History Anime / TrigunStampede

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: In ''Stampede'', the city of July has an alternative spelling as '[=JuLai=]', used in the English subtitles. This has caused confusion and debate among longtime Trigun fans as it previously was always spelled 'July'. Causing even more confusion, the world map that's shown midway through each episode marks the city as 'July', and the title of episode 12 is 'High Noon At July', referring to [[spoiler: the city's destruction]]. The anime's official social media accounts have used ''both'' spellings, making both valid. An interview with staff has clarified that the alternative spelling came from the fact they made the city Asian {{Cyberpunk}}-themed, and there is corresponding kanji for the name which would be romanized as '[=JuLai=]' (儒來).

** The color palette of [[spoiler: Vash's SignificantWardrobeShift during the battle at July where his coat becomes black with purplish-red accents nd his glasses are tinted violet is inspired by the alternative color palette(s) Yasuhiro Nightow would occasionally color Vash in and that his figures would sometimes be released in, where his coat was black and his glasses red or blue]].

** Up until ''Stampede'', Vash and Knives did not have an official birthdate. In the 1998 anime, there was a scene where Vash written down a profile of himself with inaccurate information for things such as his height and age, where he also listed his birthday as July 21st, ergo, the anniversary of [[spoiler: the destruction of the city of July]]. ''Stampede'', in possible horrific irony, has chosen to make this their birthday for real.

** Wolfwood wears a grey, untucked button-up shirt instead of a white tucked one like his previous counterparts. However, in the 1998 anime, flashbacks show Wolfwood as a child also wearing a grey, untucked button-up. [[spoiler: This also ends up subtly nodding to the fact that Wolfwood as we see him in the first 12 episodes is more immature as a character than his previous counterparts, much like Vash and Meryl also are, given ''Stampede'''s StealthPrequel nature]].

** Elendria the Crimson-Nail is, like Vash, a visual example. In the manga, she appeared to be an adult woman. In ''Stampede'', she looks like a short young girl, so much so that Rollo initially mistook her for being around his age.

* TheArtifact: Wolfwood still calls Vash "needle noggin" even though his new hairstyle doesn't look that much spikier than Wolfwood's.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Quite a lot. The radio broadcasts introduce a number of things that turn up later, for example, but there are others.

* ImmortalityBeginsAtTwenty: [[spoiler:Vash and Knives, Independent Plants, aged through childhood and adolescence in just a few years. When they physically became adults, however, they remained exactly the same for 150 years.]]

* JourneyToTheCenterOfTheMind: In episode eleven, Knives initiates a strange mental interface with Vash as a means to "remake" him. [[spoiler:They travel through Vash's memories, Knives reminding Vash of his many failures, making moral arguments, and giving his own context to events, while forcing Vash to forget the things that comfort him. Vash's immediate resistance, attempts to flee, obvious distress and even begging for Knives to stop all demonstrate the [[MindRape violating nature]] of what Knives is doing]].

* MeaningfulRename: Vash's brother in this continuity was named "Nai" by Rem but now goes by "Millions Knives", since he despises humanity and is determined to shed anything they gave him. It actually fits incredibly well, considering his primary ability involves manifesting chains made up of hundreds if not thousands of razor-sharp blades. [[spoiler:He chose it to represent becoming a kind of blade taking revenge for the suffering inflicted on "millions" of his sister Plants all over the planet.]]

* ThouShaltNotKill: Just like the manga and anime, Vash follows a code not to kill anyone. In this version, he already considers himself personally responsible for every death in the Fall, and refuses to kill anyone else.

** The first two episodes introduce Vash, the reporters, and some {{Starter Villain}}s. They have a cartoonish tone where nobody really gets hurt, and Vash is a harmlessly goofy man whose pacifist ideals lead to the situation improving. Then the third episode, "Bright Light, Shine Through the Darkness", introduces [[MisanthropeSupreme Millions Knives]]. From that point onward the series grows significantly darker, more graphically violent, and more disturbing, as well as more directly challenging Vash's beliefs. It even goes so far as to destroy the town the first two episodes took place in, as if to ensure there can be no safe harbour anymore.

** This adaptation is much darker than the 1998 anime, with graphic on-screen deaths of sympathetic characters and less of the humor the original had, though there is still a certain amount of goofiness. It's much more in line with ''Trigun Maximum'', however.
** The landscape of Noman's Land feels noticeably bleaker compared to the manga and 1998 anime, where the towns and cities felt reasonably populated and lively despite the endless desert surrounding them. ''Stampede'''s version of the world, on the other hand, really gives the feeling that the people are barely scraping by to survive on the planet that they were forced to inhabit. For example, the audience is directly shown effects of life without a Plant or other source of reliable energy, when a town cannot obtain clean drinking water because of it. The opulent CyberPunk city of July is a stark outlier, but even it has an unsettling edge when it's shown that it was literally built on top of the ruins of a spaceship that cracked in half, and it happens to be Knives's base of operations and the home of his cult, which more or less controls the place completely.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: How to demonstrate who Vash is as a person when he's still a little boy in a featureless tunic? He cheerfully greets ship full of people in cryogenic suspension by name, then initiates a flying cuddle on his foster mother. How to demonstrate the same of Knives when he's the same and still named "Nai"? He's absolutely calm, focused, and non-demonstrative as the ship begins to tear itself to pieces... and then after it's crashed, Vash finds him cackling gleefully over the wreckage.

** The purple flowers that appear [[spoiler:when Knives forces Vash's Gate]] are purple geraniums, a flower that conveys admiration and adoration towards someone. They're speckled with white like night sky petunias, which represent anger and resentment but also to never lose hope.

* LivingBattery: The Plants are pieces of organic LostTechnology that produce food, water, energy, gravity -- many things humans need to survive on a planet as desolate as No Man's Land or in space. [[spoiler:They're engineered beings resembling sea creatures that can't survive outside of their casings, and with capabilities that humans still don't fully understand. The Fall (in part) has forced humanity to over-rely on them to the point of burning them out, since a great deal of knowledge was lost in the crash and No Man's Land is not suited to support human life (or the Plants, for that matter). This motivates Knives, a rare Independent Plant (birthed rather than cloned, closely resembling a human, and capable of living outside a case) in his StartOfDarkness and attempts to KillAllHuman. Vash, his twin, has been attempting to [[TakeAThirdOption help both the Plants and humans acclimate and survive together]].]]

** On the surface, Vash is covered in human-made objects - he wears their clothing and wields their weapons. But he proves to be the 'Mother Nature' twin who is driven by his ideals and emotional connection to others, finds wonder in nature and the world, and wishes to live among the human race as part of their species. He's framed as traditionally effeminate despite being male (gentle, nurturing, a healer, even rather passive). He is also strongly influenced by the women in his life. [[spoiler: And in his confrontation with Knives at July, his powers manifest as a mass of roots and flowers and develops a wing that appears to be made of said roots]].

** In the manga and 1998 anime, all Plants were held in containers that looked like giant lightbulbs. In ''Stampede'' most of the Plants are contained in more stereotypical looking cylindrical tanks, but it's later shown that the Plant containers onboard the space colony ships also look like lightbulbs.

** In episode 12 tiny little Meryl, who might be the character least informed about what the hell is going on, is the one [[spoiler:to ruin Knives's plans simply because she wouldn't give up on Vash. Knives never factored her into his plans, barely knowing she existed right up until the moment Vash breaks free. Appropriately, he did so once she invoked his memories of Rem.]] It was [[TheWormThatWalks Zazie]] who brought her to July, which amusingly means her involvement could be considered the product of a [[StealthPun bug]].

** In episode 12 tiny little Meryl, who might be the character least informed about what the hell is going on, is the one [[spoiler:to ruin Knives's plans simply because she wouldn't give up on Vash. Knives never factored her into his plans, barely knowing she existed right up until the moment Vash breaks free. Appropriately, he did so once she invoked his memories of Rem.]]

* SpannerInTheWorks: Episode 9 reveals that [[spoiler:Rem's HeroicSacrifice to eject Vash and Nai's escape pod from the crashing colony ships also enabled the other ships to eject their pods as well, derailing Nai's plan to destroy everybody on the other ships that weren't Plant carriers and allowing humanity to scratch out an existence on the planet's surface, albeit always on the brink of destruction without the aid of Plants. Nai, now calling himself Knives, has come to despise her for this (and for what he perceives as her human influence on his brother) despite trying to convince her to escape with him and Vash]].
** Tiny little Meryl, who might be the character least informed about what the hell is going on, is the one [[spoiler:to ruin Knives's plans simply because she wouldn't give up on Vash. Knives never factored her into his plans, barely knowing she existed right up until the moment Vash breaks free. Appropriately, he did so once she invoked Rem in his mind.]]

* ArmorPiercingResponse: In episode eleven, Knives finally explains to Vash just why he crashed the ships, and why he's been trying to wipe out humankind ever since. [[spoiler:Because he believes Vash needs to be protected from humans, or he'll be dependent on their love and subjected to their exploitation forever. In short, everything Knives has done? Knives blames on ''Vash''. Already suffering under the burden of believing he was Knives's accomplice in the crash, Vash screams in guilt-ridden despair and suffers a complete mental collapse.]]

* BloodierAndGorier: For as violent as the original Trigun could get, especially the manga, blood hardly ever coated the floor in great quantities. Thanks in part of Knives's [[AdaptationalSuperpowerChange change in power set]], blood sprays across the screen much more liberally.

** Red represents humanity, both as survivors and as killers, and as beings capable of emotional extremes. Red is Vash's favorite color because he associates it with Rem and the geraniums she grew, which he complements with other warm and bright colors as well as [[DarkIsNotEvil black]]. Red is also the color of sick or dying Plants. [[spoiler:Ironically, Vash is a Plant, not a human, but one who regards himself as inferior, broken or monstrous.]]
** Blue represents the Plants, liquid-dwelling beings that seem out-of-place in the burning desert of No Man's Land. Knives is strongly associated with it, trying to present an air of detached rationality, complemented by [[LightIsNotGood white]], gray and other washed out colors. Healthy Plants glow blue. Interestingly, normal human Meryl is also associated with blue in her clothes and immediate love of a field of blue flowers.

** Vash is the red to Knives's blue, but he also is [[spoiler: the black to Knives's white. Their battle in the season finale exemplifies this, with Knives sprouting a silvery-white wing and Vash sprouting a jet-black one while pale-skinned Knives is in a white body-suit and Vash's clothes have been stained black]].

* EvenEvilHasStandards: William Conrad performed a lot of horrific experiments on children to help Millions Knives's cause, but either out of pragmatism or a legitimate attachment to his test subject, [[spoiler:he tried to stop Legato from torturing Nicholas D. Wolfwood and asked Nicholas for forgiveness before locking him in his cell.]] [[spoiler:It turns out he's trying to create humans that don't need to rely on Plants, as he firmly believes is necessary for anyone to survive on the planet much longer.]]

* ForegoneConclusion: If you were already familiar with Trigun before watching ''Stampede'' and remembered major points of the timeline, the moment you heard Vash was journeying to a city named July probably tipped you off that [[spoiler:the city would likely not be standing by the season finale. Sure enough, it wasn't]].

** The opening sequence itself is foreshadowing for the final episode, [[spoiler:showing Vash running in an attempt to escape from Knives's mental influence.]] Similarly the collapsing buildings [[spoiler:look like Jeneora Rock, which is torn apart in episode three]], and the brief flashes of Plant patterns belong to [[spoiler:Knives, Vash, Tesla, and the Core in the higher plane]].

* FromBadToWorse: Almost everyone in Jeneora Rock has sticky bombs ready to go off stuck to their bodies, the place has also been riddled with mines, and the guy responsible is happily running off to steal the town's Plant, killing everyone in his way and dooming the town to collapse. How does it get worse? The show cuts away to show the bomber's ''[[PersonOfMassDestruction boss]]'' is about to arrive. While Vash is willing to confront E.G. the Mine, his reaction to the reinforcements is desperately screaming at everyone to RunOrDie.

* LivingBattery: The Plants are pieces of organic LostTechnology that produce food, water, energy, gravity -- many things humans need to survive on a planet as desolate as No Man's Land or in space. [[spoiler:They're engineered beings resembling sea creatures that can't survive outside of their casings, and with capabilities that humans still don't fully understand. The Great Fall (in part) has forced humanity to overrely on them to the point of burning them out, since a great deal of knowledge was lost in the crash. This motivates Knives, a rare Independent Plant (birthed rather than cloned, closely resembling a human, and capable of living outside a case) in his StartOfDarkness and attempts to KillAllHumans.]]
* LostTechnology: Literally referred to as "lost technology", there exist devices and tools that no one knows how to replicate and are more advanced than what currently exists in the world (like Plants). Whatever lost technology is left was presumably recovered from the myriad spaceship crashes.

* MeaningfulRename: Vash's brother in this continuity was named "Nai" by Rem but now goes by "Millions Knives". It actually fits incredibly well, considering his primary ability involves manifesting chains made up of hundreds if not thousands of razor-sharp blades, and he despises humanity so much he likely would want to shed the name they gave him. [[spoiler:He chose it to represent becoming a kind of blade taking revenge for the suffering inflicted on "millions" of his sister Plants all over the planet.]]

** Like the first episode of the original anime adaptation, Vash's first attempt to use his gun onscreen is thwarted due to lacking ammunition.
** Vulture-bugs resembling the puppets Lenoff the Puppet-Master used to spy on Vash appear, again being used to spy on Vash, though this time they instead belong to Zazie the Beast as a species of Worm.

** Vash's goal to find Knives in the city of July at the end of episode 3, happened in previous continuities and ended ''very'' badly. [[spoiler:This time around was no exception.]]

** The people who experimented on Rollo, note that he's filled with the "venom" of hatred, referencing his original name and the fact it is a reference to Marvel Comics' ''ComicBook/{{Venom}}.''
** Wolfwood once again kills a member of the Gung-Ho Guns while Vash is trying to talk them down. Rai-Dei the Blade in the manga, Zazie the Beast in the original anime, and [[spoiler:Monev]] here.

** Vash's main gun in this continuity looks different than his predecessors. However, it's later shown that it was modified, and its original appearance was identical to the guns of his previous counterparts.

** The color palette of [[spoiler: Vash's SignificantWardrobeShift during the battle at July where his coat becomes black with purplish-red accents is inspired by the alternative color palette(s) Yasuhiro Nightow would occasionally color Vash in and that his figures would sometimes be released in, where his coat was black]].

** Vash is banished from Jeneora Rock following Knives's rampage on the basis of Vash being Knives's brother and seemingly the reason why Knives showed up in the first place. Vash's quiet acceptance, to say nothing of the bounty he already has, indicates that he's been dealing with this mindset from people for a while. [[spoiler:It's not simply that Knives is his brother, however; Vash also holds himself directly responsible for what Knives does.]]
** Episode 9 reveals that [[spoiler:Knives's grudge with humanity stems from the prior generations of humans consuming Earth's resources until [[EarthThatWas the planet became uninhabitable]], and then moving onto a new world to repeat the process. From his perspective, humans as a species are nothing but a voracious race of PlanetLooters, and wiping them out will protect No Man's Land and other worlds from being harmed by them. Meryl's reaction to Zazie revealing Earth's fate implies that most of the current generation born from survivors of the crashed colony ships are completely ignorant of it]].

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: In ''Stampede'', the city of July has an alternative spelling as '[=JuLai=]', used in the english subtitles. This has caused confusion and debate among longtime Trigun fans as it previously was always spelled 'July'. Causing even more confusion, the world map that's shown midway through each episode marks the city as 'July', and the title of episode 12 is 'High Noon At July', referring to [[spoiler: the city's destruction]]. The anime's official social media accounts have used ''both'' spellings, making both valid. An interview with staff has clarified that the alternative spelling came from the fact they made the city Asian {{Cyberpunk}}-themed, and there is corresponding kanji for the name which would be romanized as '[=JuLai=]' (儒來).

* WalkingDisasterArea: It's not for no reason that Vash is called the Humanoid Typhoon. So far, almost every last one of the settlements he's traveled to for any length of time has been destroyed as a direct result of his presence. The only one that wasn't was already deserted.

* YoungerAndHipper: While nearly every character has been redesigned to be sleeker and a little more in-line with current anime aesthetics, the major protagonists Vash, Meryl, and Wolfwood all look and behave distinctly younger than their previous incarnations. This is particularly true of Meryl whose character has been the most altered, being a young, inexperienced reporter who can barely fight, compared to her original characterization as a confident insurance agent with a cape full of derringers. [[spoiler: It becomes evident by episode 12 that this is because ''Stampede'''s story is being told as a StealthPrequel, combining elements from the first part of the Trigun manga and 1998 anime with elements from its initial backstory. Episode 12 ends on the destruction of the city of July, while in the original story it was stated this event happened many decades prior. In other words, this version of Vash is literally being depicted as younger in terms of major events in his life. As for Meryl, it's apparent that the story thus far has served as a journey for the audience to watch as she grows into being more aligned with her previous counterparts.]]

* AdaptationalGenderIdentity: During a panel with the team behind ''Stampede'', the Plant designs have notes written near them wondering if they should be a certain gender - before concluding that maybe their gender doesn't really matter. The Plants in the manga had feminine forms, and were referred to by Vash and Knives as "sister". While the ''Stampede'' Plants still retain their feminine shape, they are not exactly referred to with any kind of pronouns. The English dub even has Knives refer to them as their "brethren".

* SequelHook: Episode 12 ends with two scenes foreshadowing major future events that older fans of the series, especially those who have read the manga, will have some familiarity with, indicating ''Stampede'' intends on adapting them: [[spoiler: First, a shot of Vash's amnesiac identity ''Eriks'' with one of his caretakers, Lina. Second, a transmission containing the voice of an individual named Chronica]].
* RaisedByTheCommunity: [[spoiler:Vash grew up on Ship Three after the Big Fall and embraces its crew as his family. Luida and Brad in particular are his adoptive parents in all but name.]]

** It's difficult to see because the camera pans away so quickly, but Father Nebraska and Gofsef can be seen among the Jeneora Rock survivors at the end of Episode 3. [[MadeOfIron Gofsef's]] survival is the most surprising, since he was seemingly vaporized by E.G. the Mine's bombs.

* ThouShaltNotKill: Just like the manga and anime, Vash follows a code not to kill anyone. In this version, he already considers himself responsible for every death in the Fall, and refuses to kill any ''more'' people.

** ZigZagged with Vash. While Vash has always been a conflict-avoidant crybaby, ''Stampede'''s Vash is noticably even more passive and meek than his previous counterparts, and seems to lack their underlying temper. However, once put into dangerous situations, he's just as, [[AdaptationalBadass if not more]], capable than his predecessors in handling a fight.

** Livio the Double Fang and Elendira the Crimsonnail also show up before we even meet the Bad Lads Gang.

** Red represents humanity, both as survivors and as killers, and as beings capable of emotional extremes. Red is Vash's favorite color because he associates it with Rem and the geraniums she grew, which he complements with other warm colors as well as [[DarkIsNotEvil black]]. Red is also the color of sick or dying Plants, which makes Vash's association with the color somewhat ironic.
** Blue represents the Plants, liquid-dwelling beings that seem out-of-place in the burning desert of No Man's Land. Knives is strongly associated with it, trying to present an air of detached rationality, complemented by [[LightIsNotGood white]], gray and other washed out colors. Healthy Plants glow blue.
** Red and blue combined, of course, create purple, which is for both humans and Plants unified. Rem, who wanted humans and Plants to understand each other, had unusual purple eyes. A Plant as it's being healed will briefly glow purple. [[spoiler:And Vash's powers are purple, contrasting Knives's pale blue.]]
** Interestly, Meryl, who is an ordinary human, also seems to have a visual association with the color blue, having it present on her outfit as well as being in a scene involving her frolicking in a field of blue flowers. This puts her directly in contrast with Vash, who is a Plant associated with humanity's red.
** Vash is the red to Knives's blue, but he also is [[spoiler: the black to Knives's white. Their battle in the season finale exemplifies this, with Knives sprouting a silvery-white wing and Vash sprouting a jet-black one]].

** Vash's expression as he stares at Jeneora's dying Plant is very worried, and he says "If we don't act soon, things will get worse." [[spoiler:Not only does Vash know that Knives takes dying Plants to prevent them being subjected to the Last Run, he's ramping up his thefts and murders while Vash, the only one capable of stopping him, is reluctant to confront him. Sure enough, Knives arrives in person two episodes later, takes the Plants, and destroys the town while Vash can do very little to change his mind]].

* HeelRealization: Rosa, the local bartender and apparent leader of Jeneora Rock, has an unspoken version of this when Father Nebraska asks why Vash would bother to protect her and the rest of Jeneora Rock's people after they so easily turned on him upon finding out about his bounty.

* MoodWhiplash: ''Stampede'''s first two episodes are mostly goofy, comedic romps in a space western setting but then violently swerves into a situation that is a borderline horror flick in episode three, when the more terrifying major threats of the series descend upon the protagonists.

** Interestly, Meryl, who is an ordinary human, also seems to have a visual association with the color blue, having it present on her outfit as well as having an extended scene involving her frolicking in a field of blue flowers. This puts her directly in contrast with Vash, who is a Plant associated with humanity's red.

** Red represents humanity, both as survivors and as killers, and as beings capable of emotional extremes. Red is Vash's favorite color because he associates it with Rem and the geraniums she grew, which he complements with other warm colors as well as [[DarkIsNotEvil black]]. Red is also the color of sick or dying Plants.
** Blue represents the Plants, liquid-dwelling beings that seem out-of-place in the burning desert of No Man's Land. Knives is strongly associated with it, trying to present an air of detached rationality, complemented by [[LightIsNotGood white]], gray and other washed out colors. Healthy Plants glow blue.

* CastingGag: Various cast members from the 1998 Trigun anime cameo in ''Stampede'' as radio DJ's that have funny or ironic things to say.

* CastingGag:
** Vash's original Japanese voice actor, Creator/MasayaOnosaka cameos in this version of Trigun as the voice of the main news Radio DJ, who ironically broadcasts all the announcements to the world about Vash being a dangerous, Wanted fugitive. There's something hilarious about hearing what was for over 20 years the voice of "Vash the Stampede" now sounding out the calls to hunt down "Vash the Stampede".
** Wolfwood's original Japanese voice actor Creator/ShowHayami also cameos as the religious radio DJ, preaching the word of the Eye of Michael. Given how a preacher was Wolfwood's original occupation makes the sermon even funnier.
** Knives's original Japanese voice actor Creator/ToruFurusawa, like the above two, briefly makes a cameo as a radio DJ, lamenting humanity's chances of continued survival on a barely liveable planet. Of course, the irony here is that Knives is the one responsible for crashing the ships.

** [[spoiler: Episode 12 establishes that lore-wise, Meryl and Wolfwood have entered Vash's life much earlier than they did in previous iterations of the story, being witness to the infamous July incident that gave Vash his $$60 billion bounty. Likewise, most other familiar plot points have been transplanted into happening just prior to and in the aftermath of July, including Vash taking on the pseudonym ''Eriks'' and staying with a girl named Lina]].

* AdaptationalEarlyAppearance: Millions Knives shows up in the first episode, and terrorises Jenora Rock's inhabitants in person by the third, compared to his much later debut in the manga and anime. Vash's backstory is also given at the start. Livio the Double Fang and Elendira the Crimsonnail also show up before we even meet the Bad Lads Gang. [[spoiler: Episode 12 establishes that lore-wise, Meryl and Wolfwood have entered Vash's life several decades earlier than they did in previous iterations of the story, being witness to the infamous July incident. Likewise, most other familiar plot points have been transplanted into happening prior to and in the aftermath of July, including Vash taking on the pseudonym ''Eriks'' and staying with a girl named Lina. Chronica, a character that doesn't show up until the final story arc of the manga, is also heard as a mysterious transmission shortly after the July incident]].