They were an ordinary family, except for bad terms between parents and their wicked son. One day, they received an anonymous message, which commanded them to protect the earth.... "Of the new TV series, Earth Defence Family has garnered the most media attention. At a December 22nd press conference in Tokyo, director Satoshi Kimura (Tenchi Muyo) announced that the project, which had been in planning stages for 3 years, would shun the current trend of digital animation and rely heavilly on traditional cell animation. Kimura intoned that at this point there are certain effects in anime which can only be properly facilitated by human hand, ink and cell. The quality of animation per epsiode in EDF is said to be extremely high, with the number of animation cells used in the first episode alone exceeding 9500 pieces."