Space Warrior Baldios

A 1980 Super Robot series by Ashi Productions, followed up by a 1981 Toei Animation movie.

A distant planet called S-1 is polluted. Our hero, Marin, is a boy who escaped from S-1's crazed military dictator Zeo Gattler. Unfortunately, before he can do anything about the people trying to overthrow the evironmentalists' hard work at restoration, he is sucked into a time warp and ends up near Earth in 2100. There, he uses his ship to form part of the mighty mecha, Baldios, and joins the rebel military team called the Blue Fixers.

The finale of the series is unexpectedly soul-crushing. You should know that now. The entire show is downbeat in tone, but the abrupt ending was caused by the fact that it was cut off before it could have the one more season it had been planned. The small fanbase the show gathered made a large upcry about the awful ending, and in the following year, a movie with a "fixer ending" was released by Toei in the holiday season of 1981.

Tropes used in Space Warrior Baldios include:

• All-Encompassing Mantle: Gattler has a huge red one.
• Bittersweet Ending: Although at the end of episode 34 Gattler's fleet is destroyed and the Earth won't become highly radioactive due to transporting a radioactive core out of the ocean, most of the planet still becomes submerged with the survivors living in an apocalyptic world. Aphrodia also goes missing.
• Blood Knight: Holy crap, Gattler.
• Book Ends: The lighthouse, in the movie.
• Diabolus Ex Machina: The hero Marin and his allies can only watch as the Big Bad, Zeo Gattler, unleashes his "Final Weapon" which triggers a cataclysmic series of gigantic tsunamis that ravage the surface of the earth. The last shot of episode 32 the series is a freeze-frame of a tsunami wave, with the word "End" appearing next to it. The next two episodes are essentially scenes of other minor characters throughout the series being killed off.
• Downer Ending: You Should Know This Already.
• Epic Fail: Gamujado's destruction in episode 18.
• Fatal Family Photo: Used in the movie.
• Frickin' Laser Beams
• Never Say "Die": Used narmfully by the English dub.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Just showing sympathy to the enemy will get you brutally murdered by Aphrodia.
• Screwed by the Network
• Shout-Out: Super Robot Wars Z uses the ending frame of the series as a Game Over scene in the 44th scenario of the game. Episode 29's Fixer-1 also appears as a unit.
• Special Attack
  • Cool Sword: Balsaber
  • Dual-Wielding: Balsaber Drilling
  • Fricking Laser Beams: Bald Beam
  • Ramming Always Works: Baldiroiser
  • Shoulder Cannon: Shoulder Cannon
  • Sphere of Destruction: Thunder Crash/Flash
• Super Robot Wars: Debuts in the aforementioned Z and returns in the sequel.
• Time Travel: Serves as the main plot twist in the last two episodes and the movie.
• You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Marin