WMG / Megas XLR

Coop is a Villain Protagonist.

Coop, while the main character of the show, was never intended to be the hero of the show. Before I present the evidence, let's quickly point out that Coop isn't very motivated to do anything heroic and only fight the bad guys to save his own skin or to give them payback for things they did to him after he started it. Now, unto the evidences;

• As mentioned, Coop is never motivated to do anything heroic. In fact, in the pilot he says he just want to cruise around Megas and pick up some chicks because chicks dig giant robots (nice!). So, Coop at first simply wish to treat Megas as a car or even a toy for his amusement. Evil Coop: "Megas? I abandonned that toy years ago." That line shows that Coop treated Megas like a toy and eventually got bored of it and replaced it with a better, shinier new toy.
• Coop is responsible for his own troubles for the most parts. Barring a few episodes, he almost always directly or indirectly cause the situation leading to his eventual fight with the Monster of the Week. Alternatively, if trouble come to him, he'll usually make things much worse through sheer stupidity.
• According to the creators, had there been a season 3, it would have revealed Coop created the Glorfts. Thus, the entire show is his own damn fault.
• Coop denies being a hero. In his own words, he's "just a guy from Jersey". Now the mecha genre certainly has many reluctant heroes but Coop, while not reluctant, certainly never feel quite motivated to fight the Glorft. However, this will eventually change and while it's not exactly character development we'll see that Coop does indeed change over time. However, the point stand, Coop is not motivated to fight the Glorft (or anything else) for the sake justice or anything remotely heroic.
• Over the course of the show, Coop some severe tendencies to being a Blood Knight. He clearly enjoy the power Megas gives him, much in the same way people like videogames for the feeling of power and escapism. Coop is living said escapism, which to him is really fun and addictive.
• Consider the serie finale (since the show was cancelled in season 2). Who is the final villain of the show? None other than Coop himself! In fact, in the future, Coop became obssesed with battle. And who destroys Megas, thus proving himself to be the one villain truly a match for Coop? But none other than Coop himself! Thus, Coop's worst enemy is nobody else but himself.
• Remember Ender (who end things) from the first S-Force episode? Remember how he says Coop is as evil as he is (if not more) and want to ally with him? That's foreshadowing. Now look at Evil Coop's mech; Notice anything? It looks like Ender mixed with the Sazabi. Here, they show us that Coop has become just like Ender. In fact, in a flashback we clearly see him presumably kill his friends of the S-Force. Coop has to the deep and became a full blown Omnicidal Maniac.
• "Coop isn't very motivated to do anything heroic and only fight the bad guys to save his own skin or to give them payback for things they did to him after he started it." That seems a bit harsh. The guys Coop fights- like Magnanimous, or Ender, or Grrkek the Planet Killer, or that little robot guy with a Napoleon Complex- really are bad guys. Coop is lazy and unmotivated, but he'll always try to do the right thing, and he never blows up a planet on purpose. It's just that giant robots are a big responsibility, and things get a little crazy.

Megas was meant to be sent back to 1936

Megas was never designed to turn the tables of the war with the Glorft through direct combat. Instead, it was sent back to try and advance human technology to the point that, by the time they were at war with the Glorft, Earth would be technologically superior. However, the plan was never told to Kiva (all she was told was that she was being sent back to a "pivotal point in the war", and gambled that she could adapt) because she was willing to sacrifice herself to the cause, plus she had knowledge of the technology in Megas, thus aiding the assimilation of Megas' technology into 1936.

• However, no one could have foreseen Megas falling into the hands of Coop, who kept Megas's tech to himself.
• Also, they never said that the turning point in the "War" was the war between humanity and the Glorft. They could have meant WWII, for some reason.

Evil Coop from Rearview Mirror, Mirror somehow managed to make himself part of the Dai-Gurren Brigade.

Look at the icon behind his chair.◊ Doesn't it look an awful lot like the top half of the Dai-Gurren Brigade symbol?

• Megas runs on Spiral Energy of course, but everyone already knows that.
  • How else did merging with the s-force mecha By smashing MEGAS's limbs into them work?
    • Makes sense, the only way possible to stop the Dai-Gurren Brigade was through Megas so they sent in Evil Coop in an attempt to sabotage their efforts, promising him membership. Obviously it didn't work that way so they were forced to erase the entire MEGAS XLR universe off the map.
• The show wasn't out by that time. Evil Coop is clearly a parody of Char and his various incarnations in the Gundam universe.
• Or perhaps Dai-Gurren is duplicating evil!Coop's awesome taste.
• Kamina's father is descended either from Evil!Coop or someone who found a journal, which include the symbol, of tales about the good ol' days of Megas without the evil empire. The spiral armies that develop after the first Anti-Spiral onslaught were reverse engineered Megas units. Gurren was just the tech minimized to work with dang near anything.

Evil Coop is Kamina's father

Just to hook with the theory above. And yeah, he probably gave all that noble speech to Shota Kamina before turning evil (and finished destroying the surface, blah blah blah). Yoko is Kiva's daughter, and Simon is probably Jamie's. Leeron's dad was Goat. Don't imagine how.

If the series continued, there would be a story arc of Coop, Jamie, and Kiva going into the future, and facing the Glorft once and for all.

And that would be the series finale.

• Word of God is that there was a plan to have Megas tossed (further) into the past with Coop creating the Glorft.

Coop is a Technopath

This explains how he is the only one able to pilot Megas despite its nonsensical controls, and why the buttons seem to be able to do just the right thing no matter which one he presses. It also explains why Megas imitates his movements (dusting his hands off, leaning on a structure while thinking)

• Clearly Coop is a Spark.

Alternatively, Megas has telepathic controls.

Both Kiva and Coop just used their own understanding of technology and Megas acts accordingly. Kiva refuses to accept Coop's "neanderthal technology" so she can't synch. Coop himself just doesn't think about the contradictions like the Plot-Sensitive Button; so he's able to do far more with it.

Kiva is Scottish and has an dara sealladh

An dara sealladh refers to the ability to see the future, typically a person's death, in a symbolic way. In other words, Kiva is psychic and can see through time. But by the time Kiva is born, that power extends to controlling time. Kiva, being young, is unaware of her full potential, and was meant to have a few more years of training before attempting a time jump, but was pushed through the commander track at a young age because if something went wrong, she could save herself for another attempt. It would also explain how she followed MEGAS before the tracking system was turned on and without a navigational system.

Had the show continued, they would have eventually parodied Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Because it's pretty much the only show they didn't get around to. It probably would have involved, say, Coop trying to teach a Shinji Captain Ersatz and inevitably scarring him in the process, and a Gendo Captain Ersatz trying to romance the Unit-01 stand-in.

• And don't forget they'd parody Gurren Lagann. I bet the Kamina Captain Ersatz would become BFF with Coop.
  • Either that or he'd tell the Hot-Blooded characters to "chill out" repeatedly, eventually them taking the advice and dooming the local humans like he did with the S-Force.
    • Megas with Lagann for a head... can the universe take it???
    • Or better yet, he merges it with a Space Colony, turning it into an even bigger Megas that's temporary.
• Alternatively Coop just unplugs the Eva equivalents from from their wall sockets and walks away.
• Coop causes Third Impact and chugs Gendo.
  • And thus becomes Evil Coop!
• Thats all pretty likely and NGE was considered one of Cartoon Network's most popular Humongous Mecha series (next to Mobile Suit Gundam Wing) and this was only after one initial daytime airing and it was just the pilot episode!. Ones theorizing/fantasizing could go even further. Jamie's uncontrollable drooling/lecherizing over the Rei/Suzuka Expys and their version of Plug Suits, Coop's Moment of Awesome by tearing apart a Angel before any of the Evas even twitch a finger (or in a Continuity Nod to the series 1st ep Coop destroys the other EVA units to make the fight between him and the Angel more "fair".). And to top it all off the Gendo Ersatz's comically overly complicated explanation of his version of Instrumentality which culminates in turning everyone not into orange soda but 3-flavored Mega-Slush as to which Coop only responds with a Flat "What".
  • Fortunately most of Cartoon Networks more popular series are always given the opportunity to return at any time the shows creators have free to them. And as a possible CMOA for the series as a whole the Megas/NGE crossover ep may be made either as a 2 hour long special and/or as a special direct to DVD boxset which would give enough airtime to show as much parodying of Evangelion and even Gainax Studios as possible. Who knows maybe even a few characters from FLCL might just show up for fun (although admittedly a fight scene with Coop, Megas, and the alien girl with a electric guitar (her name escapes me right now) against an entire army of Angels would be the very definition of Rule of Cool!!).
  • End of Megas anyone?
    • Coop is the main character, with Kiva as the Asuka equivalent. Our choices are Giant naked Jamie or Giant naked Goat...we can always go further back and involve other angels such as Kaworu, which has the human features and relatability to the lead, what's the closest we have to Coop in anime proper? Probably Kamina. Plus there's the duct taped photonic stabliser to think about. So Kamina swoops down and stops Megas going nuclear (Equivalent to 3rd impact since a similiar system overload destroyed a massive junk planet) by impaling the mech with a giant drill. It all fits togeather like furious oil-stained stickle-brix. As for the end of Megas, screw that, we're dealing with a ressurrection here. We go the rebuild route. 3 movies parallel to rebuild proper, including the climax of 2.22, the berserk ascencion.

Tsuruya-san had some part in the creation of this universe.

Haruhi decided to make a universe with mecha, and decided to give Tsuruya control of this universe. To supervise, Haruhi sent an avatar of herself in the form of Kiva.

• That explains the name "Megas".

Metalocalypse and Megas XLR take place in the same universe.

The common element? Goat. One of Coop's friends, and based on the first episode of Metalocalypse, a big Dethklok fan. Since he lost his eye at a concert, it's safe to presume Megas XLR came first timeline-wise.

• That would put both in the same universe as Downtown-the show Goat (not his real name) started in.
• That explains why so much of Megas uses '80s-tech.

Magnanimous actually is Bruce Campbell

He was somehow hyper-evolved by AIM at some point in the future, then went back in time to host robot fights for his own amusement.

The REGIS Mrk.5 from episode 3 was a Necron.

Black Robot, trying to wipe out all life on the planet, hard to Kill, sounds like a Necron to me.

• It could also be a Berserker.
• It's a Sentinel from The Matrix, dropped back through time.
• It's a Terminator prototype, ditto.
• It's Omnius. He was popped into another universe at the end of the Brian Herbert/Kevin Anderson series. The Megas-verse was where he ended up.
• It's one of the Omega WEAPON Prototypes! The bestiary DID say the previous 11 wound up in some damn odd places, and we've only got about 8 or so accounted for....

It was planned to give to Kiva and Jamie their own mechas, if it continued

Well, it never mentioned what happened to the robots Kiva take from the future in the first episode.

• Didn't Coop destroy them to make the battle with the Glorft fair?
  • He knocked it over and made it useless...but it probably got destroyed anyways...
    • The other mechs Kiva had with her were either taken out by friendly fire, or because a UMD fell on it.

Coop is one of Da Boyz.

Let's see here...

• Hammy? Check.
• Big boned? Check.
• Fights for fun? Check.
• Operates and maintains a machine that by all rights shouldn't function? Check.
• Has absolutely no concept of enuff Dakka? DOUBLE check.
• Suspiciously similar Battle Cry? WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!
• Of course he's not an ork boy. He's an ork GOD.◊

Coop is a Genius from Genius: The Transgression

And Jamie is his Thrall.Search your heart, you know it to be true.

The whole show is Coop dealing with childhood psychological trauma.

Coop is actually suffering from Regression due to psychological trauma he doesn't want to confront, trapping him in the mental state of an eight-year-old (possibly connected to the absence of his father?). Note his obsession with 80s video games (which would have been all that existed around the time he was that age), pizza, fast cars, and robots. He also seems to have no concept or desire for sex, alcohol, or any social interaction beyond his one best friend.What is impossible to determine is whether Jamie is a figment of his imagination or really is his best friend and plays along with his mental state so as to not upset him. Either way, Jamie's constant presence acts as an enabler for Coop's continued regression.Worried with her son's illness, Coop's mom hired a therapist named Kelly Andrews. Having tried every conventional means of psychotherapy with other doctors, she hired Ms. Andrews to try something drastic. She enters Coop's world under the name "Kiva Andru", claiming to be from another time to help Coop become skilled enough to defeat the impending threat of the Glorft (the stresses of adulthood). She does this by playing into his scenarios via the use of action figures. Every episode is just an exercise they work through with all the toys Coop has in his basement, but Coop experiences them as wild adventures as we see them.

• The people Coop meets on his adventures are wildly different and reminiscent of several franchises of the '80s that would have toy lines. (S-Force, the many robots in Magnanimous' arena, even T-Bot sounds like a plausible toy tie-in for Mr. T.).
• The way Coop 'saves the day' in every episode is usually using childlike logic. (Using Rock Pops and soda in 'TV Dinner', randomly pulling out the Phoenix Force via button-mashing in 'Buggin' the System', saving the day with Philly Cheese Steak in 'Space Booty', etc.)
• The lack of continuity in the way he destroys Jersey City every episode implies he only does it in his imagination, plus the constant defeat and return of the Glorft, because the stresses of adulthood never truly go away.
• His childlike impulses are usually in direct opposition to her suggesting more 'training' (a.k.a. attempting to prepare for adulthood.) Even with her extensive psychotherapy, he is still resisting her therapy, pointing to the seriousness of the emotional trauma Coop is attempting to avoid.

The reason the Glorft/Human war started is because of Coop.

Stable Time Loop, anyone?

• You're right. If it continued it was confirmed that Coop CREATED the Glorft. So he did start it.
• If you want to be technical, KIVA was the one who started it, since without the portal open, MEGAS and the Glorft wouldn't have come to the past.
  • Time Loop Logic stinks. It's everyone's fault: Coop for creating the Glorft, The Glorft for creating the prototype, Kiva for sending MEGAS back to the past, Coop for fixing it and creating the Glorft...

In the event of Stable Time Loop, the future Earth is doomed to be conquered.

Considering that time warp units are not exactly commonplace in the 20th century, and even the Alternate Universe Coop's gang failed to come back to the future (no pun intended), it's pretty safe to assume that POV Coop's gang will fail as well. That means Megas never comes to the time it needs to be at to turn the tide, and the Glorft defeat the Earthers after the decisive battle for the prototype. Oops. Even if we take the Multiuniverse approach instead of the Stable Time Loop one, it means the original timeline that will have sent Megas back is still defenseless, and its only hope is Coop from some other universe, and they better hope he's not evil.

• And even if that Coop is not evil... It's still Coop. The man who once caused nuclear winter to stop a robot spider from destroying a slushy machine. The man who causes horrible apocalypses and genocide on accident. The man who uses a giant war robot from the future to pick up pizzas. Holy cow, Evil Coop isn't that different from normal Coop, it's if he just started doing all of these things with forethought.

MEGAS is really a TARDIS!

I'm surprised no one thought of it sooner, since the damn thing is bigger on the inside.

• Furthering THAT corollary, it's a stolen alien artifact with a blue paint scheme, Bigger on the Inside, and completely jury-rigged by an insane madman.
  • How about this, when Coop smashed the Time Flux Unit, it caused the MEGAS unit to be slightly fused with the Wibbly-Wobbly-Spacey-Wacey-Timey-Wimey energy, and thanks to the rest of Coops tinkering, it became the equivalent of a TARDIS. Although, while the TARDIS is a classy woman with a refined sense of humor, MEGAS is her hyperactive, always-on-a-sugar-high, baby sister who likes seeing things explode.

Coop realized the time paradox in Terminate Her

He figured out from it that going to 2 years in the past during Kiva's time would keep her from sending Megas back.

The car-head of MEGAS acts like a Lagann unit

Theoretically, Coop could shove it on the top of anything to control it.

Gorrath is a failed human/Glorft hybrid experiment.

Whenever a Glorft is shown outside of their exoskeletons, we see that they have a large, single slug-like foot with tentacles surrounding it. However, the final two episodes show Gorrath outside of his armour, and it shows him with two legs instead of the standard slug foot of the Glorft. Numerous theories could abound from it, but one possibility is that he's actually a failed experiment to create a human/Glorft hybrid, possibly to act as a spy during the war.

• His short temper and intense desire to destroy the earth comes from this knowledge that he's a freak in Glorft culture, resembling their greatest foes, and thus he got a reputation for being incredibly violent to those around him to avert being taunted for this. This drive also allowed him to become a high-ranking commander in their army, despite his obvious physical deformity.

Megas XLR has already fulfilled its mission to save the human race.

It happened in the very first episode. Kiva opened the time rift, and the Glorft warship followed Megas through. That warship is a massive beast, carrying an entire army and enough firepower to fight an enemy fleet- and it was the only one we ever saw on-screen (besides two little support ships). When Gorrath took his ship through the time rift, he also took the bulk of the Gorrath fleet with him. There was still human resistance when Kiva opened the time rift; that may be enough to defeat the remaining Glorft.

If/When our heroes travel to the future, they'll find a bright and happy Earth, and hear the tales of Megas.

A mysterious visitor who appeared in the 21st century. A guardian who defended the human race from aliens and monsters, and granted us their technology to study, and united us in common cause (somehow). And who mysteriously returned far in the future, at humanity's darkest hour, sacrificing itself in the lunar battle to destroy Warmaster Gorrath and his command ship.

The controls and abilities of Megas change all the time because Coop keeps changing them.

Megas isn't complete. It's not finished. He's still fiddling with the loadout and weapon systems and the controls, so a big red button could be wired to pretty much anything. Kiva can't use it because not only because of Damn You, Muscle Memory!, but because it's all changed from the last time she tried to learn anything.

• I wouldn't say 'incomplete,' but given how much of a gearhead Coop is, it makes perfect sense that he's constantly tinkering with the controls, trying out new weapons and devices, and rigging up new control schemes, just for fun.

There's someone in the government covering for Megas's upkeep, ammo supply, and the damages it caused.

It's highly improbable that the gang hasn't made themselves known to every government official on Earth. And with the Glorft and all the other dangers out there that Coop regularly has to deal with, it's likely that someone high up recognizes that, as much trouble as they cause, Megas, Coop, and Kiva are Earth's best defense. So they cut a deal with the gang (probably through Kiva) to keep them supplied and take care of any damages they cause.

• Who says they need to talk to the gang? You'd be surprised what you can fit through the holes in government bureaucracy and slip into an old junkyard to be found by a certain overweight mech pilot who won't ask too many questions.

Coop has a 'job' working on cars.

Well, 'job' is a bit generous, but I could see that Coop earns a bit of spending cash on the side working on people's vehicles. He doesn't really operate a shop, but if somebody wants their vehicle fixed or modified, they can pay Coop under the table to do so. Coop is dirt cheap, since he mostly does so for fun, but he also has no focus or discipline, so it's complete guess when your vehicle would be done.

Coop would have eventually turn evil had Rearview Mirror, Mirror not happened.

The best guess as to why the Evil Coop became the way he is is due to his thrill-seeking tendencies having spiraled out of control. With his Glorft defeated, Evil Coop unfortunately has nothing to do anymore. Thus, he went out into space, searching for powerful fighters but all of them were so weak that Evil Coop start to realize that no one will be able to put up an actual fight against him and the only way that can satisfy his urges are to basically destroy everything in sight.

Our Coop was about to go through the same thing until his mishaps sent into the alternate dimension. Having not only witnessing that world in ruin but also losing his robot to the Evil Coop causes Coop to reconsider his path in live.