dangermousie | Full Metal Panic: The best anime you have never seen

Today's recommendation of the day? One of my favorite animes of all time, Full Metal Panic. FMP consists of three series: the first one, called simply Full Metal Panic, then Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu (which takes place during some of FMP and after) and, my favorite of them all (and probably my favorite piece of TV animation ever), Full Metal Panic: The Second Raid.

Here is a MV:

FMP is the story of Kaname Chidori and Sagara Sousuke, who remind me, a little, of a modern-day, younger versions of Kaoru and Kenshin from Rurouni Kenshin. Kaname is your seemingly average Japanese school girl: strong-willed and bossy, but very well-adjusted and living a pretty normal life. However, unknown to her, she also happens to be a 'whispered', a person with the ability to read and understand newly appeared complex technology of unknown origin, an ability which makes her a target to a wide range of organizations.

Sousuke is a mercenary who has known no other life than that of combat. He has no memories of a family and has been recruited by his present organization after being found as a child soldier in a fictional Middle Eastern country. He lives to serve, really, and has no other conscious idenity than that of a soldier, having never really considered any personal wants and needs.

His latest assignment? His organization dispatches him to guard and protect Kaname, assuming he can blend into the environment by pretending to be a fellow student, because not only is he of Japanese ancestry, he also is about 17 (he doesn't know his real age, but he looks about that). Problem: he has never had any normalcy and has no more idea of how to blend in than how to fly.

Of course, Kaname notices the new oddball following her around all the time and is by turns amused and exasperated. But then, a routine school trip turns into a kidnapping mission by a different mercenary outfit, and Sousuke is left all alone (his group thought the danger had passed and withdrew cover) to try to rescue Kaname, a decision that might be more emotionally motivated than it should be, for such a perfect soldier. And it goes on from there...

FMP is a huge favorite for me, behind only Trigun. Why do I love it so? A clever plot. A tough adorable heroine. A conflicted, tough good-guy hero who is also a naif. Plus, it has everything: love, gun battles, school hijinks, emotional break-downs, quests for identity, and uniforms.

Kaname/Sousuke are one of my hugest OTPs in any genre: he might be a tough soldier but he is also a lost little boy who is slowly beginning to learn what it is to want for himself. And Kaname is cheerful, pragmatic, entirely too straightforward and not a pushover in any way. She rescues him as much as
he rescues her.

Here is a TSR mv:

FMP has made me laugh so hard my stomach hurt (Fumoffu), made me bawl (TSR), made me blazingly angry and giddily happy. TSR, especially, is amazing: it really is one unbroken storyline over 13 episodes, with Sousuke having to cope with being ordered away from Kaname and Kaname having to cope with danger in her life without him, and how neither can deal, and it's a character study more than anything, of someone systematically breaking down and falling apart and then, at the last minute, being pulled back together. I just...I have no words for how much I love TSR. But the rest of it is equally good.

So yes, watch. Sousuke and Kaname want you to:

ETA: these are based on a series of graphic novels which are ongoing (though the anime wrapped up their storylines very well and so it's not in flux) and I just read spoilers for some Kaname/Sousuke stuff which made me DIE of glee.

Kaname's bravery and determination came to a head in the climax of the novel Continuing on My Own. Following Sosuke's defeat by the hands of Leonard Testarossa, she gives herself up to Leonard and Amalgam to save his life. As she is picked up by the Belial's giant hand, she whispers something to Sousuke before being whisked off. After being taken by Leonard, she was imprisoned at an island villa by Amalgam. In the novel, Come Make My Day, Sousuke arrives at the island in order to save Chidori, but is unable to do so, because she's taken away in a helicopter. During the flight, Kaname is able to communicate with Sousuke, and that's when they both confess their feelings for each other, and Sousuke promises Kaname he'll find her no matter what the cost is...At the end of the novel Come Make My Day she finally expresses those feelings to Sousuke while in radio contact with him and extracts an absolute promise from Sousuke that they will kiss the moment they are reunited.

In the most recent novel, Semaru Nick of Time...Leonard Testarossa takes Kaname back to the Omni-Sphere after recovering from his wounds in Come Make My Day. There she is forced to resonate with Sophia, a key Whispered, who overtakes Kaname's personality. Under Sophia's control, Kaname is shown the illusion of shooting and killing Tessa Testarossa and Sousuke Sagara. Under Sophia's control, she leaves with Leonard for Merida Island, where Amalgam has built a machine to utilize a final ability of the Whispered; still believing she killed her good friend and the man she loves.

MAD SQUEE OF LOVE.