Gridman the Hyper Agent

Lore & Background

The series follows three computer-savvy kids—Naoto, Yuka and Ippei—who create their own video game superhero, only to discover it is possessed by an inter-dimensional police officer named Gridman. Pursuing an evil program called Khan Digifer, Gridman merges with Naoto and fights Khan Digifer's digitized monsters, created by social misfit Takeshi, to prevent the computerized demon from wreaking havoc on the town of Sakuragaoka and the entire Human World. Shot on live video, Gridman was the first series by Tsuburaya Productions to utilize D-2 digital video for its special effects scenes, allowing for smoother slow-motion photography. Tsuburaya would continue to use D-2 for all future productions.

Reader's Guide

Gridman the Hyper Agent holds significance as Tsuburaya Productions' last non-Ultra superhero series before Bio Planet WoO and as the direct source for DiC Entertainment's Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad, which aired from September 1994 to April 1995. The series also inspired the 2015 animated short Denkou Choujin Gridman: boys invent great hero by Studio Trigger, set 22 years after the final battle with Khan Digifer. In 2018, Trigger and Tsuburaya produced the anime SSSS.GRIDMAN, incorporating elements from both the original and its western adaptation, followed by the sequel SSSS.Dynazenon and the crossover film Gridman Universe in 2023. The original series was released in the United States with English subtitles on the television network TOKU on December 18, 2017, and later streamed on Tsuburaya's Ultraman Official YouTube channel starting October 30, 2020. Mill Creek Entertainment released the complete series on Blu-ray in North America on August 17, 2021.

Did You Know?

• Gridman was the first Tsuburaya Productions series to use D-2 digital video for special effects.
• The series inspired the 2015 animated short Denkou Choujin Gridman: boys invent great hero by Studio Trigger.
• Hikaru Midorikawa, who voiced Gridman in the original series, reprised the role in the 2018 anime SSSS.GRIDMAN and the 2023 film Gridman Universe.
• The opening theme 'Yume no Hero' had a piano version that appeared in the sixth episode of SSSS.Gridman.