History Manga / Saikano

** This is the default expression of ''everyone'', to the point where the blush sometimes appears to be ''coming off character' faces'' and can occasionally get quite distracting.

* MixAndMatch: School life (a bit on the {{Moe}} side) + war/[[HumongousMecha mecha]] + MagicalGirlfriend + '''pure horror''' with a side of TearJerker.

* SurprisinglyGoodEnglish: The most noticeable use of English was from invading soldiers, who spoke passable (if noticeably accented) American English.

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/saikano.jpg]]

%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.

* ApocalypseHow: Class 0 or 1 (at the beginning of the series), [[spoiler: and a ApocalypseHow/{{Class 5}} at the end]].

* AxCrazy: "YOU IDIOTS, shoot if you dare. Sorry, you're all going to die."

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Arguable in the Manga ending. Shuji and Chise (albeit, as an intangible spaceship/hologram Chise) end up together after all, with nothing to tear them apart. They seem fully content with this situation. Shuji's final words in the Manga: "It was our love song. We're going to fall in love. We're going to live.", plus, from author's end notes: "Chise and Shuji are not happy, but they are not unhappy, either. There is no hope, but there are memories and there may be a future."]]

* BlackComedy: Along with GallowsHumor below, there's a sequence in the manga where [[spoiler:after Chise and Shuji run away and start hitchhiking, they eventually get picked up by a military truck. Chise says off-handedly that everyone who knows what she actually is is already dead. The punch line to this is that the soldiers on the truck DO recognize Chise and know what she is and have a collective OhCrap in their thought bubbles.]]

* BrokenBird: Fuyumi.

* CharacterDevelopment: Arguably the main draw of the show.
* ChewingTheScenery

* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: Chise. Also partly a case of ObfuscatingStupidity when she acts like an ordinary schoolgirl.
* CreepyChild: Chise's SuperpoweredEvilSide plays with this trope.
* CrucifiedHeroShot
* CruelTwistEnding: Viewers often comment that if you want a happy ending to the series you should stop after [[spoiler:Shuji and Chise skip town and go on the run from the military]], because the final three episodes go quickly, horribly, and tragically downhill after that.
* CuteClumsyGirl

* DeusAngstMachina: It can always get ''much worse''.

* DownerEnding: [[spoiler:Seriously, for every voice in your head that says “Dont worry, it will get better...” either stop listening to them or stop watching.]]

* DyingDeclarationOfLove: [[spoiler:Akemi]] gives one to Shuuji.
* DysfunctionJunction

* TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt: Set JustBeforeTheEnd.

* FaceFault

* {{Fanservice}}

* FemmeFatale: Fuyumi.
* GallowsHumour: Where do we ''start''? Pretty much the whole series is this, particularly when the focus shifts to the military men.

* HannibalLecture: Chise occasionally gives this to soldiers. Sometimes from her own side.

* HeroicRROD

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Shuuji. He gets better. Though in the manga, [[spoiler:he is surprisingly calm about Chise killing everyone except him, even her own family]], it's heavily implied that that's just because he knows he can't do a thing about it.

* LiveActionAdaptation
* LivingEmotionalCrutch: In the beginning, Chise is acting as Shuuji's crutch. [[spoiler:By the end, Shuuji is the crutch to an emotionally destroyed Chise.]]

* LoveDodecahedron
* LuminescentBlush: This is the default expression of ''everyone'', to the point where the blush sometimes appears to be ''coming off character' faces'' and can occasionally get quite distracting.

* MadeOfIron
* MagicalGirlfriend: Deconstructed in a [[ShootTheShaggyDog horrifically mean-spirited]] way.
* ManlyTears: Especially Shuuji.
* MauveShirt: The story will often build up characters just to kill them off horribly in the war segments.
* MeaningfulName:
** In the manga, one character mentions that "Chise" means "the hearth" or "home" in the Ainu language.
** Tetsu ("iron") might be another case.

*** [[spoiler:Subverted in the anime. Chise wants to do this to spare everyone the suffering of the world ending but Shuuji tell her not to, that everyone has the right to live even in the face of doom.]]

* MoodWhiplash: Probably one of the most egregious and extreme cases in manga. Ordinarily happens several time on the same ''page''.

* NonIndicativeFirstEpisode: If you only read the first volume, you will think the manga is over. When you begin the second volume you will think it's an Anthology of happy little feel good Shojo oneshots [[spoiler:instead of the most horrible and depressing [[WarIsHell War Drama]] ever.]] In the end [[spoiler: the Heroine has to watch her boyfriend starve to death.]] And it's all her fault. You want to read the first chapter again and pretend the whole rest of the series was just a bad dream.

* OneWingedAngel; Chise, and simultaneously literal and metaphorical.

* OutOfClothesExperience: Happens to Chise at the very end of the manga.

* RagingStiffie: Manga-only; Shuji.

* RuleOfCool: Let's face it, a moe girl with tech wings is ''cool''.

* ShadowArchetype
* ShootTheShaggyDog: The only thing that keeps it from going full-on into this is that exactly two people are alive by the end.
* ShowerOfAngst
* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: So cynical that it actually [[DoNotDoThisCoolThing proves Truffaut wrong]].[[note]]DoNotDoThisCoolThing was originally called "Truffaut Was Right", in reference to his statement that it is impossible to make an anti-war film that doesn't end up glorifying war anyway.[[/note]]

* SplitPersonalityTakeover: Gradually happens to Chise.

* StepfordSmiler: Chise; Shuuji to a lesser extent; Fuyumi; Tetsu.

* TenMinuteRetirement: When Chise [[spoiler:dies]].
* ThereAreNoTherapists

%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample * TheTrickster: Chise (debatable).
%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample * {{Tsundere}}: Akemi.
* TwelveEpisodeAnime
* UnderstandingBoyfriend: Chise is a WMD? That's OK, things will work out. [[spoiler: Actually, they don't.]]
* UnluckyChildhoodFriend: [[spoiler: Akemi]]
* TheUnreveal: For example, why and how was Chise chosen as the ultimate weapon? Why is every country at war with each other anyway? What actually happens to the earth at the end?
** [[spoiler: The second bit isn't outright stated, but pretty much made obvious. The Earth will eventually die, and Shuji is confined to a FateWorseThanDeath due to energy-being Chise's [[AxCrazy "kindness"]].]]
** The best we get for the former in one of the OVA's is [[spoiler:she, and only she, just so happened to fit the criteria to be the ultimate weapon. It's even mentioned that it could've been anyone and they would've used him/her.]]
* UltimateLifeForm: Chise ''is'' the ultimate weapon, [[PersonOfMassDestruction and it's not hard to see why]].

* WaveMotionGun: Kind of. At least, it results in a SphereOfDestruction.
* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman
* WhereIWasBornAndRazed: Spectacularly inverted: Chise's hometown not only doesn't get destroyed by her as one could expect, but it's in fact one of the only "safe" places on the earth due to Chise [[MeaningfulName protecting it]], to such an extent that it gets dubbed "Chise's town" and people flock to it in a desperate effort to find refuge. However, she eventually decides that when the time comes, she'll [[spoiler: [[ShootTheDog destroy it herself rather than let everybody die painfully]]]].
** [[spoiler:In the manga she does. In the anime, she's convinced not to. The manga has the ''good'' ending.]]

* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: Who do you think?
* {{Yandere}}: While Chise technically isn't one, her characterization certainly plays with this trope.
* YankTheDogsChain: If it looks even for an instant like something good is about to happen, something terrible is about to happen.

Originally a {{seinen}} manga series by Shin Takahashi that ran in ''Big Comic Spirits'' from 1999 to 2001, it was adapted into a 13-episode anime in 2002. An OVA side-story was released in 2005, ''Saikano: Another Love Song'', as well as a [[LiveActionAdaptation live-action movie]] in 2006. The manga is licensed Creator/VizMedia, they had the anime too, but they lost the license as evidenced by the recent announcement of the anime being rescue licensed by Creator/SentaiFilmworks.

* KillEmAll: This series gives ''Anime/SpaceRunawayIdeon'' a run for its money in a quarter of the episodes.

* BodyHorror: Chise's uncanny body, and taken UpToEleven

* PantyShot

Originally a manga series by Shin Takahashi, it was adapted into a 13-episode anime in 2002. An OVA side-story was released in 2005, ''Saikano: Another Love Song'', as well as a [[LiveActionAdaptation live-action movie]] in 2006. The manga is licensed Creator/VizMedia, they had the anime too, but they lost the license as evidenced by the recent announcement of the anime being rescue licensed by Creator/SentaiFilmworks.

* WhereIWasBornAndRazed: Spectacularly averted: Chise's hometown not only doesn't get destroyed by her as one could expect, but it's in fact one of the only "safe" places on the earth due to Chise [[MeaningfulName protecting it]], to such an extent that it gets dubbed "Chise's town" and people flock to it in a desperate effort to find refuge. However, she eventually decides that when the time comes, she'll [[spoiler: [[ShootTheDog destroy it herself rather than let everybody die painfully]]]].

* OnlyOneName: According to WordOfGod, this was in order to create an atmosphere of familiarity with the characters.

* BlackComedy: Along with GallowsHumor below, there's a sequence in the manga where [[spoiler:after Chise and Shuji run away and start hitchhiking, they eventually get picked up by a military truck. Chise says off-handedly that everyone that knows what she actually is is already dead. The punch line to this is that the soldiers on the truck DO recognize Chise and know what she is and have a collective OhCrap in their thought bubbles.]]

* AnyoneCanDie: No character is safe; by the end of the story, the only two named characters that are still alive are [[spoiler:Chise and Shuji... out of everyone in the human race. It’s also debatable whether or not Chise is actually still ‘alive.’]].