Kill la Kill and Darling in the Franxx are much more clear cut examples of the Trigger Twist in action, and of the two I think Darling in the Franxx is the one where the Trigger Twist was felt most strongly.
![kuzu no honkai mal kuzu no honkai mal](https://honeysanime.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Kuro-to-Kin-no-Akanai-Kagi-dvd.jpg)
Luluco is by far the hardest sell on this point as the existential threat appears basically at the end and most of the episodes are clear references to Imaisihi’s past works but it counts in my book. Kill la Kill, Space Patrol Luluco and now Darling in Franxx stand beside Gurren Lagann as shows where the story takes a sudden shift and a new existence threatening enemy is revealed later on. This trend predates Trigger as Gurren Lagann is the first main example that comes to mind, but it has continued into Trigger and is present in more of the major productions than not. Barring Dead Leaves, which I know nothing about, and Panty and Stocking – which as detailed above is a classic example of the Gainax Ending – all of the major projects Imaishi has had a major hand in have the same twist, it turns out the main enemies are actually aliens which threaten humanity’s existence. That being said he not only co-founded the studio but is far and away the name most commonly associated with the studio so I think the term fits well enough even if I’m describing a tendency of Imaishi’s not Trigger behavior on the whole. Perhaps the Trigger Twist isn’t a totally accurate term as it’s not as though Imaishi is the only director working for the studio. this is a traceable trend in the works of Hiroyuki Imaishi. the confusion brought on by the jarring shift wore off while the aforementioned Gainax Ending is still baffling, and more importantly B. However I think this deserves it’s own term because A.
![kuzu no honkai mal kuzu no honkai mal](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/2mXwP9sZtHM/maxresdefault.jpg)
I can easily see the same being true for Darling in the Franxx, the shift was jarring. It was so sudden and out of left field that it still confuses the fuck out of me.
My personal favorite example of this term in action was the sudden end of Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt, where Stocking turns on her sister/partner apropos of nothing and chops her into tiny bits before walking off to be the presumed villain of a sequel which never came out. The most obvious parallel which one can draw to the Trigger Twist is the infamous Gainax Ending, a term coined because of the number of WTF endings in Gainax shows. If the picture above isn’t enough to clue you in I decided to bring out this term as a result of the sudden shift in Darling Franxx’s story, a shift that threw a lot of people but which in retrospect is not obvious per se but is perhaps expected. The list is long and yet here I am making one up – The Trigger Twist. Just about any community in life has it’s own lingo and as I’m sure you’re all aware anime is no exception.