Galo Thymos (ガロ・ティモス) is the main protagonist of Promare.
Burning Rescue's newest recruit. Set with a burning passion to extinguish all that is wrong, you can expect Galo to rush in first to the scene of an emergency. His 'Burning Soul' is his strongest characteristic.
Portrayal: Kenichi Matsuyama
Personality
Galo isn't one for planning ahead of time and often speaks his mind. He is willful and often relies on that to get through battles. While Galo appears to be all brawn and no brain at first, he is actually deeply compassionate and hates to see others hurt. Furthermore, his plans, while odd, have been shown to work. Galo has even passed his aptitude tests before joining Burning Rescue.
His determination to extinguish all that is wrong leads him into wanting to understand the Burnish more and what they are fighting for. He won't target a group of people without knowing why. He wants to protect all who are innocent. This can make him a little too faithful and easy to be deceived.
He tends to not follow orders that prevent immediate action, nor does he do well when dealing with his superiors. His impatience and impulsive nature can get the best of him.
His and Lio's fiery fighting styles are very compatible.
Appearance
Galo is a well-built man with a long, blue mohawk that is shaved on the sides. His waist is fairly thin compared to his chest. His eyebrows are also blue. Galo's eyes are teal with red segments and his complexion is slightly tan. He is shown to be taller than most characters, but is still shorter than both Varys and Kray.
Galo's uniform is that of red pants displaying a yellow '3', black gloves with yellow lines, and black boots also with yellow segments. With his pants, his hips have black straps. He is often seen wearing a Burning Rescue uniform without a shirt, and a white, medical sleeve on his left arm. Said arm has several burn scars.
In the prologue Galo-Hen, he was previously shown wearing a red firefighter jacket akin to Remi's, but it was soon abandoned. Said prologue also shows that he gained his scars from saving a woman during his first day on the job, when she turned into a Burnish and then accidentally hit him.
When he does wear a shirt, it is that of a blue-ish black short sleeve. Said shirt was later burned by Lio's flames. This appears to be another part of his uniform.
According to flashbacks, child Galo still sported spiky hair.
History
| Warning! Exploring this aspect of the Promare Wiki contains heavy spoilers. |
Before Promare
A scared Galo hugging Kray.
In his childhood, Galo's home was set ablaze. In fear, Galo rushed outside of the house into a college student's grasp. Said college student was Kray Foresight. From this incident, Kray was considered a hero by Galo. Galo would later grow an interest in firefighting and making his hero proud.
Before joining Burning Rescue, Galo was able to pass his aptitude tests. His training hours, on the other hand, were not even the minimum. This results in Ignis and Remi hesitant on hiring him before Kray intervenes.
Galo-Hen
Galo is first introduced in one of two prequels that discuss the events before Promare. Here, it is revealed that Galo is the newest member of Burning Rescue thanks to Kray's efforts. When introducing himself to his colleagues, he is shown wearing a red jacket, info-dumping about ancient firefighters and showing off his homemade Matoi. His co-workers do not take the same interest.
When the station's emergency sirens go off, everyone begins to set off. Galo is almost left behind, but thanks to him arguing that this could work as job experience, Ignis has Lucia take care of Galo in the truck. This results in Galo getting impatient. Eventually, Lucia discovers that one of the facilities still has a woman trapped inside. This results in Galo taking initiative, covering himself and his Matoi with an extinguishing gel, and running off to go save her.
When Galo finally finds Thyma, he proceeds to carry her outside as Burnish flames flow behind them. From the flames, Galo's jacket is left behind. Lucia's calculations state that Galo's plan had the highest rate of both Thyma and Galo surviving, making Galo out to be commendable to his peers. However, when Thyma wakes up, she suddenly becomes a Burnish, resulting in Galo receiving several burn scars to his left arm. Thyma is then taken away by Gueira and Meis before Burning Rescue can do anything.
Promare
Galo and Lio's first encounter.
In the present, Burning Rescue is sent out to deal with a recent Mad Burnish attack. Galo is the last to appear. He proceeds to help Aina with rescuing survivors on the roof. As they work, the Mad Burnish reveal themselves: Gueira, Meis, and Lio. Gueira and Meis are the first to go after Galo. Galo at first struggles, but after changing into his Matoi Tech, he defeats the duo. This results in another fight breaking out with Galo and Lio. Eventually, with the help of his fellow Burning Rescue members, Lio is taken care of.
With the leader of Mad Burnish captured, Freeze Force enters the scene to arrest him. Galo claims that he should be credited for the capture of Lio Fotia, but this results in Vulcan threatening to take Galo as well. Ignis then steps in to stop anything further from occurring. With the flames dealt with, Burning Rescue leaves.
Later, Galo is shown attending a local ceremony for himself. Here, Kray is shown awarding Galo for his deeds with a badge of honor.
Galo is then shown eating with his co-workers at a local pizzeria. As they all talk, Galo's badge is brought up into the conversation. Here, Galo reveals that he idolizes Kray. This is due to Kray saving Galo when he was a child. He comments that Kray lost his arm as a college student from the house fire. However, the conversation abruptly ends when Freeze Force makes another appearance.
Galo and Aina at the pizzeria.
Here, Freeze Force captures one of the pizzeria's employees due to him being a Burnish. Both Galo and Aina attempt to stop Vulcan, but their words mean nothing. After the incident, passersbys find disgust with the presence of a Burnish, resulting in Galo riding away on his motorcycle in anger. Aina goes after him.
She eventually tracks him down to a local frozen lake, where he reveals that this is where he goes to cool off. The duo then skate together. They discuss how they are seen as projections of those they respect: Kray in Galo's case and Heris in Aina's. Suddenly, Aina nearly falls, but is caught by Galo. She is then promptly dropped when he notices a Burnish flare. Galo tells Aina to report the flare as he goes after it.
Galo eventually finds a local cave in the area. As two Burnish children head back in, Galo enters. Lurking inside, he discovers the presence of several escaped Burnish huddling around a campfire. Of these Burnish, a young boy notices the fireman. Galo can only stare back before Lio knocks him out. A brief time later, Galo finds his wrists tied up. Yanking at the ropes, Galo is then made aware of Lio's presence and realizes he escaped from custody.
Lio briefly talks to Galo, with Galo questioning their need for food and to set thing ablaze. Insulted by Galo's claims, Lio retorts and states that Burnish are humans too. Only releasing the crying flames can free the Burnish. Galo wishes to help save a dying Thyma, but Lio refuses it and attempts a Burnish form of CPR where flames are given to the receiver via mouth-to-mouth. After Lio's attempt is sadly shown to be unsuccessful, Lio reveals that her death was caused by the Burnish experiments at Foresight Foundation, Kray's company. Yearning to help his fellow Burnish escape, Lio leaves right before Aina finds Galo.
Having been freed, Galo meets with Kray to discuss Lio's escape and the Burnish experiments. Seeing that Galo is insistent on an answer, he reveals that the Earth will soon be over flooded by magma and that the only way to save anyone is to transport the people of Promepolis. Kray brings Galo to Dr. Heris' lab, where they are currently experimenting with transportation. Galo discovers that the Burnish used is the pizzeria employee he saw before.
Kray despises Galo.
After the torturous experiment, Galo makes up his mind and says that they could easily just remove the magma from within rather than only saving a few people on Earth. Kray, however, retaliates to the idea and proceeds to punch and throw him into a cell to be executed.
Galo is later seen given food by Heris. Heris unlocks his cuffs, believing that he wouldn't physically attack her. He then asks Heris if Aina knows about the transportation plan, resulting in her briefly arguing with him before stopping herself and leaving. When Aina asks about Galo, Heris claims that she saw Galo attack Kray with her own eyes.
During Lio's rampage in the city, he accidentally frees Galo from his cell. This results in Galo managing to escape, where he then decides to meet up with Burning Rescue to stop Lio. With the usage of Matoi Tech and Aina's helicopter, Galo ends up forcing Lio and himself into a container in an attempt to calm Lio down. Another fight breaks out. What does end up stopping him is Aina opening the helicopter's container, where the duo land at the frozen lake. Lio's flames end up extinguishing the ice to reveal a hidden lab beneath.
Deus' computer AI then presents himself to the trio. The trio head inside.
Inside, Deus reveals to them his late findings. Rather than there being an overflow of magma at the center of the Earth, an energized alien species he named 'Promare' is stuck within. They appear in the shape of flames to humans, hence the existence of Burnish and their fire. The transportation plan was also one that Deus researched, but he concluded that this would only speed up Earth's destruction. This eventually resulted in Deus' murder by the hands of Kray and stolen research. Deus' AI reveals this to the trio via camera footage.
Deus then commands Galo and Lio to control Deus X Machina to stop Kray and save the world. The duo oblige.
Galo and Lio arrive at the Foresight Foundation, where the transportation plan is already underway. Despite this, Galo finds Deus X Machina to be 'uncool' and can't focus, resulting in the creation of Lio de Galon. They then start off by attacking the command tower. Realizing this isn't getting anywhere, they then try to dig into the Earth towards the machine's core. Kray eventually takes things into his own hands and comes out with his own mecha. From this, a fight breaks out in the city.
City mecha chaos.
Kray at first is shown having the upper hand, but with Deus X Machine being transformed once more, the fight ends at a standstill, with both mechs frozen in place. After thawing Galo, Lio attempts to burn Kray to death for his crimes against humanity. Kray is left unaffected.
Kray captures Lio and reveals himself to be Burnish as well, with his prosthetic actually being made from his flames. He admits to Galo that he did not enter his house to save him, rather he was the one who accidentally burned it to the ground. Galo just incidentally ran into him after. He was made to look like a hero after. However, he found Galo's presence to later be an annoyance at best and interfering with his plans, causing him to assign him to Burning Rescue for its high casualty rates. As Kray finishes up his explanation, he launches Galo in the air in an attempt to kill him and takes Lio away as a replacement core.
As Galo gets up, he finds that he was protected by Lio's flames. Seeing this act of kindness, he asks for the help of Burning Rescue to launch him underground to rescue Lio.
At the machine's core, Galo ends up landing where a dying Lio is, who he accidentally releases. For this, Kray attempts to kill Galo once more. Galo is still protected by Lio's flames. He eventually brings himself to Kray to give him one last punch to the face. He then tells him to watch as he saves everyone.
Galo saves Lio.
Galo brings himself to where Lio is. He recalls what Lio attempted with Thyma earlier and, after swallowing Lio's flames, he gives Lio a CPR kiss, resulting in Lio healing from his wounds. With Lio safe, the duo work together once more to save the world. Lio commands his fellow Burnish to assist them. As all of the non-Burnish are protected from the flames, the much larger Galo de Lion is formed to help remove the Promare stuck on Earth. The world is then saved.
After Galo and Lio land back on Earth, Galo comments on the need for more helping hands to restore Promepolis. He asks for Lio's cooperation. Lio agrees.
Relationships
Lio
Galo and Lio in the aftermath.
Lio Fotia was first seen by Galo as a terrorist with no other agenda than to set cities on fire. However, when they encounter each other once more, Galo realizes the error of his ways. He attempts to make up for it, offering to help save Thyma, but Lio refuses, likely knowing that normal CPR wouldn't work.
Later, while attempting revenge against Kray Foresight, Lio accidentally frees Galo from his cell, resulting in Galo looking into the night sky where Lio is. Galo recognizes Lio to be crying. He finds himself relating to Lio due to Kray locking him up a week before. Even with this, he refuses to let Lio destroy the city and go against his own moral code, resulting in Galo setting off to go stop him.
Afterwards, both them and Aina come across Deus' lab, where the truth of the Burnish and Kray's plans are revealed. From this, Deus' computer AI insists that Galo and Lio work together to control Deus X Machina. They promptly do so. During this period, neither of them struggle with controlling the mecha, with the only issues being that Galo finds the machine to be uncool. This results in Lio complying with his wishes and reforming the mecha into both Lio de Galon and Galo de Lion.
When Lio attempts to kill Kray for all of his crimes against the Burnish, Lio is instead captured by Kray. However, Lio puts Galo's safety first and uses the remains of his flame to protect Galo. Galo is touched by this, resulting in him going after Kray once more.
Galo eventually catches up with the duo, where he ends up defeating Kray for Lio. Galo then decides to repeat Lio's method of CPR by swallowing Lio's flames and performing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. He successfully revives Lio. When Lio asks him about it, he is left flustered, realizing that he lit a flame to save Lio, causing him to demand Lio to 'take responsibility' for what he's done.
The duo then save the world with the help of the Burnish. In the aftermath, the duo are shown fist bumping.
Kray
Kray being punched by Galo.
Kray was at first Galo's idol. Believing him to have saved him as a child, he saw him as a hero. He took pride in both the opportunity to work at Burning Rescue and the badge that Kray gave him. He would then begin to slowly doubt this belief when Lio reveals Foresight Foundation's involvement with the Burnish.
Galo later questions him on the issue, which results in Kray admitting to his plans. He at first attempts to convince Galo that this is how things should be, but Galo disagrees, resulting in Kray revealing his true feelings in the form of a punch to the stomach. Kray admits that he sees Galo as nothing more than a nuisance and a waste. He then promptly locks Galo up to soon be executed.
When Kray reveals himself to actually be Burnish, he admits that he was the one who set Galo's home ablaze and that he only used the incident to make himself out to be a hero. When Galo continued to exist in his life after that, he decides to have Galo become a firefighter so he could eventually die. At this point, Galo has now lost all respect for Kray.
When Kray attempts to kill Galo twice, Galo is protected by Lio's flames, resulting in him saying that he will save everyone, including Kray. He then punches Kray. When Kray is dealt with, Galo rescues Lio and leaves with him to save the world Kray almost helped destroy.
Aina
Aina talking to Galo.
Aina is one of Galo's co-workers at Burning Rescue. Out of all other members, Aina appears to be the most acquainted with Galo, where she is the one to go after him when he gets upset and is the one who saves Galo in a few instances. Heris comments that Aina talks about Galo a lot to her.
When Galo is locked up by Foresight, she immediately retorts to the idea that Galo would hurt Kray. This results in her briefly arguing with her sister. Aina also accidentally assists in the finding of Deus' lab, in which her, Galo, and Lio explore together.
With the new information revealed to her, she helps assist Galo and Lio by revealing Deus' murder to Heris and helps stop the transportation plan.
Burning Rescue
At first, most members of Burning Rescue found Galo to be unqualified. However, after his successful rescue of Thyma, they grew to see him as a valuable member of the team. They occasionally are shown hanging out with him outside of work.
Besides Aina, Lucia seems to be well acquainted with Galo, as she is shown projecting a PowerPoint Galo made about ancient Firefighters. She was also the one put in charge of Galo on his first day.
Both him and Varys are shown eating pizza together at the pizzaria.
Thyma
During Galo's first day on the job, Thyma was trapped inside a burning building. With the others distracted by Mad Burnish, Galo goes out to rescue her. She has a face mask placed on her and is carried out. Regaining consciousness, Thyma immediately turns into a Burnish. Galo is then left with several burn scars.
They meet once more when Galo finds a Burnish hideout. It is unknown whether or not Galo recognizes her. Here, Galo offers to help save Thyma as he is equipped for CPR. Lio declines the offer and attempts it himself. Despite his efforts, Thyma turns to ashes, leaving the both of them feeling remorseful.
Gallery
Trivia
- Galo's last name, Thymos, comes from the Greek word Thumos, which is the concept of "spiritedness" or the need for recognition.
- Galo’s first name “Galo” could mean “from Gaul”.
- Galo's first name is also the word for "Rooster" in Portuguese.
- This may be a reference to Galo de Barcelos, where a roasted rooster saves an innocent man from being hanged.
- Galo's appearance, specifically his hair and lack of shirt, are fairly similar to the character of Kamina from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, another animated work by Studio Trigger.
- According to Promare's director, Hiroyuki Imaishi, it was that of a coincidence and was not intended[1].
- When discussing his design, his hair is referred to as 'job hair.'
- During a panel, Imaishi comments that his hair was said to also be made this way to act as a sign that he's an idiot protagonist and because Imaishi enjoys the look. An example of this would be Panty from Panty and Stocking[2].
- He also commented that he prefer writing stories with stupid protagonists due to the fact that the story would end too soon if the protagonist was smart. This would result in the rest of the run time being wasted. Thus, stupid is the way to go.
- According to Promare's director, Hiroyuki Imaishi, it was that of a coincidence and was not intended[1].
- His Japanese voice actor, Kenichi Matsuyama, played L from the live action Death Note.
- His English voice actor, Billy Kametz, also voices Josuke of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure and U-1146 from Cells at Work.
- With the lyrics of "I will follow my grandfather's journey" in Inferno and his interest in Japanese firefighters, Galo may be Japanese. This is presuming that he has a grandfather who was a hikeshi.
- His Matoi, alongside a tribute to Edo period firemen, is likely a reference to the protagonist of Kill la Kill, Ryuko Matoi.
- Even when wearing a shirt, Galo is shown wearing his medical sleeve in Promare. Promotional art has shown him wearing a shirt without the sleeve though.
- Galo is stated to have passed all his EMT exams before joining Burning Rescue.
- During Deus' explanation, he falls asleep briefly.
- When Heris gives Galo his final meal, it appears to be that of a loaf of bread, a salad, and meat.
- The food will soon be sold during a Promare x TOWER RECORDS CAFE event[3].
- According to Promare's staff, information such as Galo's blood type or birthday is not to be given out. This is due to them not wanting to 'categorize' either Galo or Lio.
- In the same panel this was revealed, they were stated to be "entry businessmen age[2]."
- This places them at their "early twenties".
- In the same panel this was revealed, they were stated to be "entry businessmen age[2]."
- Galo is constantly shown in both promotional art and in the film to enjoy pizza, making it his favorite food.
- Galo owns a motorcycle. He states that he has a first aid kit with it.
- According to Galo himself, whenever he's upset, he goes to a local frozen lake where he vents out his frustrations.
- Galo tried digging to the bottom of the lake one time, reaching five meters (sixteen and a half feet) deep. This is why he knows the ice is safe -- and why Aina is rather shocked.
- During the Burnish CPR kiss scene, Galo comments that Lio was the first to make him light a fire, causing him to freak out and demand Lio "take responsibility" in the Japanese version. The phrase itself is one associated with romance media in Japan, where one partner will use the phrase in order to get married or start dating.
- In the English version, he merely asks what Lio is going to do about it.
- Instead of Lio being Burnish, Galo was planned to be a motorcycling Burnish[2].
- Early concept art shows Galo originally having a braid with his mohawk, his medical sleeve being black, having a mechanical arm that shot ice and/or wearing an eye patch.
- During a live stream, when asked about an image in the Memorial art book featuring Galo standing over a smirking Lio, the artist of the piece, Gunyasu Shunpei, merely said it was up to fans to decide on.
- The Memorial art book also features a piece with Galo's face on a skateboard.
- In another art book, Galo is shown skateboarding.
- The Memorial art book also features a piece with Galo's face on a skateboard.
- Galo has appeared in the Japanese mobile game Monster Strike alongside other Trigger characters. His artwork features his Matoi Tech, Lio de Galon, and Lio with him.
References
- ↑ "Promare Director Addresses Main Character's Resemblance to Gurren Lagann" https://comicbook.com/anime/2019/06/08/promare-galo-kamina-gurren-lagann-resemblance-studio-trigger-comments/
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 "Some notes from the Promare panel yesterday!!!" https://twitter.com/Turbocrit/status/1196125354785529856
- ↑ TOWER RECORDS CAFE opens its first store in Nagoya “Promare x TOWER RECORDS CAFE” starts at Nagoya Sakae SKYLE store and Omotesando store on 2/1 (Sat.) https://re-how.net/product/361892/