Dai-Gunzan

Towering over the ordinary Gunmen around it, the Dai-Gunzan starts life as a Beastmen war machine set under the general Thymilph, a commander loyal to Lordgenome. It behaves less like a single duelist and more like a stronghold that walks on two legs, built to spearhead the campaign against humanity. When the rebels of Team Gurren pry it loose, the giant changes hands and is reborn under a new name, the Dai-Gurren.

Its silhouette is that of a warship mounted on a pair of gigantic legs. A blade forms the prow, and the command tower above it is styled after a face, the viewports set to read as two eyes above a mouth. A working arm juts from each side, while gun batteries line the deck and the tower's shoulders alike. The fortress fights mainly as a carrier rather than a brawler: those side arms hurl the Gunmen stored within at oncoming foes, and they also brush aside anyone who scrambles onto the deck, where firing the cannons would risk the hull itself.

When pressed, the prow blade shoots forward in an attack named the Knife Anchor, and the twin rear thrusters can be launched like enormous missiles. For all its ship-like build, the thing cannot float unless it is modified first.

Under Thymilph, a general in Lordgenome's service, the fortress first rolls out to back up Viral. The whole of Team Gurren, Gurren Lagann included, proves unable to fell the colossus in a straight fight, so Simon drops it into a vast pit and the group pulls back. Come the next day, they slip Lagann inside to hijack the base, though the victory takes Kamina's life almost the instant it is won.

Rebranded the Dai-Gurren by its captors, still called by its old name among the Beastmen, the ship gains a red coat and a replacement tower after the takeover wrecked the first. Dayakka Littner steers it thereafter, Gabal Docker among the crew, and it stays the brigade's roaming home until Teppelin, where the crew deliberately blows the hull and ejects the rest before it powers down.