Top 10 Mecha Anime Flexes

#10: Allow Me To Introduce Myself

“Super Robot Wars OG: The Inspector” (2010-11)

If you’ve played any of the Original Generation games then you know Sanger Zonvolt is just about the coolest MFer on the planet… or any others for that matter. The TV series did a pretty good job of portraying this too, as you’re about to see. In the ultimate display of aura farming, Sanger emerges from the water, giant sword first, in his Grungust Type-0. He then takes a simple, circular swing at the surrounding units and you’d probably expect them to all split in half - typical anime trope right? WRONG. Instead, they’re diced into tiny pieces. How? Why? Because he’s Sanger Zonvolt damnit.

#9: Breaking Beck

“The Big O” (1999-2003)

Jason Beck was a real pain in the ass for Roger pretty much any time he popped up in the show. The sleazy criminal was perhaps at his most annoying when he managed to put together this megadeus, the Beck Victory Deluxe. It’s a somewhat pathetic little thing, which even failed to pull off The Big O’s iconic entrance. But alas, he got totally humbled after pulling off numerous frustrating stunts against Roger. In the closing moments of the fight, Big O pulls him in and dishes out its trademark pilebunker right to the skull. The whole thing shatters to pieces… except for the cockpit - meaning Roger gets a front row seat to the spineless pilots quivering in fear. To be able to enact this kind of destruction, but still leave the pilots alive isn’t just an act of mercy and pity, it’s a flex at how well he can hold back.

Roger Smith may be a louse, but he’s a better man than us.

#8: Mission Accepted“Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz” (1997)

Sheer disrespect - that’s the best way to describe this moment. When taking the fight to the Dekim and Mariemaia, Heero arrives at their final outpost looking to end the battle.

He calls them for a quick chat, mostly to confirm one of their claims - that their fortress is impenetrable. “Challenge accepted” says Heero, who then proceeds to contradict everything they’ve said by blasting the fortress relentlessly with Wing Zero. His aim is so good that he’s able to hit precisely the right spot to break the fortress’s shield. Never tell a Gundam pilot that something is impossible.

#7: Rising From The Ashes

“Yamato Takeru” (1994)

When your series features mechs created by literal gods, you know there’s some flexing to be had. Early on in the show, Kazenoo piloted by Kiriomi manages to lay the smackdown on the divine machine Susanoo piloted by Yamato. It’s here that Kiriomi attempts to do a little flexing of his own by using the powers of his mech to summon a flow of Lava to put the hero out for good.

Game over right? Haha, did you forget what this list was? After being submerged in the lava, Susanoo emerges from it completely unscathed… actually looking better than ever. The biggest F-U here comes from the fact that he places his hand in the scorching pool, lifts it up, and takes a big ol’ gulp of the stuff. Was that necessary? Yes. Yes it was.

Episode 6

#6: Fine, We’ll Do It Ourselves

“King of Braves GaoGaiGar”

The highlight of every episode of GaoGaiGar is that god-tier combination sequence. But what happens when those Zonder bastards enact a plan to block the final fusion? Guy is left completely helpless. That is until the GGG crew come up with the insane plan of trying gattai Gaigar and the gao machines manually. That’s right, they want to risk their own lives doing something that has to be machine accurate with only about a 31 percent chance of success. There’s a small hiccup at first, but the team manages to pull it off in style - leaving the zonderized menace helpless against a Heaven and Hell attack.

Pulling off something like this is not just BRAVE… It’s a damn flex.

Episode 15

#5: Van Goes Beast Mode

“The Vision of Escaflowne” (1996)

Perhaps the coolest moment in the entire series falls here when Van pilots Escaflowne to claim a little bit of revenge. His target, the Dragonslayers who suffer some of the worst aura-loss in anime history despite going up against Van more than 10 to 1. Within seconds Van is able to reduce them to blubbering, piss-sodden dweebs. He’s taking them out left and right, but they don’t die with dignity, no no, each one is screaming in terror as he chops them to bits.

The cherry on top comes when Van gives Dilandau the old badass, slow walk of imminent doom. Dilandau survived this one, but he’s never gonna recover from how hard he and his crew jobbed to Van here.

Episode 14

#4: Checkmate

“Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion”

During his rebellion against the forces of Britannia, Lelouch, under his Zero guise, did an awful lot of flexing. More often than not though, he’s flexing his intellect rather than his raw strength… Though after this little spectacle he managed to possess both traits. With the first flight-capable knightmare-frame nearing completion at the enemy encampment on the island, Lelouch is able to orchestrate one of his greatest campaigns in the whole series, infiltrating the enemy lines. However, he doesn’t simply destroy the Gawain before Britannia can put it into action. No, he ends up rubbing it in their faces and claims it for himself.

The worst part of this whole situation for the Britannians is that this is the perfect unit for Lelouch, now he can get an aerial view of the battlefield, see all the pieces, and turn it into even more of a chessboard for him than before.

Also doesn’t hurt that he can fire massive hadron cannons at his foes, but still.

#3: Mirror Match

“Getter Robo: Armageddon” (1998-99)

While we’ve seen some absolutely bonkers flexes in the Getter Robo manga series, the anime have some pretty damn good ones in their own right. Take for example in Armageddon, everyone’s favourite bit - when the second original team of Ryouma, Hayato, and Benkei are finally in the cockpit of Shin Getter and come face-to-face with the possessed Dr. Saotome and the invaders. It’s Getter vs. Getter, with the advantage obviously going to the constantly regenerating villains. They’re frantically switching between forms over and over, but that’s when the lads show just who the hell they are. They’re so in sync with each other after countless battles that they’re able to outpace the transformations of their opponents, even stopping them mid docking. To be this much better than flowing between forms than the creator of the machine itself is one hell of a flex.

And that stoner sunshine at the end is the ultimate chef’s kiss. MWAH.

#2: Kira “Jesus” Yamato“Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny” (2004-05)

Do you have any idea how hard it is to whittle it down to one Kira moment? The dude is a living flex machine. Well, if we have to pick from his finest it’s gotta go to his first launch of the Strike Freedom. He completely turns the tide of a huge scale battle in the blink of an eye.

Kira’s able to target the weak points of every would-be enemy around him, making them unable to fight. Now we know he’s only immobilizing the mechs because of his pacifist nature, but causing them to be unable to fight is so much more difficult than just straight up obliterating them - and it’s got to be so humiliating. He’s done this before, but not to this scale. Alas, 25 downed opponents in 2 minutes just isn’t enough for him though, he then decides to take the fleet out too with shots so precise, the passengers survive. The lad is just plain ridiculous.

#1: Who The Hell Do You Think We Are?

“Gurren Lagann The Movie: The Lights in the Sky are Stars” (2009)

You simply can’t talk about overpowered mecha without bringing up Gurren Lagann. While the series conclusion saw the ridiculous, galaxy sized Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann come together, the movie compilations had to take things even further beyond. Here in the final battle with the anti-spiral, rather than stopping at the tengen toppa stage, Simon and the crew get absurdly bigger and reach “Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann”. We’re talking trillions of lightyears in size. Stuff that’ll make your head explode. They’re not even trying to show off, their will to fight and protect their loved ones is just that strong. What were the odds of victory again? Who cares - do the impossible, row row fight the powah!

Which mecha anime flex did we miss? Let us know in those comments below