Simon Husbando

Simon (pronounced like "Simone" or "sea-moan" in English, and "Shimon" in Japanese), also known as Simon The Digger, is the main protagonist of the anime and manga series, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. He begins the story as a short, unassuming and lonely young boy, but grows up into a commanding and well-loved man. Hailed for being like a drill (a dynamic he explains at the top of this article), he became known as a legendary hero who overcame impossible odds both personal and universal and now stands eternally as a beacon for the good of all man and Spiral kind. Simon's most notable physical traits are his wild dark blue hair, short height, deep indigo eyes and strong lean build, but this was not always the case. Earlier in the series, for his age so he was quite short, shorter than even Nia, Rossiu and Yoko, all of the same age group. At age 14, he stood at approximately 5 feet, and was not as defined compared to the rest of the men in the brigade. He had a lightly tanned baby face which may have not been so bad, was it not for the rest of his body which made him look younger than he actually was. This, as a man, was much to his chagrin. Despite this, his attractive features were still noticed by some women. In part 3 and 4, 21-year-old Simon looks very different. He has matured considerably, now standing at an impressive 6'2'' (taller than both Kamina and Kittan) and is much more muscularly defined. His facial features have matured, gaining hardened edges in his jawline, and his voice dropped an octave or two. In addition, he is even more level-headed than he was before. After the 20 year timeskip during the epilogue, Simon has become visibly taller and has an extremely muscular and tan body. His hair has grown shorter and is similar to Kamina’s haircut, and his right eye has developed into a spiral due to not using his immense power for decades. His face shows several wrinkles and his hair has grayed. Simon is polite, humble, compassionate and brave. At the start of the series, he was a shy, extremely withdrawn boy, finding solace only whilst digging tunnels for the expansion of Jiha village. He also had a huge fear of earthquakes after losing his parents in one, though this changed when he discovered that the Gunmen were responsible for those earthquakes. After finding Lagann and fighting a Beastman for the first time, he began to come out of his shell but continued to fear the pressure to be brave and fight for the rest of the team. Initially, Simon relied heavily on those around him to inspire him to fight bravely, especially Kamina, who often had to convince Simon to pluck up the courage needed in battle. However, Simon displayed an uncanny aptitude for combat despite his timidness, and has even enjoyed himself on the battlefield, as seen during the first battle against Thymilph. He is also more than capable of being brave, and refused to just stand around while Kamina got himself killed. Simon is also very level-headed, and often kept the rash and reckless Kamina from making poor decisions; Kamina even remarked at one point that his level head is the only thing that kept him alive. As a teenager among like-aged women, Simon was prone to jealousy and heartbreak. This was demonstrated when he witnessed Yoko, then the object of his affections, kiss Kamina. The image was burned into his mind during the pivotal battle against Thymilph, and Simon was unable to fight properly until he was, inspired to fight by Kamina, who ended up dying in the battle. The latter's death changed Simon profoundly, and Simon fell into a state of heavy depression. Initially, he disconnected himself from the rest of the crew and even once lashed out at Rossiu, mocking him for having once believed in a false religion. These same feelings forbade him from operating Lagann correctly. These frustrations greatly interfered with his fighting as well. Simon resolved to try emulating Kamina, but the Spiral rejected it, forcing him into a fit of nausea and discharging raw Spiral Power out of Lagann's cockpit. After meeting Nia, he temporarily forgot about his emotions in utter awe of her, though he sank once again into his depression after both he and Nia were safely aboard the Dai-Gurren. With nearly everyone having "abandoned" him (at Yoko's urging, as she believed nobody could help Simon overcome Kamina's death but himself), he is at his lowest. Simon is eventually able to snap massively out of his delirium through a combination of his want to change Nia's desperate situation and his own resolve to rescue his crew. Behind him, the Dai-Gurren crew watch as Simon uses his core drill to diligently break through to freedom. It is in that moment that they were witnessing what Kamina saw all along; an unbreaking back that was in silence paving the way to their freedom. Not only were they seeing a man chip away at bedrock, but they were witnessing him chip away at himself and their leader slowly being broken out in front of their eyes. Shortly thereafter, Simon awakens and lays waste to the Beastman opposition. Performing the first solo Giga Drill Breaker shown in the series. From that point forward, the true Simon had awakened and the old Simon was gone. He also accepted that he could never be like Kamina, but that doesn't matter as he can still be his own person. Even after mastering his immense Spiral Power, however, Simon refuses to see himself as a god, and instead thinks of himself only as 'Simon the Digger'. In part 3, Simon appears to have, as Gimmy has pointed out, gotten lazier, having fallen into the monotony of bureaucracy, though he wished to return to his hot-blooded life. When Rossiu has him imprisoned after saving Kamina City from the Mugann, Simon seemingly resigns himself to his fate, but shows that he still yearns to fight, shown through his heated battle against Viral in the prison showers. Once Simon and Team Dai-Gurren go to space to rescue Nia, Simon goes through his final evolution. He is much more outgoing and fired-up as opposed to how he was during his tenure as leader of Kamina City. He revels in being able to once again fight alongside his friends. In the final battle against Antispiral, Simon develops a hybrid personality between himself and Kamina, wherein he leads the team in a hot-blooded assault against Antispiral using the bravado once exhibited by Kamina without the arrogance or foolhardiness which frequently landed Kamina in trouble against tougher opponents. One of the most prominent traits that Simon holds is that he cares about others more then his own well-being, as shown when he tells Rossiu to put a bomb inside of Gurren-Lagann to make sure he can't escape to save himself before he went off to fight an incoming group of Mugann during his trial in order to save Kamina City.