Luluco: A Love Letter to Trigger [2016]

This is an old and subpar piece, I am just uploading it here for posterity. Originally uploaded 27 June 2016.

Just a heads up, this contains spoilers for a decent amount of Trigger and Gainax works. There’s pretty major spoilers for Space Patrol Luluco, Gurren Lagann, the second Gurren Lagann movie, FLCL, Diebuster and Kill La Kill.

With that out of the way, Space Patrol Luluco is a short series directed by Studio Trigger’s founder and resident madman, Hiroyuki Imaishi. Right from the get-go, Space Patrol Luluco completely oozes with the chaos and nonsense indicative of an Imaishi anime- it’s crazy, colourful and fast paced. Luluco herself wants nothing more than a normal life as a normal middle-schooler and that lasts about an entire minute and a half before everything starts going completely wacky. As the show went on, fans started to notice that the series was packed full of references to past works that Studio Trigger and their predecessor Gainax had put out. Space Patrol Luluco is like a love letter to everything that Trigger is famous for, it stands on its own feet as a great show while also celebrating their rich past. I’ll be pointing out some of the references I noticed.

Episode 1

In the first episode we’re introduced to the chief of the Ogikubo branch of the Space Patrol, Chief Over Justice. For those in the know, he’s instantly recognisable as being similar to Inferno Cop. Both of them are 2D fire skeleton policeman.

There is no doubt about their connection, as Studio Trigger themselves confirmed very early on that Chief Over Justice is in fact Inferno Cop’s boss who he was on the phone to while in the pyramid in Egypt.

The similarities between the two don’t stop there, as Over Justice’s act of repeatedly arresting and releasing Luluco is a callback to a joke from episode 3 of Inferno Cop, where a Southern Cross judge performs the same gag during a trial.

Over Justice also dons large glasses that appear to be a mix between the designs of Kamina’s glasses and Simon’s star glasses.

One final similarity can be drawn between the transformation sequence of the Judgement Gun Morphing and the gun mode of Canti in FLCL.

Episode 4

Now in episode 4, or rather, season 2 episode 1, we get a meta-reference from Studio Trigger. Among online communities, there is the inside joke of the infamous “fourth episode” with Imaishi. In Imaishi’s two major series Gurren Lagann and Kill La Kill, the fourth episode suffers from a distinct lack of quality compared to the rest of the series. In Space Patrol Luluco, they reference that infamy by avoiding having an episode 4 in any of Luluco’s 5 seasons.

Episode 5

In episode 5 we get a lot of references to past Trigger and Gainax works.

Perhaps the most obvious out of all the ones in the episode is to be found in the form of Luluco’s mother, the space pirate Lalaco Godspeed. Lalaco’s cape has Kill La Kill life fibres in it, which was the very first thing to suggest that perhaps this series would serve to unite a wider Triggerverse.

As well as that, Lalaco herself could be considered a reference to FLCL since both her and Atomsk are space pirates based in a red colour palette.

The second most obvious reference is the animation of Chief Over Justice standing up to transform before his battle with Lalaco. The movement of him throwing off his jacket and buffing up his chest for a second is identical to the way Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann moved when it threw of its cape in order to do its Giga Drill Break in the finale of the second Gurren Lagann movie.

Over Justice’s body is like a mix between the body of Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and the Super Granzeboma.

Upon transforming his glasses change to more closely resemble the pronged glasses on the stomach face of the Chouginga Gurren Lagann.

After revealing his super powerful Super Tengen Toppa Mode he transforms into a feeble looking gun and uses a move called Fire from Fire which could potentially be a reference to the naming scheme of Dark and Dark from Inou-Battle.

This doesn’t faze Lalaco and while Over Justice recovers she swoops in kicks him away with a “yearrt”, referencing Ninja Slayer.

Finally, Lalaco’s space pirate ship looks very similar to the Dai-Gurren, down to that fact that both are red, both have similar arms and both fly.

Episode 6

In this episode they awaken Luluco’s dad and he helps them. As his body was broken he is nothing more than a talking head, similar to Lordgenome in the second half of Gurren Lagann.

Five minutes into the episode during the scene where they have use Midori’s black hole app to try and shoplift Lalaco’s ship, the screen displays a ‘type:green’ warning which is a reference to the ‘ blood type: blue’ warning  that denotes the Angels in Evangelion.

At one point in the episode, Lalaco puffs up the feathers on her cape in a way that reminiscent of both Satsuki and Ragyo Kiryuuin from Kill La Kill.

It was already established that Lalaco had life fibres in her cape. The Life Fibres are an evil space-faring species, and the Space Patrol deals with universal justice. Could it perhaps be that the space patrol would be interacting with the life fibres? The answer to that question is a glorious yes. BAM there it is. At the end of the episode we get teased super hard by being shown a planet that is undeniably covered in life fibres.

Episode 7

Up until this point, the references were just that, they were simple nods to Trigger’s backlog of work. But with this episode and the visit to Thread Ball Planet KLK-X while on the search for Ogikubo, they can no longer be classified as simply references. At this point the existence of a wider Triggerverse is undeniably confirmed. It should be noted that as far as I can tell this is a different planet from the one that Kill La Kill takes place on. They are a space faring species so it makes sense too. Unlike Earth in Kill La Kill, planet KLK-X has succumbed to the Planetary Cocoon Sphere and been enslaved by the life fibres.

The planet is swarming with COVERS.

There is also a leader who uses the same method as Ragyo did in episode 20 of Kill La Kill, connecting a life fibre to the target in order to appear to them as their desires manifest.

This leader who appears to Luluco as a fake Nova is called a “Kill***killian”.

The “Kill***killian” references Kill La Kill heavily. He radiates bright beams of golden light similar to Satsuki.

He begins his speech by saying “Let me tell you two useful pieces of information”, which is a reference to Tsumugu in Kill La Kill, who in turn was referencing Viral from Gurren Lagann himself.

The Kill***killian also references the Scissor Blades, saying that “the only way to cut life fibres is to cut them on both sides simultaneously with an ultra hard scissor like object”.

As if those weren’t in your face enough, Kill La Kill’s main hype track Before My Body Is Dry starts playing, and Kill la Kill’s iconic red text pops up as well.

During the battle, it features the stylistically animated close-ups utilised in the final battle of Kill La Kill.

In the end, Over Justice uses his flames to light the life fibres on fire. Why did this work when regular flames didn’t during Kill La Kill? Could it be because the chief is made of Dark and Dark? Who knows. It was probably just the magical power of justice flames. At the end of the fight, the Kill***killian is struck with a seni-soshitsu for good measure.

At the end there’s also these weird humanoid versions of Guts, but I have no clue what that’s about and I’m not sure I really want to know either.

Episode 8

I don’t even know what to tell you on this one. They go travel to Magic Planet LWA in search of Ogikubo. Literally they just go to the Luna Nova Magical Academy. There’s no subtlety here, it just straight up is Little Witch Academia. They even reuse some of the same shots.

In the last episode, nobody from Kill La Kill actually appears and they don’t even go to the same planet that Kill La Kill took place on, but in this episode they go the the Luna Nova Magical Academy and even run into Sucy.

Episode 9

We had Kill La Kill. We had Little Witch Academia. What crazy crossover are we gonna see this time? Perhaps they’ll ride through Jack Knife Edge Town with Inferno Cop or save anime with Ninja Slayer? Maybe they’ll experience a totally normal yet not normal at all school life with the crew from When Supernatural Battles Became Commonplace, or help advance some people with the Hackadolls.

Nope. Scratch all that off. Instead we get Studio Trigger’s most famous and beloved anime… Sex and Violence with Machspeed.

Like most people, you’d probably find yourself asking, “What the heck is Sex and Violence with Machspeed, I’ve never even heard of that.” First a bit of history. Before there was Trigger there was Gainax. Two of the main names within Gainax were crazy in a fun way Imaishi and crazy in a messed up way Anno. Hideaki Anno is most famous as the man behind Evangelion and one of the original co-founders of Gainax. In 2006 formed another studio called Studio Khara, and a year later he officially announced his resignation from Gainax. So far the only major thing Khara has done is their three Evangelion Rebuild movies. Besides those, in 2013 Studio Khara headed a project called the Japan Animator Expo. The Animator Expo was a platform where each week a new anime short was released. Quite a few studios were involved, including Trigger. One of Trigger’s shorts was called Sex and Violence with Machspeed, and it was headed by Imaishi himself no less. It was kind of like a more obscene version of Panty and Stocking, and that’s the work they decided to crossover with here.

Episode 10

There was comparatively less references in episode 10. There is a brief moment where they use an overhead light in a similar vein to Mako’s hallelujah moments in Kill La Kill.

This episode is also the first time we see Lalaco wielding a black version of Shiny Chariot’s Shiny Rod from Little Witch Academia. Other than that I didn’t notice anything else.

Episode 11

Season 3 of Space Patrol Luluco was the crossover season, so that was the end of any explicit appearances right? Skipping ahead from episode 9 to episode 11, this episode says “ha just kidding we tricked you” and gives us the crossover we all wanted. Luluco dies and goes to hell. And who does she run into in hell? Just a little somebody called Inferno Cop.

He appears in all his 2D glory, although oddly his badge has a crack in it, and he’s missing his gun. He mentions that he used to be in the Space Patrol so I wonder if the reason for his model changes is because he no longer works for Chief Over Justice, he might just be chilling in Hell with his Auntie Grenda.

He sits her down around a campire, eating marshmallows with one of the wands from Little Witch Academia. This could either be just a reference to Little Witch Academia, or it could be a reference to the fabled Little Witch Academia x Inferno Cop crossover short.  Although at this point I’m not sure that short actually exists, I think it’s just a massive practical joke Trigger played and people have latched onto it.

Inferno cop proceeds to give some legitimately serious advice to Luluco and reassures her that he’s only 21 years old before sending her on her merry way back up towards life. The stairs Luluco takes out of Hell are the same stairs that Inferno Cop used to escape in episode 7 of his series.

Episode 12

When Luluco connects to Lalaco’s space pirate ship, the dynamic sequence of zooming along the ship’s hull is reminiscent of the shot used at the very beginning of Gurren Lagann and then again in Parallel Works 8.

Luluco is shown standing on the very front of the ship doing her very own Gainax pose.

This mimics the scene from episode 14 of Gurren Lagann where the Gurren Lagann stands on the very tip of the flying Dai-Gurren as they wage war against Teppelin.

During the fight, space pirate Lalaco uses the stolen shiny rod in the same manner that Akko does at the end of the first Little Witch Academia, transforming it into a magical bow to shoot an arrow of magical energy.

After her emotion-filled charge, she finds Nova sitting atop a glowing piece of moon. The way Nova is sitting is similar to Kaoru in episode 24 of Evangelion.

Once Nova awakens his emotions and his shirt gets blown off, you can see that he has a Kiznaiver scar on the lower right of his back.

As well as that, he also has a cross-shaped scar on his forehead similar to the evil Southern Cross organisation from Inferno Cop.

At the very end of the episode we see the Blackholeian transforming into a bigger purple form similar to the way that the AntiSpiral transforms into the Super Granzeboma in the climax of the second Gurren Lagann movie.

Episode 13

When Luluco’s hair changes I thought it was going to be a reference to Diebuster when Nono activates her Buster Machine 13 mode for the first time, but instead it became something even crazier.

Right before Luluco fires Nova at the Blackholeian, it shows the trigger on her justice gun getting pulled. Interestingly enough, the trigger is the same one featured on the bottom of the two g’s in Trigger’s logo. Now why would this be?

It all comes full circle and Trigger goes crazy one last time. The reason that the Trigger was the same one in the logo? Turns out that Luluco is one of the Trigger Girls. The Trigger girls are a trio of characters that were featured in some promo art Trigger made for their fifth anniversary, but they’d never appeared anywhere and people had been wondering about them for a long time.

Luluco uses Nova as a bullet, and the shot of him moving away calls back to Kaworu in Evangelion 3.0.

Right before getting sucked into the wormhole, the Blackholeian says, “There will be a second and third-“ before disappearing. I think this is their way of saying that the other two Trigger girls will be getting their own series in the future as well.

During the epilogue, it shows where all the characters end up. Luluco and her dad stay with the Space Patrol in their Ogikubo, chief Over Justice is promoted to CEO of the entire Space Patrol organisation (also featuring a cameo from Ariel Suzuki, Inferno Cop reporter).

Lalaco steals some Kiznaiver scars from a Gomorin.

And Luluco herself becomes Mrs Trigger, one of Trigger’s three mysterious mascots. And then as a final bonus, Luluco high-fives Akko of Little Witch Academia, passing the torch from her and her show Space Patrol Luluco to Akko and her newly announced upcoming Little Witch Academia TV series.

It’s also worth noting that Luluco and Nova had a cameo in the Kiznaiver finale, which canon-wise would have occurred during the crossover season.

And in acknowledgement of this they also made crossover versions of the Luluco and Kiznaiver promo art.