Violet with her crewmates.
- One-Gender Race - The Solnoids.
- Opposite Sex Clone - The "new life form".
- OVA
- Planet of the Apes Ending
- Powered Armor - Used by Lufy.
- The Real Remington Steele - Catty Nebulart
- The Remake - Gall Force: The Revolution, a 1996 Revival OVA.
- Retool - Rhea Gall Force/Earth Chapter, New Era.
- Ridiculously-Human Robots - Catty
- Robot Buddy - TOIL and AIL.
- Roboteching - While one translation refers to what the ships are firing as missiles, and they're drawn that way at least once, the majority of the time the bendy-path weapons look and act more like lasers.
- Senseless Sacrifice - Pony essentially dies just to satisfy her curiosity.
- Sole Survivor - Seven people survived on the Star Leaf. Only one of them made it to the end.
- Space Is Noisy
- Space War
- Star-Killing
- Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Shildy, who replaced Rabby as Lufy's foil in the sequels to Eternal Story.
- The Team Wannabe - Mitty
- Ten Little Murder Victims
- Token Mini-Moe - Rumy.
- Transforming Mecha - The hoverbikes that turn into humanoid robots.
- World of Action Girls - Justified by being a One-Gender Race.
- Wrench Wench - Pony.
- You Are in Command Now - Eluza.