YMMV / Battle Angel Alita

• Arc Fatigue: The Zenith of Things Tournament (Z.O.T.T.) arc. Begun in Last Order Chapter 25. Ended in 110. So fatigued that it's broken up by various sub arcs, some of which experience fatigue themselves (the Vampire arc, where all of Earth's backstory is revealed). Bewildering once you realize that the Z.O.T.T. was only supposed to be a distraction for Alita's infiltration of Ketheres. Even more bewildering, in-universe the Z.O.T.T. took place over the time of a week. While in the original 9 volumes 16 years went by. This is actually Lampshaded in chapter 93.
  Toji: It's only been two months since we fought on Leviathan 1... But it feels like it's been years, doesn't it?
• Broken Base: Last Order in all its size and glory. Some fans (while usually noting its shortcomings) see it as a welcome addition to the series which brings in new faces, deepens the Worldbuilding and is generally fun to read. Other feel that it's an empty action-stuffed drivel that throws all the depth of the original out the window in favor of boring Flash Backs, Infodumps, mindless Tournament Arcs, and Monsters Of The Week.
• Complete Monster:
  • Manga: The Super Nova incarnation of Desty Nova, in his introduction, betrayed the main characters and the other two clones of himself to Aga Mbadi. He then proceeds to gleefully tell Alita how LADDER is going to send down an army after the Z.O.T.T. to wipe out The Scrapyard and capture all people on Tiphares for their brains, just before destroying Alita physically and mentally by telling her her brain was replaced with a chip and deconstructing her body, causing her remains to fall down a shaft all while maniacally laughing about it and celebrating over her despair and sadness, disturbing even his other clones. When he asks if the clones would like to work together with him and they politely decline, stating that their methods have grown too different, he uses his power to kill NovaPod and would have killed Nova X if he didn't unplug communication.
  • Battle Angel OVA: Stripped of all his redeeming qualities from of the manga, Vector is a cruel crime lord who reigns over Iron City. Stringing along young Yugo with promises to send him to Zalem, Vector has Yugo and others illegally remove the spines of cyborgs in a black market trade to enrich himself, while also funding highly illegal operations. Vector even executes a victim himself to prove a point to Yugo about witnesses. When Yugo is caught, Vector calmly sells him out to be killed. Not content with this, Vector also keeps the scientist Chiren under his thumb with promises to return her to Zalem, extorting sex from her in the process. Vector later reveals what going to Zalem truly means: murdering people and harvesting them for their organs, which he does on a monthly basis, uncaring why so long as he profits.
• Epileptic Trees: In Volume 3, Sechs notices something is wrong in Jeru when Elf and Zwoelf's little toys start flying away. Afterwards Elf and Zwoelf are completely in Mbadi's control. Several volumes later we learn that Elf and Zwoelf's brainchips are not in their bodies but the little toys they carry on their shoulders.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: As mentioned below, the manga has a shout out to Judas Priest song "Blood Red Skies", which is a Filk Song based on James Cameron's The Terminator. Guess who got the rights to Gunnm and produced/wrote the movie adaptation?
• Jerkass Woobie: Given what a pain train the series is, it's inevitable that some of the antagonists are of this sort:
  • Alita's Evil Former Friend Erika Wald is a major asshole and a recurring Cute and Psycho antagonist, but her Freudian Excuse is of an astronomic scale. In Mars Chronicle, which shows her backstory, author seems to revel in sadistic delight heaping suffering and misfortune on her, from horrific childhood with Abusive Parents to the later upbringing at the hands of a Complete Monster training her to be more evil than him.
  • Said Parental Substitute, Itall Sonann, baron Muster,^note Who just happens to be Alita's uncle. is no different. His backstory and the Start of Darkness is a one endless Tear Jerker.
  • Desty Nova, for all his Crazy Is Cool-ness, didn't live on a bed of roses as well. His life was difficult enough that his craziness is probably the only thing that keeps him going and being The Unfettered that he is.
• Moment of Awesome: Desty Nova.
  • Last Order runs on awesomeness. This is the series that had the most epic thumb war ever conceived, featured a fight against a giant robot with a Wave-Motion Gun installed on a massive Gag Penis, and gave the most evil and monstrous incarnation of Desty Nova a massive afro. There is no shortage of times when the series just revels in its utter insanity.
• Squick:
  • One of the contestants in the latest Tournament Arc is a mindless monster that attacks using its giant phallus. Which fires energy beams. The explanation for this is that the machine was created by beings who saw humans in the simplest way, reducing us down to what they thought was the basic human traits (eat, kill, reproduce) so they designed the machine with a giant phallus, a giant mouth and omnicidal behavior.
  • Kaos's epic Ouroboros-fuelled tripout features some amazingly nauseating and squirm-inducing visuals. THE BRAINS THING.
  • Venusian bioengineering has led to more Body Horror than you could possibly imagine.
  • Eisenburg buzzsawing the top of his own head off manages to be disturbing even in a Gorn-laden series as this.
• The Un-Twist: Alita's brain in Last Order is a micro-chip. While it's unexpected, considering how much of a punishment she endures, it'd be more shocking that her brain was 100% human.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: The original manga takes place on Earth, in the Scrapyard, where just surviving day-to-day is a struggle. Space is implied to be a place of infinite luxury built upon their unwilling sacrifices. Last Order kills that concept dead as the dodo - space is every bit as horrible, just ruled by intrigue and Realpolitik instead of the constant bloody duels of the wasteland. Isn't that what a lot of immigrants experience when they travel from the Third to the First World?
• The Woobie:
  • Ed, Alita's Motorball manager. Too bad he dies a few chapters later.
  • Lou Collins, in a big way.
  • Alita herself goes trough so many horrible experiences she sometimes begs whoever has her at his mercy to just let her die. But always gets through.
  • Erika. In the Mars Chronicle author seems to delight in heaping suffering and misfortune on her.
  • Nollin Sonann, baron Muster's sister and Alita's genetic mother. All the suffering^note The face-tits, dear God, the face-tits alone… from princess Kagura Donrburg's intrigue snapped her brother hard.

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