Sengoku Majin GoShogun

せんごくまじんごーしょーぐん

Aired: 1981

A television anime produced by Ashi Productions and broadcast on TV Tokyo affiliates. A super-robot SF action series in which young pilot Shingo Hojo and his allies at the GoShogun Institute clash with the world-domination conspiracy Docouga. The titular super-robot is a fairly conventional three-machine combiner triggered by the iconic 'Go-Flasher' transformation call, but what truly distinguishes Sengoku Majin GoShogun is the wickedly charismatic Docouga inner circle - the suave aristocrat Bundle, the brutish Kernagool, and the calculating Cutnal - whose witty banter and three-dimensional personalities helped pioneer the now-familiar trope of foregrounding 'cool villains' in super-robot anime. With sharp scripts from rising talents including Takeshi Shudo, the series cultivated a passionate cult fandom and later spawned the 1985 theatrical sequel 'Time Etranger,' a darker SF mystery that continues to be reappraised as a landmark of mature anime storytelling.