Betterman (ベターマン) is a Japanese anime television series produced by Sunrise's internal "Studio 7" and JVC. It is a spinoff of The King of Braves GaoGaiGar, produced under the direction of Yoshitomo Yonetani and writer Hiroshi Yamaguchi. It aired on TV Tokyo from April 1, 1999 to September 30, 1999, and was the first anime to broadcast in widescreen, though it was letterboxed.

Plot

In the year 2006, the world is affected by a mysterious disease dubbed "Algernon" that causes mass suicides and murders. Meanwhile, while preparing for the opening ceremony at the geofront underground amusement park "Bottom the World", a mysterious mass fatality accident occurs. Mayo Tsuko of the Algernon research institute Mode Warp, who came to investigate with the police, concludes that Algernon was the cause of the accident. At the same time, Keita Aono accidentally enters the closed Bottom the World. As he wanders, he encounters a gigantic humanoid mecha (or "neuronoid") called "Kakuseijin 01". In the cockpit is his childhood friend Hinoki Sai, who he broke up with when he was young, as a head diver. Kakuseijin 01 was stranded after Hinoki's partner, the head diver Cactus Prickle, suddenly disappeared. Attraction robots that have gone out of control attack them. Keita suddenly gets into the cockpit of Kakuseijin 01, and along with Hinoki, uses Kakuseijin 01 to fight off the robots. In order to escape from Bottom the World, Keita cooperates with Hinoki and searches for the missing Cactus.

Shared continuity with The King of Braves GaoGaiGar

Betterman takes place in the same world as The King of Braves GaoGaiGar, predominantly before the events of The King of Braves GaoGaiGar FINAL, though only a few minor links are visually made within the series itself. The novel series King of Kings: GaoGaiGar VS Betterman fully explains the connection between two series and how both events overlap each other.

Characters

Protagonists

Antagonists

Betterman's transformations

Glossary

Episodes

Releases

Betterman is composed of 26 episodes, first aired on TV Tokyo from April 1, 1999 to September 30, 1999. It was licensed and released in the USA (on DVD) by Bandai Entertainment. The series was dubbed by Ocean Productions at their Blue Water studio in Calgary, Alberta. The dubbed English version from this DVD release has also aired on the US cable network G4TV (Known as TechTV at the time of its airing) during the "Anime Unleashed" rotation, premiering on December 30, 2002. Following the 2012 closure of Bandai Entertainment, Sunrise announced at Otakon 2013, that Sentai Filmworks has rescued Betterman, along with a handful of other former BEI titles.