Elysium

In the year 2113, a team of scientists poking around Antarctica finds ancient symbols carved into the ice and a massive tower buried underground. Naturally, this wakes something up — something not from Earth. What follows is a full-scale alien invasion that tears through humanity's military like it's nothing. Enter Van, a pizza delivery guy who turns out to have the exact genetic and brainwave profile needed to pilot Earth's last-resort mecha weapon. So yeah, one day he's dodging traffic, the next he's strapped into a giant robot alongside Nyx, a no-nonsense military officer who has zero patience for his learning curve. The tone is bleak and urgent — humanity is on the ropes from the jump, and the odds never really feel fair. If you liked the "ordinary person chosen to pilot humanity's salvation" setup of Neon Genesis Evangelion, or the desperate last-stand-against-extinction vibe of Knights of Sidonia, this hits similar notes. It also shares some of that grim underwater-apocalypse energy with Blue Submarine No. 6. What makes this one genuinely interesting as a curiosity piece is that it was an early attempt at full 3D CGI anime — a South Korean and Japanese co-production from 2003 that used motion capture for its mecha fights. The CG is very much of its era, but there's a scrappy ambition to the whole thing that's hard not to respect. One movie, self-contained, done.