Rinne no Lagrange: Worst Mecha Ever (or Most Hilarious)

Kyono Madoka is miss perfect highschooler but seems to be bit of an airhead. One day she meets a mysterious girl that promises to be her comrade and asks her to pilot a robot. Under attack by alien forces, Madoka accepts and suplexes the alien invader ...

Rinne no Lagrang, First Impressions: To be blunt, this is a pretty dumb plot. None of it makes any sense whatsoever ... it's like they are improvising the dialogue on the spot and then animating something to fit. Like wow, wow, wow. But here's the thing, it's not just all randomness though. The way I see it, once they latch onto something crazy enough to use, all the actors then feed into the craziness (i.e. the cellphone scene at the end of epi 2). It's like I'm watching an episode of "Who's Line is it Anyway", only THIS IS A MECHA ANIME. ARGH. If you've also watched this show, you gotta know what I'm talking about.

Because furthermore, I cannot possibly believe in all of anime there exists a potentially less qualified group of mecha pilots, and that's even after taking account the one anime from 7 years ago with the shrine maiden duo. I don't know if I should be impressed or freaked out that I can remember that.

There's also some subplotline where the Earth is stuck in the middle of an intergalatic war and neither side seems particularly trustworthy. In fact, the "invaders" already feel more like "the good guys" than the so-called "advisors" and allies for Earth, and if that's going to become their big plot twist later down the line, then wtf; it's just too transparent for the one serious thing that's going on here. I see this as the result of one of two possible causes: either a 12 year old wrote the story OR the creator is an absolute retro mecha maniac (like maybe a super otaku of some sort). Anyways, the animation is pretty old school, robo-tech even, and the CG is also sub par.

Basically everything sucks -- except for one thing.

The sudden debut of seiyuu Kaori Ishihara in a lead role (as Madoka) singlehandedly saves this mess. Energetic and quirky, Madoka's character is probably the sole reason for even considering this anime as something viewable. It's kind of like someone took Yui Horie's Minoran from Tora-Dora and turned her into a mecha pilot that has a knack for saying the most hilariously inappropiate things at all the most critical moments (think Will Smith style). Although the performance is pretty damn refreshing (a good thing), I think the result is just unintentional comic gold.