

The excellent "[Light Before we
Land](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Delgados)" by the Delgados is used as
the theme-tune for the first season of Gunslinger Girl (ガンスリンガー・ガール /
Gansuringā Gāru)

**Why (and how) did an obscure track by a Scottish 'Indie' band end up as the
theme song for a Japanese anime series based in Italy?**

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTxoH_5CnhM>


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2017-07-11T23:12:52.750
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2018-12-20T07:36:48.087
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gunslinger-girl
What is the connection between The Delgados and Gunslinger Girl?


I can give some insights into the why. The how probably was through the usual
process of licensing foreign songs.

The anime was made by Madhouse who contributed two episodes to the 2003 anime
Animatrix. This project was important at the time, since it was a direct
result of the anime-craze in the west in the early 2000s. Anime studios in
Japan started to pay attention to foreign markets and with people behind a
major Hollywood success like The Matrix reaching out to Japan to create
something like the Animatrix, chances with the western market seemed good.

And thus a lot of studios did some projects betting on that western market.
For Madhouse, these projects included Texhnolyze, Monster and Gunslinger Girl,
each of them featuring a song by a foreign artist and deviating from usual
expectations of anime fans, who just discovered their fetish for maid
characters in their moeblob harem shows, that casual western fans didn't even
knew existed.

The songs:

  * Texhnolyze (2003): Guardian Angel from [Juno Reactor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_Reactor)
  * Monster (2004): for the love of life by [David Sylvian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sylvian)

Gunslinger Girl was part of the studios efforts to appeal to the western
market, which is why obscure foreign artists ended up in anime of that time.
At least that's my attempt at explaining how this came to be. I don't have any
inside knowledge and am speculating from an observer's point of view.

The second season came out five years later and was handled by a different
studio. To be specific in 2008. It was at a time everyone betting on the
western market realized that this was a huge mistake. Studio Gonzo who made
the biggest bet was in the most miserable state and talks of bankruptcy went
through the news.  
It was under this circumstance, that the studio handling the second season
tried to deemphasize the appeal to the western market and therefore changed
the character design towards something I described above as moeblob. This is
purely speculation on my part, but it seems like a valid assumption that this
was the motivation behind the change.

It also didn't help very much, that the manga itself wasn't exactly going
strong. Most of the story weaknesses were copied directly from the source. It
just so happened that the first season made subtle changes in the presentation
to appeal to western audiences, which the second season avoided.


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