FLCL

The first season of FLCL is a coming-of-age story and revolves around Naota Nandaba, a 12-year-old, working-class boy living with his widowed father and grandfather. His life in the city of Mabase is interrupted by the arrival of a Vespa-riding maniac named Haruko Haruhara. She runs over Naota then revives him with CPR before hitting him on the head with her left-handed, electric bass guitar (a blue, vintage Rickenbacker 4001) and proceeds to stalk him. Finding Haruko weaseling her way into his life as a live-in maid, Naota discovers that the head injury she caused created an "N.O." portal, which giant robots produced by a company known as Medical Mechanica emerge from periodically. The first of these robots is hit on the head by Haruko and becomes a friendly service robot later named Canti. Canti ingests Naota to assume the reddened form he first had when fighting the robots sent after him.

Haruko claims she is an alien investigator from the Galactic Space Police Brotherhood, and her presence places Naota and those around him in danger. The Interstellar Immigration Bureau's Commander Amarao, whom Haruko has a history with, asserts rather that she is an apathetic seductress seeking a space-manipulating being called Atomsk who was partially contained within Canti. Every time Naota is absorbed by Canti, Atomsk is gradually brought to Earth. As Atomsk is held in Medical Mechanica's custody and Haruko ultimately places Earth under threat, the company eventually turns their factory stationed on the planet into a doomsday terraforming device, attempting to have Naota and Canti absorbed by the doomsday device's Terminal Core. Haruko's plan fails as Naota ends up becoming Atomsk's host and then releases him into the universe after a brief battle that ends Medical Mechanica's attack on Earth. Haruko follows after Atomsk, and Mabase returns to some normalcy.

In the second season, FLCL Progressive, Haruko returns to Mabase years later after a failed attempt to contain Atomsk, although she did manage to absorb him. Placing herself as a middle school homeroom teacher, Haruko targets a 14-year-old girl named Hidomi Hibajiri through her classmate and eventual love interest Ko Ide. Haruko finds opposition in both the headphones Hidomi wears and Julia Jinyu, a more stoic offshoot of Haruko that splintered from her during her initial attempt to control Atomsk's power. Haruko eventually eats Julia to restore herself, and uses Ide to get to Hidomi. Like before, this causes conflict between Medical Mechanica and the Interstellar Immigration Bureau, as the latter was reverse-engineering Canti's technology to utilize the N.O. Channel's energies for their own use. Atomsk appears on Earth as planned, but Haruko ends up failing again with a freed Julia taking her leave. Haruko regains her composure and resumes her hunt for Atomsk as Hidomi and Ide begin their relationship while Mabase rebuilds after much of it was destroyed by Medical Mechanica.

In the third season, FLCL Alternative, Haruko enters the life of high school student Kana Koumoto and her friends as she became a mentor of sorts to Kana in helping the teen's transition into adulthood as Medical Mechanica begins its assault on Earth.

The first season of FLCL was directed by Kazuya Tsurumaki and produced by the FLCL Production Committee, which included Gainax, Production I.G,[6] and Starchild Records.[7]

Tsurumaki has said that he tried to "break the rules" of anime when making FLCL, for example, by choosing a contemporary Japanese band to provide the soundtrack, and patterning the style more after "a Japanese TV commercial or promotional video", creating a work that is "short, but dense-packed".[8]

FLCL's localization director and script writer Marc Handler stated that localization of the script was the hardest part of the show. The in-jokes in the show included obscure pop culture references that had to be decoded and transferred to English audiences. One example was a reference to Cheerio, a discontinued soft drink in Japan, for the English release the choice was made to use a discontinued American soft drink at the time, Crystal Pepsi.[9] Director Kazuya Tsurumaki responded to criticism of FLCL, stating "comprehension should not be an important factor in FLCL".[10]

The Medical Mechanica building featured is in the shape of a large iron. The character Amarao describes Medical Mechanica's goal as the destruction of all thought. FLCL uses the iron as a symbolic breakdown of "thought" by smoothing out the wrinkles as equated to the removing of the brain's wrinkles. For English localization, the Japanese team had to explain the concept because a direct translation of script did not convey the ideology.[11]

Haruko's 1965 Vespa Super Sport 180 and left-handed Rickenbacker 4001 bass guitar

FLCL has received a mostly positive reception. The series has been described as "bizarre" and "surreal",[50][51] and has been noted for its symbolic content,[52] unusual plot,[53] and its soundtrack composed by The Pillows.[54] Its experimental nature has also been noted, which includes an entire scene made in the cutout animation style of animated American series South Park,[55][56] or The Matrix-like camera rotation tricks.[57]

Christopher McDonald of Anime News Network called it "downright hilarious" and "visually superb" with great music, citing the packaging of 2 episodes per DVD as the only weakness of Synch-Point's original release.[58] Robert Nelson of THEM Anime Reviews gave the anime 4 out of 5 stars, stating "FLCL may not have a straightforward or deep plot. It may not have complex characterizations. Hell, it may not have any meaning. But FLCL does succeed in its true objective. It is fun to watch!"[59] Chris Beveridge of Mania gave it an A−, stating "FLCL is something that allowed those involved to try a wide variety of styles and techniques and does come off as quite experimental. But nearly everything worked in their favor and you end up with three hours of nearly break neck speed action, comedy and commentary on modern life."[60] Brian Ruh praised the series, stating "It was very frenetic and kept pushing the envelope on what was possible in Japanese animation."[61]

IGN columnist Davis Smith reviewed the anime shortly after its English premiere. In the article, Smith praised the series' unusual story telling, extremely high quality animation and the soundtrack provided by The Pillows; rewarding the series a score of 9 out of 10 concluding, "Logic dictates that FLCL should be an undisciplined and unaffecting mess, given all the insanity that its creators are attempting to weld into a functioning whole. Yet while it's hard to explain exactly why, it works. It entertains me. At times, it makes me laugh; at times, it makes me a little misty-eyed; at times, it makes me want to scream and howl and light things on fire and break windows with baseball bats and yes, maybe even buy a Vespa. That's the kind of success that you just can't argue with."[62]

From January 3 to February 7, 2012, Hayden Childs, of the online magazine The A.V. Club, composed a six-part weekly analysis and review of each FLCL episode in celebration of The Legend of Korra's then upcoming third season, a series that was heavily influenced by FLCL's animation style. In the article, Childs gave an extremely positive review of the series, understanding it as a surrealist inspired coming of age story,[63] stating "For all of its wild and initially bewildering aspects, the major purpose of FLCL is the impressionistic and often naturalistic documentation of Naota's passage into maturity."[64]

Avatar: The Last Airbender director Giancarlo Volpe has stated members of his staff "were all ordered to buy FLCL and watch every single episode of it."[65]

Chainsaw Man creator Tatsuki Fujimoto has stated in his 3 million copies sold thank you letter to fans that Chainsaw man is a "wicked version of FLCL".[66]

Anime News Network reported on August 31, 2015 that the production studio Production I.G may have been planning a remake of the popular series after announcing their purchase of the rights to FLCL from production company Gainax. This led many to speculate on the potential of a remake or possible continuation of the series.[71] According to Hideaki Anno, Anno's studio Khara was originally set to buy the rights to FLCL from Gainax. Before the deal was done however, Gainax suddenly raised the asking price causing the deal to fall though.[72]

On March 24, 2016 via Toonami's official Facebook and Tumblr pages it was announced that 12 new episodes of FLCL would be produced in cooperation with Production I.G.[73][74] The episodes were split into two individual seasons: FLCL Progressive (フリクリ プログレ, Furikuri Purogure, "FLCL Progress") and FLCL Alternative (フリクリ オルタナ, Furikuri Orutana, "FLCL Alterna") which served as sequels to the popular series which were initially broadcast on Adult Swim in August 2003. Neon Genesis Evangelion character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto designed the characters and Kazuya Tsurumaki, an assistant director on Neon Genesis Evangelion, served as director.[75]

The synopsis of the series was published by Adult Swim:

In the new season of FLCL, many years have passed since Naota and Haruhara Haruko shared their adventure together. Meanwhile, the war between the two entities known as Medical Mechanica and Fraternity rages across the galaxy. Enter Hidomi, a young teenage girl who believes there is nothing amazing to expect from her average life, until one day when a new teacher named Haruko arrives at her school. Soon enough, Medical Mechanica is attacking her town and Hidomi discovers a secret within her that could save everyone, a secret that only Haruko can unlock. But why did Haruko return to Earth? What happened to her Rickenbacker 4001 she left with Naota? And where did the human-type robot 'Canti' go?[76]

FLCL Progressive, the sequel series, featured the return of original character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamato (as his respective role) and original series creator Kazuya Tsurumaki, who supervised the project. Hideto Iwai wrote the scripts, and Katsuyuki Motohiro served as chief director on the project, with each episode featuring a different director: Kazuto Arai, Toshihisa Kaiya, Yuki Ogawa, Yoshihide Ibata, Kei Suezawa, and Hiroshi Ikehata.[77] The animation was produced mostly by Production I.G, but studios Production GoodBook and Signal.MD handled episodes 2 and 5, respectively. The Pillows contributed to the series soundtrack,[78] although the score was primarily composed by R・O・N from music production company VERYGOO.[77][79]

FLCL Alternative, the third season, once again saw the return of character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, composer R・O・N (with tracks by The Pillows), scriptwriter Hideto Iwai, and supervisor Kazuya Tsurukamki. Katsuyuki Motohiro, as well, returned as chief director, although Yutaka Uemara was the only director, and Kiyotaka Suzuki served as assistant director. Production I.G, Revoroot, and NUT produced the animation for the series.[79]

FLCL Progressive premiered on June 3, 2018 on Adult Swim's Toonami programming block and concluded on July 7, 2018;[80][81][82][76][83][84] FLCL Alternative premiered on September 8, 2018 and concluded on October 13, 2018.[85] In Japan, Alternative and Progressive had theatrical screenings[86][87] on September 7, 2018, and September 28, 2018, respectively.[88][89] The first episode of FLCL Alternative unexpectedly premiered early at midnight on April Fools' Day on Toonami, airing entirely in Japanese with English subtitles.[90] The day of the second season's US premiere, Toonami simultaneously announced via its Facebook page that they would be delaying the English subtitled versions of both new seasons until November 2018, in respect for the Japanese film format releases.[91][92] Warner Bros. released FLCL Progressive on DVD on October 1, 2019.[93] It later released FLCL Alternative on DVD along with a Blu-ray combo pack of both sequels on February 4, 2020.[94]

Two additional seasons were ordered by Adult Swim in 2022, which were announced on Toonami's 25th anniversary, titled FLCL: Grunge and FLCL: Shoegaze, respectively. Both seasons will premiere in 2023.[95][96]

• DuHamel, Brandon (February 24, 2011). "FLCL: The Complete Series Blu-ray Review". Blu-rayDefinition.com.
• "FLCL Vol. 1". Newtype USA. Vol. 1, no. 2. Houston: A.D. Vision. December 2002. ISSN 1541-4817.
• Johnston, Chris (November 2006). "FLCL Ultimate DVD Collection". Newtype USA. Vol. 5, no. 11. Houston: A.D. Vision. p. 151. ISSN 1541-4817.
• Horn, Carl Gustav (March 2002). "FLCL". Pulp. Vol. 6, no. 3. p. 1. Archived from the original on June 15, 2002.
• Horn, Carl Gustav (March 2002). "FLCL". Pulp. Vol. 6, no. 3. p. 2. Archived from the original on June 24, 2002.
• Horn, Carl Gustav (March 2002). "FLCL". Pulp. Vol. 6, no. 3. p. 3. Archived from the original on June 24, 2002.
• Horn, Carl Gustav (March 2002). "FLCL". Pulp. Vol. 6, no. 3. p. 4. Archived from the original on June 24, 2002.
• Horn, Carl Gustav (March 2002). "FLCL". Pulp. Vol. 6, no. 3. p. 5. Archived from the original on June 24, 2002.

Wikiquote has quotations related to FLCL.

• FLCL at Funimation
• FLCL on Twitter (in English)
• FLCL (OVA) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• FLCL at IMDb