Nerding Day: Angel Wars: Guardian Force

Paradise Lost, plus Reboot, minus Paradise Lost. I love this dead planet.

Getting back out there’s tough. Maybe you’re divorced. Maybe you split before paperwork. Maybe there’s no one to split from. Maybe your perfect Baptist Power Rangers botched their Kickstarter. Whatever your story, it’s not over. You can focus on yourself (die alone), become an alpha (die alone), or meet someone perfect (die alone). Dying alone’s not about love, it’s just a prank from God.

See? More Christian super-teams await. And people, if you’re into that. My heart’s already full.

Well, that’s the shittiest poster. And my favorite—it really captures the Liefeld tries Flash aesthetic. This cover would be more sporting:

There’s that false hope.

The first Angel Wars DVD emerged in 2004, as every pixel above shows. Today you can watch it on Minno, “The #1 Source of Christian Content for Kids.” Handy, if you think Reading Rainbow only needs one book. They didn’t get paid today. Thank YouTube’s “Angel Wars Fan,” who enjoys a simpler, easily dazzled life. In their world every Esurance ad is Spirited Away. May the finest truffles fill their trough.

In fairness, Angel Wars: Guardian Force has an ideal title. Not for making you watch it or connect to the message or feel endorphins. But nothing artful could’ve captured faith hitting 00’s pulp like a bug zapper. Angel Force channels an era’s spirit, like bellbottoms or giving your baby horse meds. All that authenticity cost was any chance with a network. Or my memory. I keep typing Angel Force or Guardian Wars, and I’m done fixing it. If that typo enters the world, blame Satan.

The pitch? Angel Siege: Guardian Team portrays the clash for the cosmic throne. When God’s favorite child strayed, and the sky shook with strife. We’ve finally captured Milton’s dreams in full motion, letting a new generation weigh freedom and fealty. Angel Battle: Guardian Legion brings the struggle for faith to life.

I kid: Angel Duel: Guardian Squad skips Bible monsters to focus on near-future Ozempic. Winged traffic cops flap around Beast Wars asset flips, guilting shoplifters and pharma staff for an edge on demonkind. Angel Blitz: Guardian Group DVDs make great gifts for parents that love Christ and tolerate their kids.

Brace for VeggieWars. In fact, director Jason Brian Adams’ only non-Angel Senshi: Guardian Tournament credit is a VeggieTales tract.

Now, my biased instincts say that when you tell your kids this is Pinocchio, the state should take them. But when I slow down and consider other viewpoints, I think they should let you visit.

Anyway, I like these shows because they could kill us all. Fundie superheroes are a vast untapped propaganda front. More nerdlings learn ethics from Red Rangers than parents, including me. If Batman wore a purity ring, I’d write for The Babylon Bee. For now, they still suck, and civilization limps along for another week. Two, even!

One quirk of the Guardian Fighters: there are too fucking many of them. Sure, some teams run twice this size before staff, love interests, and their questionable overlap. But their creators have read multiple books. Jason’s working on his first, and thinks Sodom might turn things around. Creatively, he hasn’t even hit the “here’s me, but perfect” or “my Dad wasn’t great” phases.

To help you keep track, I’ve made trading cards. Collect them all to kick off the rapture.

Our hero, who sucks. We spend the most time with the junior angel, since Jason assumes we’ll relate to an inept, untrained fuckup. Ouch. Eli’s impulsive, a heroic flaw that demands ability, empathy, and painless dialogue. Today, those belong to Christ.

Kira sucks. Making her a natural partner/dialogue mannequin/babysitter for Eli. While Eli stabs you for your hotter tabs, Kira’s reads Abundance as Satan hands out forehead tattoos.

Swift’s a large bald angel. Like most bald characters in Christian Nationalist media, he’s a subordinate jobber. Odd, given how many hardcore American Christians are bald. He fights witch doctors.

Paladin’s the closest Angel Adventure: Guardian Tendency gets to charm. He’s got a Top Gun ego and an Australian accent—two whole traits! Some say he’s named after Dungeons & Damnation, but I don’t cosign slander. I’m sure Jason’s very plugged into French history.

Arianna’s tough on the cadets, because she cares. And they’re really quite worthless. But the angle is Team Mom. Eli’s still alive, making Arianna the most powerful canon character.

While Arianna manages angels, tracks threats, and runs training, Michael’s tall. Taller. Look, Angel Armada can’t be more forward-thinking than the theocracy that spawned it. Michael’s in charge because the author remembered that name from Bible Camp.

What would Paradise Deferred be without a fallen angel? Not Satan, mind you. Morg explicitly works for the offscreen “Dragon.” There’s a pattern: Born-Again adventures worry that punching Satan makes Jesus look lazy. Personally, I’d lean in. “Cosmic nepobaby” looks better than “someone that would hate our church.”

Morg’s a fallen guardian, and their only real threat. So the Guardian Armada exists to fight the Guardian Armada. It’s time to defund hoverboards. To make my case, here’s the first episode of Angel Debate: Guardian Discourse.

The real title’s “About Face.” Jason’s after the beauty industry for refusing to touch born-again comic collectors.

Nope! Foreshadowing.

The Angel Defense: Guardian Unit debut runs just over half an hour. That sounds short for a standalone DVD, but my scratched Iron Man vs. The Mandarin disc says this was standard cash-in procedure. And Christian fantasy’s not a crowded market, unless you read books or subtext.

“About Face” opens cold on a lone skater. Radical. He just cruises, which is fair live and wretched for a cartoon. Give us a manual, it costs you nothing.

Two imposing shadows follow. On Green Goblin gliders–oppression’s most radical form. Stalking unarmed minors seems grim for Bible Reboot, but you know demons. We’ll have more to cheer for when our heroes show up.

Oh.

Fine, our heroes are cops. More words for militaristic authoritarians come to mind, but you guys look tired. Eli drops a hammer of a first quote: "Whatever happened to bringing some fire and brimstone to the mortals?" It sounds like a flub, but fits his arc. All Angels Are Shoggoths.

Today, warrantless stalking’s justified: stealing candy summons a cyborg ninja, from Cyborg Hell. No matter what happens, I’m finishing the series. Angel Conflict: Guardian Ronin and I were born to die together.

Shame the animation bites dicks. The fights have a classic scope problem: you can see the games they’re thinking of, but the scene never gets there. And they refuse to adapt or pay Pyongyang more.

Kira wants to observe, in case it’s the harmless kind of daemon cyborg. Eli’s already run in alone, in case it’s the harmless kind of daemon cyborg. Neither cadet deserves to survive, but this isn’t Attack on Angels or Guardians of Thrones. They skirt death by digging in, fighting as one, and it’s just a simulation.

A Danger Church.

The first third of Jason’s tilt at promoting his career and/or faith. And it’s a copout. Granted, now I can imagine Eli as a dropout gamer instead of a chainsaw killer. Unfortunately, those concepts are currently neighbors. Why’s Angel Discord: Guardian Warriors so afraid of me investing in it? I’ve wanted someone to make this work since my stint in Bible camp. Fulfill your destiny, Angel Games. Let me rest.

Arianna calls them worthless, locking her in as my favorite. She’s undermined heartbeats later by Michael, who praises bloodlust and indecision as the heart of teamwork. Locking him in as my back pain.

Maybe Michael’s sensitive to rejection after losing his best friend to hell. Maybe he’s selling the Children’s Crusade with a Buzz Lightyear impression. But his Team Dad routine’s off, and we’re already on the wrong side of Starship Troopers fans. I get a migraine every time his mouth flaps.

In any case, Arianna has fresh shifts from God. The cadets need to track a pharma flunkie, in case he cures some character-building plagues. But the other team’s been working instead of playing Police Brutalizer III, so they get there first.

Meet Norman Kubert, a first-draft Valorant pick. A nerd caricature sculpted by parents, gods, and animators that are cruel, stupid, and checked out. You decide who gets what label. My answers are cleverly hidden throughout.

Norman holds Angel Playoffs: Guardian Bench’s first concrete lesson: don’t try. He enjoys a comic called Professor Destiny, and thus suffers a case of Sahara dick. If that seems self-hating for the minds behind Angel Slayer: Mugen Guardians, shut up. Shut your heathen mouth. Jason is the teacher, and you are the student. By trying to get laid, Norman resurrects Lucifer’s understudy.

It starts when Norman’s desperation attracts the attention of Cubus, a daemon wielding telepathic erection control. A power matched by any hip abductor user, but we’re in the world of drama. Cubus, true to her GameCube namesake, can see any nerd’s secret heart.

In Norman’s case: he loves the billboard across the street. Or the next person that asks, really. But we focus on the billboard.

Cubus weaves a subtle web.

Wheels within wheels.

The unplayed notes of seduction.

It really takes her longer than it should.

Cubus offers a simple trade: if Norman releases Tapeworm Pills early, she’ll stand near him. But it’s not about the skinny pills. By siphoning his negative energy, which I’m almost, almost, almost above calling semen, she can resurrect Morg. While I’ve told you Morg’s a fallen Guardian, the show’s told us jack shit. As far as live viewers can tell, demons want nerd cum for the love of the game.

Blink and you’ll miss the fifth dumbest part: Norman’s already working on this drug. They’re already trying to sell it. Cubus tempts Norman to do jack-squat. Considering the time he spends gooning over a talking billboard, she’s slowed Nega-Zepbound down.

Back in the sixth dumbest part: the angels have this. In the danger room, Eli and Kira kicked too much ass with too much strategy. We’re done with Armor of God Force. No more armless, legless failures biting impotently at the ankles of the devil. It’s go time. Exorcism is our business, and business is good.

What? How?

No.

No way.

Come on!

ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?!

Please.

Like fucking piñatas.

Look, I get the idea. God has the power, and our uppercuts pale before a good Revelations reread. But this is the uppercut genre. You rendered all this power armor for a reason. Play ball. When our heroes have hollow bones, it says that Jesus gets me beaten like Jesus.

Back in the somehow dumber half of the plot, sin energy turns Norman into…an average nightclub attendee. Thanks to his amorphous drug, which flips between Ozempic, makeup, and hell jizz. Almost dressing yourself is the first step on the road to damnation. The line “girls like her don’t go for guys like you,” follows Norman, adding a little Revenge of the Nerds to the formula.

Embarrassing, for sure. But a bit short of the Mark of the Beast. Yet Friday Night Norman provides, on a planet with six active genocides on a given day, enough negative energy to resurrect Muscle Satan. I’m not sure what Norman’s insecure about, he’s clearly the most important dork alive.

Centuries of training is just enough for our heroes to escape their Scooby-Doo knots. And take a personal beating from Satan 2.0. Eli goes to the Heavenly Emergency Room for a plan unclear to everyone but him. A school of strategy called suicide by the unsaved, and martyrdom by the elect.

Honestly, I dig the sword. They can’t animate it, but it makes a nice still.

With Eli getting the faith beaten out of him, the mission’s down to Kira. If she can outhink or outfight a Hexadecimal recolor, mankind’s saved. She reaches out to Norman with an honest thread of humanity.

Okay, not that honest. It’s jabber about beauty being skin deep, and loving yourself (but mostly Christ). Angel Assault: Guardian Office swings wide, and the point’s often lost to man and angel alike. But Norman gets it, gives up on love, and stops chasing a bad date across the freeway. Good man. Now his drugs can enter the world slightly later. Likely after a cheaper, less stable competitor. Pharma’s wacky like that.

Without his cum supply, the devil’s left powerless. Until the next episode, when he’s stronger than ever. Perhaps he found an alpha training camp. For now, Eli and Kira are a step closer to their wings.

Thus Angel Slapfight: Guardian Playground begins. I love it. We’ve gone twenty years crazier since this. Every day reality eats a thin sliver of paint, and we live in the golden aftermath.

Fair.

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