GUNHED (ガンヘッド) is a 1989 Japanese cyberpunk tokusatsu mecha action film co-written and directed by Masato Harada, featuring special effects by Kōichi Kawakita, and starring Masahiro Takashima, Brenda Bakke, Eugene Harada, Kaori Mizushima, and Mickey Curtis. It was released by Toho on July 22, 1989.
Plot
In the year 2038, the world is ruled by supercomputers powered by a rare and powerful element called Texmexium. Years earlier, the Kyron-5 AI, created by the Cybortech Company and housed on the isolated island 8JO, rebelled against humanity, sparking a devastating war. Though a specialized GUNHED (Gun UNit of Heavy Eliminate Device) battalion was sent to shut it down, they were defeated. The island was abandoned, left to Kyron-5’s control—until a group of tech scavengers arrives seeking profit in the ruins.
The scavenger team aboard the Mary Ann, led by Captain Bansho, includes Brooklyn, a skilled but reluctant former pilot; Babe, a brave and determined crew member; Bombbay, Barabbas, and Boomerang. They infiltrate the facility, but Kyron-5's automated defenses quickly eliminate several of them—Boomerang and Boxer die outside, while Bansho and Barabbas are killed inside an elevator. Brooklyn, Babe, and Bombbay survive and discover Sgt. Nim, a wounded Texas Air Ranger on a mission to recover the stolen Texmexium and destroy a rogue Bio-Droid.
Nim joins the scavengers, but the Bio-Droid soon kills Bombbay. The survivors find a vial of Texmexium in Kyron-5's core, only to be attacked by the Bio-Droid again. Babe sacrifices herself, falling into a vat of chemicals with the Bio-Droid—though she survives, fused with the machine in a tragic transformation.