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Back in 1995, the studio Gainax, under the leadership of Hideaki Anno, made Evangelion. This was widely agreed to be an epochal thing, and Gainax was hailed as a great studio. They followed up with a series of other critically succesful works - FLCL in 2000, Diebuster in 2004, and Gurren Lagann in 2007. (Which is not to say that all of their works were great - but some of them certainly were.)

Today, it is often said that Gainax has fallen from grace. Their recent works are... somewhat less epochal - Houkago no Pleiades in 2011; Medaka Box in 2011 with a sequel in 2012; C3-bu in 2013; and (currently airing) Magica Wars in 2014.

This motivates the following question: is there anybody left at Gainax who worked on Evangelion back in 1995? It's often claimed that a large part of Gainax (including Anno) left to form Studio Khara (for Rebuild), and that the rest of the good people (including e.g. Imaishi Hiroyuki, i.e. the Gurren Lagann people) left to form Studio Trigger. If it is, in fact, the case that there's basically nothing connecting 1995 Gainax to 2014 Gainax besides the institutional name, that would do much to explain Gainax's "fall".

senshin
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In 2011, many main creators did drop out from Gainax. They are the members of the 'Gurren Lagann' and 'Panty & Stocking' creator.

Panty & Stocking with Garter Belt Wikipedia

After that, those members build a new company named 'TRIGGER Inc.' as the anime studio of course.

Trigger Company

When they make the anime 'Kill la Kill', answered the question of the 'Gainax drop out'.

ガイナックスを辞めた理由。新作「キルラキル」トリガー大塚雅彦代表に聞く１ - Why they dropped out from Gainax. We asked Otsuka CEO of the Trigger of new anime 'Kill la Kill'.

---Japanese---

ガイナックスを飛び出し、身軽さを手に入れたかった

---English---

We want to spring out from Gainax, and take the free from the burden for the new challenges.

In fact, they have continued the new challenge.

Little Witch Academia 2 Crowfunding

You can interpret this as the fall of Gainax. But I do not think so. There is no doubt that Gainax has grown them. When the grown birds leave the nest, their parents should be relieved. However, I think I might be the minority, but I think that they ought to be praised.

Today, Gainax is too large. I think that their current essential work now, grow the people, and make the affiliates. Studio Color, A-1, Trigger, those are the works of the Gainax I think.

Gagantous
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oden
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  • I'd like to say like that "When the person drop out the corporation, a lot of Japanese citizens think that the corporation is a rogue. I don't think that it just is not the only case." Is it the insulting manner expression? – oden Aug 13 '14 at 11:10
  • I cannot understand the point, but if it is the no manner answer, I'll delete it. If there are no comment about it until next 1h, I'll delete this answer. I'm very sorry. – oden Aug 13 '14 at 11:28
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    There was nothing wrong with your answer, other than a few misspellings or grammar errors - nothing insulting was said. As such, I have undeleted your answer, and edited what little errors I caught. – JNat Aug 13 '14 at 13:33
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    @oden: Sorry for not commenting - I was looking around trying to improve your answer and make sure it says what you want to say. Your answer has valuable content and there was no reason to delete it. – nhahtdh Aug 13 '14 at 13:47
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    I think that What @oden (correct me if I'm mistaken) is trying to say is that Japan being a society deeply rooted in tradition, long-term relationships create very strong bonds between a company and its employees and especially co-workers and managers. Even in smaller companies where labor liquidity is higher, good employees may well stay with one employer for life. However leaving and doing your own thing can be seen as negative or being disloyal (going maverick). But the this seems to have been praised by industry veterans as an achievement/innovation in the industry (new ideas/ventures). – кяαzєя Aug 13 '14 at 15:56
  • English is so difficult for me.....orz – oden Aug 13 '14 at 16:14
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    @oden 大丈夫です がんばれ~! – кяαzєя Aug 13 '14 at 16:23
  • @ɹǝzɐɹʞ ありがとうございますお＼(^o^)／ – oden Aug 13 '14 at 16:31