Gainax

GAINAX Co., Ltd.
株式会社ガイナックス

Type	Animation studio
Industry	Animation (Anime)
Genre	Various
Founded	December 24, 1984 (1984-12-24)
Founder	Hideaki Anno Yoshiyuki Sadamoto Hiroyuki Yamaga Takami Akai Toshio Okada Yasuhiro Takeda Shinji Higuchi
Headquarters	Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan
Key people	Hiroyuki Yamaga (President)
Products	Gunbuster Diebuster Neon Genesis Evangelion Gurren Lagann This Ugly Yet Beautiful World FLCL Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi Petite Princess Yucie Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt
Website	www.gainax.co.jp

DVD cover of North American release of Otaku no Video.

GAINAX Co., Ltd. (株式会社ガイナックス, Kabushiki-gaisha Gainakkusu) is a Japanese anime studio famous for productions such as Gunbuster, The Wings of Honneamise, Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi, FLCL, Gurren Lagann and Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt, which have garnered critical acclaim^[1][2] and been commercially successful. Evangelion has reportedly grossed over 150 billion yen, or approximately 1.2 billion USD.^[3] In a discussion at the 2006 Tekkoshocon, Matt Greenfield claimed Evangelion had grossed over 2 billion USD;^[4] Takeda 2002 reiterates that "It sold record numbers of laserdiscs in Japan, and the DVD is still selling well today", as well as for their association with award-winning anime director and studio co-founder Hideaki Anno. The company is headquartered in Koganei, Tokyo.^[5]

Until Neon Genesis Evangelion, Gainax typically worked on stories created in-house, but the studio has increasingly developed anime adaptations of existing manga like Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou and Mahoromatic. Series produced by Gainax are often known for their controversial twist endings.

The Animage Anime Grand Prix has been awarded to Gainax for Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water in 1991, Neon Genesis Evangelion in 1995 and 1996, and The End of Evangelion in 1997.

History

Beginnings

The studio was formed in the early 1980s as Daicon Film by university students Hideaki Anno, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, Hiroyuki Yamaga, Takami Akai, Toshio Okada, Yasuhiro Takeda and Shinji Higuchi. Their first project was an animated short for the 20th Annual Japan National SF Convention, also known as Daicon III, held in 1981 in Osaka, Japan. The short film is about a girl who fights monsters, robots, and spaceships from early science fiction TV shows and films (including Ultraman, Gundam, Space Runaway Ideon, Space Battleship Yamato, Star Trek, Star Wars, and Godzilla) until she finally reaches a desert plain and pours a glass of water on a dried-out daikon radish, which immediately resurrects itself, grows into a huge spaceship, and beams her aboard. Though the short had an ambitious scope, the animation was rough and low-quality.

The group made a much bigger splash with the short they produced for the 22nd Annual Japan National SF Convention, Daicon IV, in 1983. Starting with a better animated recap of their original 1981 short, the short then moves to the girl as a grown woman, wearing a bunny suit and fighting an even wider range of science fiction creatures (including various Mobile Suits from the Gundam series, Darth Vader, an Alien, a Macross Valkyrie, a Pern dragon, Aslan, a Klingon battle cruiser, Spider-Man, and a pan across a vast array of hundreds of other characters) while surfing through the sky on the sword Stormbringer. The action was all set to the Electric Light Orchestra song "Twilight", though the group's failure to properly license the song would prevent the short's official release on DVD (and make the limited laserdisc release of the Daicon shorts very rare and highly sought after items).

The Daicon IV short firmly established Daicon Film as a talented new anime studio (albeit small and with only 20 million yen or about US$200,000).^[6] The studio changed its name to Gainax in 1985, basing the term "Gainax" on an obscure Tottori Prefecture^[7] term for "giant", with the English suffix -x added because it sounded "good and was international".^[8]

Gainax's first work as a commercial entity was Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise, released in 1987. Honneamise was (and still is) critically acclaimed and a classic anime movie; however, it had a tepid commercial reaction (Gainax did attempt to develop a sequel later in March 1992, before abandoning it for lack of funds).

The next release, the 1988 OVA Gunbuster, was a commercial success^[9] and put Gainax on a stabler footing to produce works like Nadia and Otaku no Video. During this period, Gainax also produced a number of items such as garage kit and adult video games (a major earner which kept Gainax afloat on occasion, though they were sometimes banned).^[10]

Evangelion

Gainax's offices in Koganei, Tokyo, circa 2004. The studio since moved to a modest two-story premise, also in Koganei, before moving again to another premise.

In 1995, Gainax produced perhaps their best known series, the commercially successful and critically lauded Neon Genesis Evangelion. In the wake of Evangelion's success, however, Gainax was audited by the National Tax Agency at the urging of the Tokyo Regional Taxation Bureau on suspicion of committing tax evasion on the massive profits accruing from various Evangelion properties. It was later revealed that Gainax had concealed 1.56 billion yen worth of income (thereby failing to pay 560 million yen due in corporate taxes) which it had earned between the release of Evangelion and July 1997 by paying closely related companies various large fees, ostensibly to pay for animation expenses, but then immediately withdraw 90% of the sums from the other company's accounts as cash and store it in safe deposit boxes (leaving 10% as a reward for the other company's assistance).^[6]

Gainax president Takeshi Sawamura and tax accountant Yoshikatsu Iwasaki were arrested on July 13, 1999 and later jailed for accounting fraud.^[11][12][13] Yasuhiro Takeda later defended Sawamura's actions as being a reaction to Gainax's perpetually precarious finances and the shaky accounting procedures internally:

"Sawamura understood our financial situation better than anyone, so when Evangelion took off and the money really started rolling in, he saw it as possibly our one and only opportunity to set something aside for the future. I guess he was vulnerable to temptation at that point, because no one knew how long the Evangelion goose would keep laying golden eggs. I don't think he purposely set out with the goal of evading taxes. It was more that our level of accounting knowledge wasn't up to the task of dealing with revenues on such a large scale."^[14]

2000s

Current Gainax headquarters in Koganei, Tokyo.

In 2004, Gainax marked their 20th anniversary with the production of Diebuster, the sequel to Gunbuster. Gainax's most recent successes on television have been the popular anime series Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (2007) and Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt (2010).

In August 2011, Gainax was sued by A.D. Vision, who claimed Gainax's refusal to accept an option payment for the perpetual live-action rights to Evangelion was a breach of contract and had resulted in losing an opportunity to produce the film with a major studio.^[15] A.D. Vision has asked to be awarded the live-action rights to Evangelion and any accruing legal fees.

In 2012, Gainax announced it would be producing its first live-action television series, EA's Rock, with director Nobuhiro Yamashita.^[16]

At the 2013 Tokyo Anime Fair, Gainax announced that they would be making once-dead Blue Uru film with Hiroyuki Yamaga as the director and screenwriter and Yoshiyuki Sadamoto as the character designer.^[17]

Filmography

TV series

Films

OVAs and ONAs

Daicon tokusatsu fan films

Other works

Gainax has also teamed with other groups to create various works, such as a 1987 promotional video for the song "Marionette" by Boøwy^[23] and the 2006 Momoko-based "Gainax Girls" fashion dolls created in collaboration with a Japanese fashion doll.^[24] Gainax also collaborated with Game Arts in 1992, resulting in the video game Alisia Dragoon.

Gainax has also produced a number of computer games, including a strip mahjong game featuring Evangelion characters^[25] and its most famous, the Princess Maker series (later adapted as Puchi Puri Yūshi).

Gainax also collaborated with Saudi Arabian media content company ARiNAT on a three-minute anime trailer titled "Desert Knight" (Sabaku no Kishi), which debuted at the "ANI:ME" Japanese pop culture festival in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.^[26]

Relationship to fan community

Since Gainax originated as a group of fans, it has maintained ties to the general otaku community, allowing dōjinshi of its work, fan-made action figures,^[27] promoting series like Evangelion at private festivals, and so on.

The term "Gainaxing" has been coined by fans to describe exaggerated bouncing of a female character's breasts. Similarly, the term "Gainax ending" has been used in reference to several Gainax productions to describe an ending to a work which is surreal, or seems to come out of nowhere and resolve little.

See also

• Gonzo - studio created by ex-Gainax staff
• Khara - studio created by Gainax's co-founder
• Trigger - studio created by ex-Gainax staff

References

Further reading

• Hernandez, Lea. "The Curse of Urusei Yatsura", interview by PULP magazine, vol. 5, no. 8 (August 2001): 24–29. ISSN 1096-0228.
• Howell, Shon. "The Fabulous Dog and Pony Show: An Interview with Shon Howell". By Ben Dunn. Mangazine, vol. 2, no. 23 (May 1993): 11–18. Shon Howell was the second vice president of Gainax in charge of United States operations (General Products) after Lea Hernandez (the first) quit.
• Howell, Shon. "The Fabulous Dog and Pony Show". Mangazine, vol. 2, nos. 24 (June 1993), 25 (July 1993), 27 (September 1993), 30 (December 1993), 31 (January 1994), 32 (February 1994). A column further detailing Shon Howell's experiences with Gainax.
• Leonard, Andrew. "Heads Up, Mickey". Wired, issue 3.04, April 1995. An article on anime, focusing on the history of Gainax.
• Takeda, Yasuhiro (2002). The Notenki Memoirs: Studio Gainax and the Men Who Created Evangelion. Houston: ADV Manga. ISBN 1-4139-0234-0. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Gainax.

• (Japanese) GAINAX NET — Gainax's official Web site
  • Gainax's Official Daicon Films Website — Info on their classic tokusatsu & anime shorts (DVDs available there).
• Gainax at Anime News Network's encyclopedia

Gainax
Founders	Hideaki Anno Hiroyuki Yamaga Shinji Higuchi Takami Akai Toshio Okada Yasuhiro Takeda Yoshiyuki Sadamoto
Television series	Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water (1990–1991) Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995–1996) Kare Kano (1998–1999) Modern Love's Silliness (1999) Oruchuban Ebichu (1999) Mahoromatic: Automatic Maiden (2001–2002) Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi (2002) Mahoromatic: Something More Beautiful (2002–2003) Petite Princess Yucie (2002–2003) This Ugly yet Beautiful World (2004) Melody of Oblivion (2004) He Is My Master (2005) Ani*Kuri15 (animated sequence) (2007–2008) Gurren Lagann (2007) Shikabane Hime: Aka (2008) Shikabane Hime: Kuro (2009) Hanamaru Kindergarten (2010) Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt (2010) The Mystic Archives of Dantalian (2011) Medaka Box (2012) Medaka Box Abnormal (2012) Stella Women’s Academy, High School Division Class C³ (2013) Magica Wars (2014) Wish Upon the Pleiades (2015)
OVAs/ONAs	Appleseed (1988) Mahjong Hishō-den: Naki no Ryū (1988–1990) Gunbuster (1988–1989) Beat Shot (1989) Circuit no Ōkami II: Modena no Tsurugi (1990) Honō no Tenkōsei (1991) Money Wars (1991) Otaku no Video (1991) K.O. Beast (1992–1993) Casshan: Robot Hunter (1993–1994) Debutante Detective Corps (1996) FLCL (2000–2001) Anime Tenchou (2002) Mahoromatic: Summer, Special (2003) Re: Cutie Honey (2004) Diebuster (2004–2006) Mahoromatic: I'm Home, Special (2009) Wish Upon the Pleiades (2011)
Films	Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise (1987) Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water (1991) Neon Genesis Evangelion: Death & Rebirth (1997) The End of Evangelion (1997) Revival of Evangelion (1998) Gunbuster vs. Diebuster (2006) Gurren Lagann The Movie: Childhood's End (2008) Gurren Lagann The Movie: The Lights in the Sky are Stars (2009)
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