Genre: Action
Company: Gonzo
Format: 24 episodes
Dates: 10/9/2002 to 3/19/2003
In the Star Century 0165, the Galactic Organization of Trade and Tariffs (GOTT) was formed, utilizing the ES task force to maintain order throughout the Galactic Union. The year is now Star Century 0328, and Eclair and Lumiere are two ES members who carry out missions for the GOTT with their superpowers. As they take on more and more missions, they begin to realize that there is far more to the GOTT and the Galactic Union than what they see on the surface.
summary by Eek
Reviewed: 11/19/2003 by
Grade: 37% 
Highs: Decent opening and closing theme songs
Lows: Irregular and sloppy character development; ridiculous action; is that a plot or scrambled eggs?
You must be joking. Kiddy Grade is an anime? Unfortunately, the answer is “yes”. Gonzo has done it again; they blew through my already-low expectations and created a series that takes itself seriously… but I have a hard time taking it seriously at all.
I find it amusing that the only good part is the opening and closing songs. The opening, Mirai no Kioku by Yuka, and the closing, Future by Little Viking, capture a bit of style that the series fails to deliver on. However, everything else in between is not worth your time at all; save yourself the pain of watching this series by purchasing the theme songs if you truly want to listen to them that badly.
I stick by the saying “character development is never a bad thing”. Kiddy Grade gives some background for Eclair, Lumiere and one other character. That’s it. However, most of this comes during a few episodes in the middle third of the anime and comprises a few dark flashbacks into Eclair’s past that make little sense. Everyone else is effectively a name with a face and superpowers. Speaking of superpowers, it seems that almost everyone has some power that turns ridiculous at one point or another. Fights end up being drawn out, boring and usually turn into get-beat-down-only-to-rise-back-up-and-reveal-true-power type that Dragonball Z seems to specialize in. As if that was not bad enough, the plot has a case of amnesia, going from bad to promising to worse. In the first third of the series, it is purely Case of the Week with tiny mentions of anything to come; the middle third has a working plot and gets somewhat interesting, yet the last third is so filled with plot twists that it winds up poking holes in the story. I am sure that some genius at Gonzo was thinking, “Hey, plot twists make intelligent anime,” as soon as they realized just how deep of a hole they had dug. When there are at least two new twists per episode, you know something went horribly wrong.
With characters you will have less sympathy for than a box of pancake mix, bad action sequences that become more bizarre as time goes on and a poor plot that twists more than a salsa dancer, Kiddy Grade is one of the worst anime I have ever seen. You should only watch this… thing… to gain more appreciation for good anime.
Anime Academy 