Gad Guard: Mecha Action in the Slums!

A stone that listens to your emotions. A city split into rich, middle, and poor levels. And a sudden transformation that can swallow the metal around you to build a towering robot or a nightmare creature. That’s the weird, gritty spark behind Gad Guard, and we give it a fast, high-energy review with just enough detail to help you decide if it belongs on your watchlist. 

We walk through Unit Blue’s three-tier layout, with Night Town’s harsh reality sitting under Daytown and Gold Town’s polished comfort, then connect that setting to the show’s central mechanic: Gads. These mysterious stones act like ultra-valuable currency, but their real danger is how they react to strong feelings, shaping Techos and other forms through violent, material-hungry transformations. If you love sci-fi anime that treats worldbuilding like a pressure cooker, this one has plenty to chew on. 

From there, we dig into the character lineup and what their machines say about them, from Hajiki and Lightning’s speed and aggression to Katana and Zero’s cold long-range edge. We also hit Arashi’s drive for freedom, Takumi’s justice obsession, Aiko’s Gold Town expectations, and the way Sayuri changes what you think you know about Katana. We close with what still holds up after two decades, including the jazzy soundtrack, the look, and why we rate Gad Guard an 8 out of 10. 

If you’re into mecha anime, early 2000s sci-fi, or stories where emotion becomes literal power, subscribe for more reviews, share this with a friend who needs a new watch, and leave a rating so more people can find the show.

Transcript

Intro And Series Premise

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What up gang? It's the Zone Podcast back at it again with another review. It's Mega Monday, and today's topic is Gagguard. Now, before I get started, fair warning, it's gonna be a yap fast. But I swear I'm gonna try to get through it as fast as possible without boring y'all. Now several hundred years into the future, the natural resources of the earth are exhausted, and the progression of the human race has stagnated. Uh, we got Hajiji Sonata, a delivery boy living with his widowed mother Kyoko and his younger sister Sasuke and Unit Blue in the impoverished uh part of unit known as Night Town. While delivering a package, he unwittingly stumbles upon a gad, a mysterious device that reacts to the strong feelings of a nearby person. The gat transforms, takes on the form of a humanoid robot referred to as a techo. Hajiki soon discovers he isn't the only one who has had contact with a gad, and that the contact with one doesn't always end well. The series follows his struggles to cope with his new friends, his Teko, and his wife in Nighttown. Now, the main series does take place with Ajaquis' rivalry with Katana and the relationship he's here with the other Tekko owners after running into the Justice Craze Tamuki, the friendly Aiko, and the danger-prone Arashi, the group forms a friendship over the course of the series. Their relationship varies from episode to episode as Hachiki sees Takumi as overly righteous, thinks Aiko is a little too obsessed with mutual friendship and can't seem to understand what to do with Arashi. Still, he seems to hold all four of the others close, even Kostuna, and like Aiko, he wishes they were close all on the same side.

Unit Blue And Life In Night Town

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Now the central unit in which Jaguar takes place is Unit Blue, which is separated into three levels. Gold Town, which is the richier upper class area, uh Dayton, which is the middle class, uh, middle ground area where it's not as fancy as Gold Town, but according to the people in Nighttown is the right place to be, you know. And then Nighttown is the ghetto of Unimbu, where you have gangs, punks running the streets, uh, local kids going to school at a church. Uh, talk about a nun and a young teacher. Uh just dark and dank and grimy setting for most of Dad Gar, where Katsuki and his family live, along with Kotuna, the Doc Bruno gang, and a host of other characters.

What Gads Do And Why They Matter

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Now, Gads, they're these powerful stones. Everybody wants and desires them and believes that they can fulfill people's dreams. And though the real importance of GAD is unknown, they are used as very high sums of currency and are usually only owned by the rich or powerful. A GAD has many peculiar abilities and can take shape into a number of things depending on the personality and thoughts of the owner. These creations are separated into actually four groups. Uh, I want to say, are heavy metals made from gas? Because I know a bunch of people ride on heavy metals, and I believe those count. But it's those the techos, which is the humanoid robots that the main cast have. There's Atecos, which is uh, well, I'll explain those. Uh Autticos and Gadrians. Again, I was playing earlier. It's unknown what initially triggers a gas transformation while strong feelings are involved. Other times there are no reaction at all. Upon a gas transformation into something, all metal and most other material around it are violently absorbed and used as a base for the final product. Now, a tech code is one of the three things that's brought from gas, uh, and also called a gas band, occasionally by characters who aren't aware of the difference between the two, like Raphael and that one gun. I think Raphael was uh voiced by Steve Bloom, who voices Spite Spiegel from Cowboy Bebop. It usually takes the form of a large humanoid robot, roughly 20 feet or 6.1 meters tall, fueled by the emotional bond between the robot and the owner. Uh, those robots are born after contact with the gas owner while they have a strong or serious emotion in an area occupied by a lot of metal. Five main techos of the series is Lightning, Zero, Thunderbolt, Measuresmith, and Hayate, all named after World War II era fighter planes. An Ateco is the manifestation of one's darker feelings. Most guys take the form of Otikos. Uh, being with that being said, Tecos are very rare, the humanoid techos. They genuinely take the form of chaotic-looking monsters and are formed in the same way techos are by absorbing the materials around them. But unlike techos, octicos are independent creations. They can also be a result of a gad failing or falling into the hands of someone without any kind of strong impacting emotions or attention, such as a young child. A gadrian is what is formed when the feelings of hate or greed completely consume the owner of a gad, and likewise the gad itself, and then eventually the gad absorb these thoughts of greed and anger, killing the owner of the gad and creating a monster that's like organic in nature with technological modifications. So, in other words, a cyborg. So, unlike techos, gadrians are made of both inorganic and organic matter. Gadrians can be considered a subclass of oxycos.

Characters And Their Techos

SPEAKER_00 6:33

Now, I already mentioned Hajiki being a delivery boy. He's short-tempered, somewhat jaded, being the eldest child and the only son of the son of the family. He works as a delivery boy to make ends meet. On this skateboard and moped, hangs out at all hours with his similarly punkish friends for a lack of anything better to do. Maybe it's like at an arcade or well, not really arcade, more like a nightclub or something, something like that. His father uh supposedly died in a freak accident as an astronaut um launching into space. And yeah. His techo lightning is named after his father's plane, is his tech code, and he received it in the first episode coming in contact with a guy he was delivering. Uh, lightning is very quick, especially made for melee fighting and jump career. Uh the use of his extendable exhaust tube coming out of his neck. He also has engines in his lower leg, which can propel to great speeds when it gets down on one knee. It's mostly red, white, and blue and resembles a sword, but he's a superhero. Now, Katana, uh, yes, pronounced katana as opposed to the sword katana. Different. He's the main anti-hero of the series who acts as the antagonist to the main character, so he constantly switches between villain and ally from situation to situation. In a nutshell, this dude's pretty much a sociopath. He's like this goth that just don't care for anybody, uh, except for himself. Maybe his partner is zero, but not so much as the heavy metal that he has seven. Basically, he wants to uh take over Night Town, he wants to inconvenience everybody. He he's a real asshole. He's really gonna what else can I say? He's not evil, but he is a sociopath. And I already mentioned um zero a little bit, like he excuse me. I'm sorry, I'm kind of choked up right there. Uh Zero. Just imagine Zero being like Unlike Lightning, who's mainly for melee fighting, Zero has his gun, so he's more so for long range. He can do long range. Yeah. Now, along with Hazaki, Katana does meet up with other the other three Tekko operators, shows a variety of opinions about them, and Aiko earns uh Katana's light trust when he he rescues Sayuri from a dangerous uh spot in the middle of one of his battles. Uh Takumi, however, earned Katana's disdain almost to the level of that of Hajiki due to his meddling and loudmouth sense of justice, and he delights in baiting and teasing him coldly only to prove that he's superior to the short fuse boy. Arashi stands as Katana's way of getting to Hajiki, using her as a messenger and even learning his name from her. Again, Tusera fights, and he seems to despise her to the point of near blind rage in their final confrontation. Jumping ahead, we got Arashi. Uh, she's the daughter of great martial artists, so she also got hands, too. She always wanted to fly away from Nighttown and whatnot. Like she's mainly a girl that just wants freedom. But also, she got feelings for Hajiki too. So she'll pretty much follow him around. Once she got Hayate, he she pretty much been trying to help Hajiki without actually fighting because she doesn't really like violence, even though that's the thing about being a martial artist. Just because you're trained, that doesn't mean that we go out to beat up anybody that we can. That's not how it works. Now, relationship-wise, besides Hajiki, Arashi has little contact with the others, uh, say for uh Katama uh Katana. She finds people like Katuna disgusting because they do bad things, although she herself like Takumi Aiko does not understand the troubles of living in a place like Nighttown because she's from uh Daytown. Uh like I said, I mentioned Hayate being uh the name for Japanese word for wins, uh after Harachi's desire to fly. Kind of shaped like an act, like more close to an actual fighter jet from World War II with the way the propellers are on his neck. Uh other than this ability, Hayate has no special functions for fighting a violent combat. You know, uh talk to me, I kind of meant to him. He's the short, wealthy boy from Dayton. Uh, he has a Techo Thunderbolt, and he was trying to be, you know, like this hero justice. But sadly, he's the first one to lose his techo, which was pretty sad. But he was kind of hanging around, hanging around with uh Hotsky's mom and whatnot. But yeah. Uh who else? Uh Iko, uh, the adopted daughter of the Disney man Larry Harmony, uh, owner of the Central Electronics, the biggest electric company in Unit Blue. She's a sweet girl, but very 15, only child of a rich and rather famous family. She is constantly under the pressure to see her father when he steps down from the company, something that she only at 15 is not perfectly certain she wants to do. Now, unlike others, Aiko is the only one from Gold Town. Like, see Arashi from Daytown, Takumi's from Daytown. She is from Gold Town, so that's why it was important to mention the three different places in Unit Blue earlier. Nobody really dislikes Aiko, but you know, because sometimes people feel like, oh, you know, your real they'll just probably say some nasty thing, you know, kind of like haters. But nobody really likes Aiko. Nobody, excuse me, nobody really dislikes her. Uh, I'm gonna keep trying to blaze through it, I swear, because I'm not trying to hold y'all too long. Uh, Sayuri, adorable little blonde girl who showed up out of the blue the day that Zero appeared to Katsuna innocently asking him what he was gonna call him. And for whatever reason, this child, armed with a pink coat, a bunny plushie, and a big smile, refused to leave Katsuna's side, following the not-so-welcoming boy, wherever he goes with the claim that she is his friend. She seemed to seek others who surround Katsuna, uh, searching for more uh friends for him, asking ICO, and even talking to me if they are friends of his when she runs across him in the junkyard. And after having her around and being unable to damage her, no matter how she walls around after him and pest with him, Kantana becomes accustomed to her and finally grows attached to her to a point that she becomes becomes with him everywhere, even answering his job phone for him to take messages, reminding him uh that he likes she likes to remind him constantly that he low-key likes Hazaki and that they should be friends, but he purposely saves her from harm. But why he does not know initially. She's actually a Techo created from the same guy that Zira came from, and from part of Kostana that remembered his childhood, and in particular, a childhood friend that was very dear to him. Sayri is possibly the only person or creature Kazana has ever truly and completely loved since the day he lost his memory, if only because she is the part of him that remembers and the proof that he is at heart just a lonely little boy. Uh, Sayuri is very loyal to him and are invention and alluded to, uh, created by him inadvertently. And un and like all the techos, she disappears when he no longer needs her and learns to function on her own. There's other characters, but I just didn't want the review to drag off for too long. Main

Music Visuals And Final Score

SPEAKER_00 15:44

thing is, I like the jazzy music, it visually holds up after about 20 years. I believe it came out in 2003 or something, and ultimately it's about a bunch of techno pilots bonding with each other or conflicting with each other as they deal with given the situation around the setting, such as heavy metal users causing trouble, whatnot, deliveries, robberies, general scenarios, and after all that, I'd give Gagard an 8 out of 10. It was pretty great. Pretty great. And yeah, I had more notes, but like I said, if you've been listening to the podcast for the past few months, it's just been mainly me. And lately it just seemed like the more I just keep yapp yap yapping, the more my throat kind of dries out. So I'm trying to do it as fast as possible so that way it doesn't seem like I sound boring, or I either sound bored trying to do this, sound miserable trying to do this, or not. Like I'm trying to uh bring some energy to it, but you know, ironically like being a podcast host, and apparently I don't even like to yap that much. But nah, I do like to talk about these certain things, but my main thing is I just don't want to yap on for too any longer than I have to, you know what I'm saying? So yeah. 8 out of 10. I'm feeling good about that score. So

Wrap Up And Sign Off

SPEAKER_00 17:30

with that being said, I'm gonna go ahead and get up out of here. You go ahead and have yourself a good morning, good afternoon, good evening, good night, uh, whatever time you have to be listening to this. Stay nerdy and remember that great things are coming. And ultimately, take it easy.