After watching FLCL and other anime series, Gainax’s premier of their nice new digital animation software, I became enamored of Anime Music Videos. The fun, humorous plays on themes from the show and the music or their juxtaposition gave me that warm feeling inside as only the Doom Song can. One of those videos was a mix of Styx’s Mr. Roboto and FLCL, made by John Vaders. After watching it once it smacked me squarely in the face. The stories were too similar to be coincidental. They had to be related in some way, it’s most likely that the writers of FLCL used part of the story from the Rock Opera Kilroy was here in the subplot dealing with Atomsk and the strange powers Naota has. To explain my argument, I’ll point out the paralleling plots in both.

Mr. Roboto is about the revelation of the character “Kilroy.” Robert Orin Charles Kilroy was the world’s last rock star, after it had been devastated by Dr. Everett Righteous and his group the Majority for Musical Morality. At a concert one of the MMM’s protesters was killed, and though no evidence blaming Kilroy was found, he was put under arrest and put in a reeducation prison guarded by Mr. Robotos, the Japanese answer to unskilled labor in the future. Rebels fighting the MMM break the mind control and give him instructions that allow him to steal the exoskeleton of one of the Mr. Robotos. The final scene is Kilroy revealing himself in the Dr. Righteous’s museum of Rock Pathology.

Warning, thar be spoilers.

In FLCL Atomsk is the enigmatic pirate is captured by Medica Mechanica(MM) in the back story. Medica Mechanica is a fascistic organization that builds factories on planets it wishes to remove the creativity and individuality from, with gigantic irons. It is clear from the plot that he escapes in the robot named later Lord Kanti or Kanchi. After a quick fight between the possessed robot and a gigantic robotic hand, Haruhara Haruko destroys a crucial part on the robot, making it impossible for Atomsk to manifest himself without partially merging with Naota. At the end there is the revelation that it truly was Atomsk helping Naota save the city from the monsters that had the tendency to emerge from his head. Throughout the show there is an odd proclivity on the part of the characters with powers to fight by hitting things with guitars.

There is the evidence I have seen so far. The robots guarding the outlaw, who escapes in one of their bodies. The final revelation before another who fights Medica Mechanica. The similarity of the characters of Atomsk and Kilroy. And the love affair which the OAV has with Rock and Roll. So much narrative coinciding without correlating is unlikely is a world so media obsessed as our present one is, and thus I conclude that there is a connection, be it inspiration, plagiarism, or homage.

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