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Oh, and before anyone says anything, yes, I know it's not anime, but I don;t care, I reviewed it anyway.

Titan A.E.
(2000 movie)

This is one of those movies that I wanted to like but just couldn't. That's mostly because much like so many movies and other shows before it, it had so much potential that just kind of fizzled out and died. A big part of that is that this movie couldn't decide what it wanted to be, kind of like the Disney movie Atlantis. On the one hand, it wanted to be more of a serious grown up movie, and that's the part of it I liked and felt had potential to go somewhere. On the other hand, apparently somewhere along the way, someone decided this was a kid's show (probably because it's animated), so there was a lot of childish humor along the way, and to be frank it really gave off mixed signals. Just as an example, a character got shot by one of those fancy sci-fi laser guns that does pretty much whatever it needs to do in a particular scene, and in this case that was to reduce this character into a mass of green goo, which should have been a gruesome but instant death, but instead this character's mouth managed to survive long enough to say, "bulls eye." Then of course there's the scene where one character goes all mortal combat on the other and snaps his neck. For kids!

To be fair, though, not a whole lot about the movie really made all that much sense. Apparently humanity has developed this giant space ark they call the Titan, which has the capability of forming an entire planet out of nothing but giant ice crystals and cloning every other form of life that existed on Earth prior to some aliens showing up and blowing it up. This is where I, at least, feel not a lot makes sense, though this may be just due to a lack of a scene or something just to set things up. Because why would Earth ever develop the Titan, let alone have it all ready to go for a last minute escape? Sure, it could have been that the planet was overcrowded and they needed a colony to help ease that. It makes me wonder where they'd originally had in mind for this since they gave the Titan and FTL drive that gave it an interstellar capability. The ship ends up becoming humanity's last hope, but it would have been nice to find out more about why the ship was built to begin with, because it's also apparently the reason Earth was destroyed by the Drej, which are aliens made of pure energy. Apparently the Drej feel so threatened by the Titan that they decide to exterminate humanity, and the first thing they do is blow up Earth. I don't know how humanity knows this, but it's what we're told. I also don’t understand why humans seem to be able to understand what the Drej are saying when they speak, but they do, so I guess the Drej could have said something before they blew up the planet.

And that's just the set-up; the actual story doesn't make a lot of sense either. The story follows a character named Cale Tucker (seems to be a popular name in sci-fi), who we see as a small boy the day Earth died. His father was behind Project Titan and took the space ark off to some hidden location just in the nick of time. Fortunately he thought to give his son a magic space ring that had a map to where he'd planned to hid the Titan, and which also acts as the key which starts the Genesis Device-I mean the transformation sequence. So this is why his dad leaves the ship and ends up getting killed, apparently along with everyone else who had gone with him on the giant ship. That makes sense, as does the Drej's obsession with wanting to find Titan and blow it up, since they were apparently afraid of what it could do to begin with. This is where Cale comes in, because apparently the Drej have figured out he has a map leading to the Titan, and naturally they want it. This also apparently takes 15 years for them to figure out, but later we find out why, and it involves something else that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Which, speaking of sense, since the Drej want to find where the Titan is, one would think they'd want to capture him, and later on they try to and succeed. Except the first time they spot him, they try to shoot him, repeatedly, and they even manage to hit him a couple of times. This is where the magic sci-fi guns come in, though, as the same gun that reduced one character to goo just gives Cale a couple of flesh wounds that take like a minute to patch up.

Fortunately, this seemingly Han Solo type named Joseph Korso who shows up on his cool ship named the Valkyrie to rescue him. Naturally this isn't a coincidence, and it was all part of a plan to help the Drej to find and destroy the Titan. Now, I'm not sure if the Drej showing up was all part of the plan to get Cale to go with or not. Cale was somewhat reluctant to do anything that might get him killed and all, even if he's yeaning for a way to get out of the crappy salvage yard he calls both home and work. He's become very pessimistic, losing his planet and the only remaining member of his family (apparently) and all. So having the Drej show up just kind of lit a fire under his ass, quite literally. The thing is, as I mentioned before, they sure seemed to be doing their damnedest to kill both Cale and Korso. So, what, did no one tell the Drej foot soldiers about the whole "capture that human because he has the only key to the ship we want to blow up" plan? Later on it's more obvious that the Drej are just trying to grab Cale on their own, because Korso bitches about this to them after they managed to capture Cale and copy the map. This is also where the bullshit heel face turn takes place.

One of the other potentially good things this movie had going for it was the crew of the Valkyrie. They were a somewhat rag-tag crew that seemed like they could be interesting. Since Joss Whedon had a hand in writing this, it isn't all that surprising that this crew reminded me a little of Serenity's crew from Firefly, though this movie predates that series. The thing I liked about them was just how natural they seemed to be. They had some minor annoyances with each other, and their own little quirks, and that made them seem interesting. But while they had their own little conflicts with each other, none of them really seemed like they were just itching to kill each other. This is part of where the movie doesn't make sense, because that bullshit heel face turn I mentioned drastically alters two of the characters, who suddenly become evil. I understand that Korso and his first mate being in league with the Drej was supposed to be a surprise and all, it's just that their attitude and actions don't match up with everything that came before this heel face turn. Up to that point, Korso actually seems to genuinely care about Cale, and even indulges the young man by letting him fly the Valkyrie during this cool eye candy scene. The first mate, Preed, up to that point seemed like a somewhat sarcastic but otherwise likeable character up to that point, but suddenly he wanted to kill Cale along with his other crewmates, who have presumably been together as a crew for some time, and Korso seems to be in agreement with this. Not only does he not say anything when Preed mentions he's going to blow up the other two crew members who somehow aren't in the know on the whole evil plan thing, but he threatens and assaults those crew members before that, and during his whole bitch session to the Drej he mentions how he'd like to kill Cale, and then tries his damnedest to do just that. Also part of this heel face turn is that now Cale is suddenly the champion of humanity's continued survival while Korso is the pessimist who sees no way of beating the Drej or for humanity to survive beyond the near future, and really only cares about himself and getting rich. Of course at the end of the movie, Korso makes the heroic sacrifice to save the day because, surprise, Preed made another separate deal with the Drej for his survival provided he kill Cale and the rest of his crew, and this just makes Korso change his mind again for whatever reason.

Naturally there's also something of a deux ex machine in that whereas the Drej's weaponry has been devastatingly destructive up until now, the Titan can suddenly be jury-rigged to convert the energy of the Drej as well as the energy of the Drej themselves to simultaneously power its reactors and make the new planet while killing all the Drej in the immediate area. As the movie ended, I couldn't help but note that this was just one ship, and it seemed entirely possible that more Drej could just show up later. I mean, the movie wasn't suggesting that this one ship and its fighters were the entirety of the Drej species, was it? Well, Wikipedia confirms this is the case, but given all the other face palm worthy aspects of this movie, it isn't all that surprising, it's just that it's stupid.

There were some other nitpicky things I didn't like either and I'd complain about, but this review is getting to be long enough as it is. The sad thing is, this movie could have been so much better. If it'd dropped all the kiddy comedy elements and had a plot that made more sense, it would have been a lot better. There's also the Valkyrie's crew, which had a lot of potential that just ended up being squandered. Rather than learn anything more about them or allow anyone other than Cale to undergo a little development, they were pretty much just there to set up a few jokes and to conveniently come to the rescue when Cale almost managed to get killed a few times. Oh, and the hot chick to fall into insta-love with Cale, you know, because. But just think of how much more interesting it could have been if the entire crew had been in on the deal with the Drej from the start. Sure, it wouldn't have been as much of a surprise when the evil plan was revealed, but there's a difference between surprise and just coming out of no where for no real reason. It also might have made the crew more sympathetic had there been a more realistic reason behind their deal that wasn't just about getting rich. Say they'd actually been nice and reasonable people to start out with and were forced into it somehow, and had to play along with the plan, all while actually kind of feeling sorry for Cale, and feeling bad about the whole betrayal of the whole human race thing? The crew could've even tried to keep him at something of a distance so they didn't get to know him too well in order to spare themselves some of the guilt. And if the hot chick, Akima Kunimoto, found herself being attracted to him in a not completely out of the blue manner, there even could have been a scene where the captain warned her against getting too close, to foreshadow the coming betrayal. Then it could have been a running theme to have Cale trying to figure out what the deal was, and seeming to make some progress with Akima or maybe even Korso at some points before being shut out again. You know, drama.

Also wasted were the Drej. They were some of the most alien aliens I've seen in a sci-fi, and they had the potential to be really interesting, what with the whole being made out of energy thing. Like if the movie had gone into their origin somewhat, and gave them some motivation for wanting to kill every single human being beyond just being ass hats. Unfortunately they just ended up being generic bad guys who were hard to kill, at least with normal hand-held laser guns, what with the whole being made out of energy thing. They even had a queen Drej who made typical bad guy speeches about killing every human being. And apparently all the Drej could fit on that one planet-killing ship from the beginning of the movie. Lame.

The voice talent was ok-ish. I did recognize a few of the voices right off the bat, but everyone sounded somewhat bland. I guess maybe since they'd read the script and decided to not even really bother putting any real effort into it. Speaking of bland, while the soundtrack is somewhat decent to listen to in its own, it also really dates this movie. I'd normally say something along the lines of doing something instrumental, but really the movie wasn't worth it. I'm actually not even sure why I bothered to mention it, other than that it kind of made me roll my eyes at times.

I'll throw this movie a bone, but really it's only because I feel a little sorry for it. Part of what sucks about this movie is that there was some really obvious potential there, and it just got wasted, which in some ways is even worse than if it'd just completely sucked. 3/10.

Time of Eve
(6 episode OVA)

I'm honestly of mixed opinion about this short OVA. On the one hand, it actually is kind of touching, and I honestly would have liked to have seen the rest of the story play out. On the other hand, it was kind of corny, and I couldn't help but think of geeks who relate a lot more with the women on their computers than with the flesh and blood women in their lives. I mean, why else would you make androids who look like gorgeous women, right?

Okay, to be fair, the story goes a lot deeper than that, and the image above isn't actually what it looks like, at least not as far as who the android is there. The story follows protagonist Rikuo Sakisaka as he comes to discover that his family's android maid has apparently been taking side trips to a small coffee shop named The Time of Eve. Here there's a rather unusual rule, which is that humans and androids are to be treated equally, which is stated on a large sign in the shop's entrance. This makes more sense when you realize that the vast majority of androids look just like human beings except for a holographic ring that floats above their heads as required by law for that every reason. Here, the rings are turned off which really means that it's hard to know who is human and who's a skin-job, to borrow from another sci-fi, especially since, for some reason, a lot of androids act very convincingly human. So basically the story arc deals with how Rikuo overcomes his own prejudices toward androids, and the mocking from society at large that this kind of liberal attitude usually entails.

In a lot of ways, I'm honestly not surprised that this is essentially a thinly-veiled allegory for bigotry – a time-honored tradition of sci-fi, really. In this case, it was even pretty well done. In others, I find myself disappointed that that's basically what this show boils down to. Here, androids are treated basically like crap, and the big twist that most "normal" people would reject is that these androids are fully capable of experiencing emotions and of essentially being human. Oh, and the few people who stick up for androids are lumped in with the kind of people who marry their hentai video games and given the label "android-ohalic." Now, I've written before about the ethics of creating what amounts to a slave race in an essay that can be found here. As you might guess, I find the idea pretty messed up. I've also already bitched about becoming too dependant on technology in my review of Summer Wars, so I won’t repeat my short rant about it. Of course, this show does kind of take a shot at people like me, in a way. But really what it comes down to is that I find this kind of allegory rather tiresome now, and I can't help but feel that a lot more interesting questions are being glossed over thanks to the bigotry issue.

The story focuses mostly on Rikuo and his home-bot Sammy as they learn more about each other and basically fall in love, or at least develop a kind of friendship. Or something. Rikuo's kind of a dick until he undergoes a kind of personal epiphany as the story progresses, actually. For me, though, the odd thing is in the kinds of questions being asked, which is to say not to many were asked about the nature of the androids and how they became self-aware and basically human, all while electing to not conduct a robot revolution and remain in servitude. So while Rikuo asked questions about how long Sammy has been going to that coffee shop, I would have been asking about how long androids have been self aware, and how it is that they came to be self aware, along with other questions relating to that. This is, in part, because I'm an engineer, so the idea of a machine becoming self aware is both interesting and somewhat disturbing, because really when you think about it, the androids in this OVA have no reason to be any more self-aware than what you’re reading this review on. Androids should only have software, not souls; they shouldn't get happy, they shouldn't get sad – they should just run programs. So for me, the idea that they could become self aware is the interesting part, which would then be more Ghost in the Shell territory I guess, or more like what Star Trek: The Next Generation did with Data. That's why I'm disappointed this show went the more standard bigotry route.

Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, the show kind of took a shot at people like me by making people who are uncomfortable with the idea of having android slaves, or with humanity becoming too dependant on technology this show's version of racists. It's a group of people that calls themselves an "Ethics Committee," and they seem to be a pretty powerful group, which dedicates itself to an anti-android/robot agenda. They hate places like The Time of Eve and can apparently have people arrested if they treat androids too much like people, too, thanks to the connections they apparently have. As it turns out, Rikuo's best friend, Masakazu Masaki, is the son of a top-ranking member of this committee. Oh, and Masakazu had been going with Rikuo to The Time of Eve up until Rikuo started to soften on the whole android issue. Naturally there's a reason behind this, and it goes back to something that happened during Masakazu's childhood, because even though his father hates them, he apparently has had a robot to help out around the house for a very long time. Of course, the Ethics Committee apparently already knew about The Time of Eve and has been spying on it for a while, so that kind of leave's the coffee shop's fate a bit up in the air at the end of the OVA.

I'd be more butthurt over the portrayal of the Ethics Committee as the stereotypical bigoted people who just don't understand the androids, but honestly I can't get very worked up about it. And while I was somewhat disappointed with this show, I still found it somewhat charming, and interesting enough that I'd totally watch a full series of it, presuming one got made. But this show was brought to you by the same people who brought you Pale Cocoon, so that probably isn't going to happen.

The show also had plenty of genuinely funny moments for all the others I didn't find particularly funny, like the reference to Blade Runner, and the part were a really old robot came into the place with Terminator vision and a soundtrack to match. There are also plenty of other references to other sci-fi works that I recognized and smiled at, like a robot named thanks, for example.

The downside is that it also had some other things that tended to annoy me, like the whole "socially awkward male nerd and the women who love them" crap that's so horribly common these days in anime. That and the Moé. Like the 4-year-old girl who's brought to the coffee shop by her grandfather, erm, foster father, or whatever on a regular basis.

She insists that she's a cat, too. Isn't she just cute enough to make you want to puke rainbows? Did I mention she's given free reign of the place and likes to steal things from people so they'll play with her?

Oh god, I can feel it coming on again... Must... resist... urge... to growl...

"Get off my lawn..."

Okay, I guess I'm better now. Wink

Another thing that annoyed me a little was the simulated camera work. This isn't exactly something I would normally make a point of complaining about because, let's face it, it's anime, but they did the whole thing with bits of shakey-cam, and really wild pans and tilts, and it was a little hard in some ways for me to watch it because of that, mostly because it was a bit distracting from what was actually going on. It does look pretty good otherwise, though.

Anyway, as I might guess, I'm not exactly a huge fan or anything of this show, but I still found it somewhat interesting and worth watching. I would still recommend this OVA, even if I'm not exactly counting it among my favorites. I'm sure some of you wouldn't be bothered at all by the stuff I found annoying or disappointing, and each episode is only 15 minutes long, so it's not like you're out a lot of time by watching this. 7/10.

Wouldn't a 1/10, by definition, fit the description of a truly horrible anime, one of the worst out there? I suppose a 0/10 would be worse but a 1 isn't much different. Yet you said The Slayers wasn't that horrible, "just not good" which should put it at 3/10 at least. Personally I think The Slayers is a Masterpiece. I rank it as one of my 7 most favorite shows ever. 10/10 all the way baby.

In my opinion it warranted a 3/10, mostly because while I didn't find it bad, I did find it really, really annoying and unfunny. I know others feel differently, I don't agree.

Toward the Terra
(1980 movie)

Gads this movie was bad, in pretty much the same way the 1980 Cyborg 009 movie was bad – loads of corn and preaching without much of an interesting plot to hold it together. Actually I'd say the main problem with the plot is that there seemed to be way too much of it to fit into just one movie. I guess that didn't stop whoever made this from trying, though.

The story follows a young protagonist, Jomy Marcus Shin, as he's about to become an adult at the ripe old age of 14. This goes hand in hand with the backstory of most of humanity having escaped to the stars following the virtual destruction of Earth's environment and ecosystem. Following this, for no rational reason, they apparently decided to just let computers run everything. And not just any computers, but telepathic super-computers. As part of this Brave New Word (*cough*), humans are now "rationally" grown completely artificially and raised by random couples in a colony that's supposed to look like some random Earth city. Jomy is one of these people, and like a lot of young people he doesn't want to grow up just yet and he also questions the system, especially since the system is bent on taking him away from the parents he's grown to love. Unfortunately for him, the computers that run everything don't like being questioned and tend to have people like Jomy killed, especially if wiping their memories doesn't work. It doesn't help that Jomy is also a Mu, or a human who has developed telepathic and/or telekinetic abilities. The computers also hate those people and wages a campaign to have all of them killed.

Jomy is actually saved by the Mu, and is taken in by their leader who's actually named Soldier Blue for some reason. Anyway, naturally having been trained from a very young age to hate the Mu has made Jomy very resistant to being around the Mu, let alone accepting that he's actually one of them. That actually might've been an interesting story, but since they had to try to cram so much into this movie, that's over in like five minutes and Jomy actually ends up taking on Jomy's memories and leading the Mu. Convinced that there is a way the Mu can peacefully resolve their differences with the rest of humanity, he actually ends up leading the Mu to settle on a colony world that Earth had actually abandoned, where they then live out a luddite fantasy of farming and having kids the old fashioned way.

At one point we meet who's kind of the main antagonist but not really, Keith Anyan. Truth be told, his character was probably one of the worst handled of the bunch. He's supposed to be an "Elite", but basically he's a human who was rapidly grown to adulthood in a tank by the computer, specifically so he and others like him could be absolutely under the command and control of the "Grand Mother" computer that's running Earth, and to be resistant to the telepathic attacks of the Mu. To do this, he was apparently created from the ovum of one of the main Mu characters, a blind woman we meet not long into the movie, and seemingly just for that connection. Unfortunately this comes off as forced, as does the ambiguity they try to give Keith. I mean, they sort of try to make him sympathetic in that he seems to feel sorry at times for killing people when the computer orders him to, and he does rescue another adult human who just spontaneously becomes a Mu one day. On the other hand he's shown to be a completely cold bastard, and he does his damndest to exterminate the Mu even though they were just sitting minding their own business on that farm planet.

I guess the ambiguity comes from the fact that Keith eventually catches on to what's going on. Early on, he wonders aloud why the Mu are even allowed to be born, since all humans are now artificially created anyway, and the genes that produce them could in all likelihood be found and eliminated. This actually goes on to prove somewhat important later on, when Keith finally turns on the computer, though not before he follows its orders to shoot Jomy. It really wasn't all that surprising when the reason was revealed, which turned out to be so that humanity had a common enemy among them to keep fighting, and to keep relying on the computers to run everything for them.

There's also another character, Tony, who was one of the first naturally born among the Mu. He ends up leading the Mu on a campaign of slaughter himself while Jomy is conveniently sealed off from everyone. It's understandable what with how Keith is basically responsible for his mother's death, but to be fair Tony was also trying to kill Keith at the time, and that was when Tony as 5 years old. Then at the end of the movie, with the big bad computer destroyed, humanity in disarray, and the Mu having returned to Earth, Tony and a few of his fellow young people decide to head off on their own, because for some reason he figures they'll be the new enemy. It isn't really explained all that well, pretty much like everything else in this movie.

To be honest, I'm surprised I was able to write this much about such a stinker of a movie. I guess that's because I recognized that there was some potential here that just got lost in everything being crammed in all at once. On the other hand, it had one of those really preachy, anti-technology, pro-environment, "you shouldn't fight anyone even though they're trying to kill you" messages that I've seen more than once in sci-fi in general, but especially in sci-fi anime. 2/10.

Geneshaft
(13 episode series)

This was an okay-ish series, but mostly I found myself disappointed from the get go. The series starts off with an opening scroll not unlike Star Wars, explaining the background of the little universe the series is based in. Basically, there was some big war that nearly wiped out humanity, so the survivors formed an extremely authoritarian government and set about making the "perfect" society. Humans are now completely genetically engineered and are expressly made to fulfill a particular role within society. Emotions are likewise supposed to be limited, with love in particular being singled out for elimination. One would have thought emotions like anger and hatred would have been eliminated, but nope, just love. Oh, and they apparently decided to make the female to male ratio 9 to 1, because, well, sexism mainly. Yeah, they try to explain it all, but really it comes down to gender roles and stereotypes, not to mention an excuse to have a bridge staffed full of bridge bunnies under the command of one man.

Actually, some of the women have been specially bred to be completely emotionless in order to serve as "registers" to the few men that are around to keep track of what they say and do in order to make sure they don't get out of control, and to also do pretty much everything they are ordered to do – like a secretary and a political officer all in one. Based on the premise described in the beginning of the series, I would have thought that all of humanity would be more like the registers than what they ended up being shown as, which was essentially as normal human beings. So what could have been something like Gattaca meets Equilibrium kind of fell on its face, though to be fair that's mostly from the nonsensical charlie foxtrot way the series was executed in lieu of simply failing to live up to its own premise. While there were a few token "lessons" learned about the nature of humanity, and how abhorrent the idea of humanity becoming what to me would be a nightmare, for the most part it was like the series only paid lip service to that aspect, and wanted to be something else it just couldn't quite figure out.

On the one hand it was something more along the lines of 2001, which copied both themes and imagery from, but on the other, it was mostly a generic anime that wanted to be funny more than anything. It tried really, really hard at being funny too, between the insane token lolis and the stereotypical bitch fights between some of the female characters, but I was more annoyed than anything. Which is where the disappointment really comes in, because while it was obvious that this series was going to be kind of bad from the first scene on, it was also obvious that the series could have had potential in the hands of someone who took the subject matter more seriously. And on top of that, there was also a lot of good voice talent involved (speaking of the English dub) – it had both the Major and Togusa, and Spike and Jet even showed up to visit for an episode (that turned out to be basically pointless).

And just think, I haven't even gotten to the story or characters yet. Wink

The story follows protagonist Mika Seido, a teenaged girl who has just been assigned to a special mission to investigate a mysterious ring that's taken up an orbit around the moon. We're quickly introduced to some of the supporting characters, including Mika's best friend, Sofia Galgalim. But before any of them can do anything, there's a terrorist attack on the surface of the ring, which apparently provokes the ring to open fire on Earth, taking out part of the station Mika and Seido are on. Fortunately, the ship they were supposed to be posted to for their special mission was docked there, and they were able to get there before the station self destructed, presumably to prevent large debris from falling to Earth. But not before a touching scene where a character we never know and who I don't think even had a single line dies all to establish that Mika really hates her new captain, Hiroto Amagiwa, because she blames him for the death of one of her friends and is utterly convinced that he's a heartless bastard. To be fair, he and pretty much every other human in this show's universe are, though.

Too bad the Master Chief wasn't there to solve this one for them.

On the orders of a character named Lord Sneak (not kidding), humanity's newest battleship, the Bilkis, springs into action and manages to destroy the ring, but not before the ring takes out a small fleet of warships which were actually there to prevent the Bilkis from attacking on its own initiative. Lord Sneak then sends the Bilkis to the Jupiter moon Ganymede, to check out some ruins that he says are related to the rings. As you might have guessed though, he's hiding things from the crew of the Bilkis, as well as from Earth's governing "Council of Elders". I mean, who would've thought with a name like Lord Sneak that the guy would be sneaking around behind the scenes putting his own plan in to action?

The vast majority of the series pretty much just involves the Bilkis, which looks like a giant sting ray, flying around space attacking and being attacked by more of the gold rings, with the help of its giant mecha, which they, for some reason, have named "the Shaft". I'll admit that it was kind of fun playing with that name in my head, and that it was a lot more funny than any of the actual humor the series attempted, which mostly involved an insane loli forcing some computer geeks to resolve the buggy operating system of the Shaft. Then there was the other part, which was mainly about how Mika really hated Hiroto, and another bitchy woman named Mir Lotus, who is supposedly genetically perfect. Oh, and then later she suddenly starts caring about both of these people she was supposed to have hated so much, and to be frank really deserved to be hated by any sane and decent human being.

There was also a throw-away episode involving the space shuttle Columbia being transported to the future with Spike and Jet on board, all so they could meet the Mika and the others and comment on how completely messed up humanity has become. Naturally they react the way any normal human probably would by attempting to fight back against it by taking over the Bilkis, so if nothing else they can see Earth one last time. And then a ring shows up to transport them away, and nothing ever really comes from it aside from the message Gattaca gave much better.

When it comes to the characters, I have to say that I really didn't care for the vast majority of them. Really the only one I liked who didn't disappear within the same episode they were introduced in was Mario Musicanova, voiced by Crispin Freeman in the English dub, mostly just because he was the most normal and well-adjusted character. He also had a lot more interesting about him than the main character because he had become fascinated with how humanity used to be, and with the concept of love. Most everyone else was either bitchy, psychotic, obnoxious, or otherwise annoying, so I really wish in some ways that there had been more done with Mario's character.

And as an aside, damn the names on this show are lame.

Worth mentioning, I guess, is the giant mecha. I can't help but laugh at the idea of a humanoid robot being used for space combat, but I suppose something this particular giant robot has going for it is that it looks kind of unique. The Wiki article describes it as being "crane-like", but really it reminds me a lot more of a willow tree. It also reminds me a little of the derelict ship the aliens came from in Alien, which I suppose makes sense given the way this show rips off- I mean, pays homage to other sci-fis, and that the Shaft was made using plans from a mysterious race of giants. It also lacks a traditional head and has two projections of some kind mounted to its shoulders. Oh, and it's named "the Shaft", and its main weapon could almost be seen as being like ejaculation. Just saying. Wink

Believe it or not, though, I can actually do a little more analysis of this show, because it actually managed to have a little depth. Well, it wasn't really deep, per say, because it was pretty obvious, but I guess it was a little deeper than most of the bad shows I've seen. I'm not an expert on Japanese culture by any means, but that seems to be what the show is getting at, because there's a heavy emphasis on people being forced to serve roles within society as a duty and responsibility. From what I understand of Japanese culture, there also seems to be an emphasis there on that. This is contrasted by the 21st century humans that show up, who are real big on things like individuality and being able to be whatever they want to be. They also just happen to be Americans, who are generally seen as being all for those kinds of things. I guess if nothing else, it was nice to see the US in a somewhat positive light in an anime.

I think the best thing this series has going for it, though, is that it's fairly short, at only 13 episodes long, so if you really want to check this series, out, you aren't wasting as much time with it as you would be with a 26 episode series. To be honest, that's the biggest reason I stuck it out through this entire series. It did manage to have a few moments that I actually found interesting, but for the most part I wouldn't really recommend this series. It isn't horrible, but it is kind of obnoxious and disappointing. 3/10.

Toward the Terra
(24 episode series)

This series was 200% better than the movie that came out almost 20 years before it. It actually managed to make the movie make more sense, though to be fair, being able to explain characters and what's going on in the story is a lot easier to do in a series than a movie thanks to actually having time to do so. It kind of makes me wonder why anyone would try to cram such a lengthy and complex story into a slightly less than 2 hour long movie, anyway. But enough about that.

The story of the series is probably 95% identical to the movie. We follow protagonist Jomy Marcus Shin on a very difficult coming of age story. The backstory here is that Earth's environment is ruined, and that Earth itself is basically abandoned save a few who are essentially guinea pigs to let humanity know when the planet has recovered enough for people to live there. In the mean time, along with becoming completely frakked up by letting a computer control every aspect of their lives, they've made a home for themselves on many other planets in many other systems. Jomy actually grows up along with every other human child on a planet specifically set aside for that, because the computer deems children to chaotic to allow them to be born and brought up the normal way. Instead, they are grown artificially and raised by couples who have no blood relation to them. When they reach age 14, they have to take an exam to enter the next stage of their lives, the exam being to see if they are actually a normal human or not, and to erase their memories. Oh, and resist that or question any part of this rigid system, and end up getting killed.

That's what almost happened to Jomy, as he failed the "actually a normal human" part of the exam along with the getting his memories erased part. Fortunately for him, he's rescued by a group of telepaths/telekinetics who call themselves the Mu. The Mu are hunted down and killed without mercy by normal humans at the behest of the oddly emotional computer called Grand Mother which runs everything through numbered Terra computers. For the most part humans do so without question, as they've been brainwashed into seeing the Mu as their enemy, what with the whole being able to read minds thing and being damn dirty mutants. So, as one would expect, Jomy actually isn't happy with being taken in by the Mu and in fact believes they interfered and caused the situation he's in as far as being a hunted individual. It also didn't help that they all bombarded him with their telepathic mojo as soon as he stepped on board their huge whale ship.

The Mu are initially lead by a character named Soldier Blue, so named because he's the head warrior of the group, and because of the type of telepathic./telekinetic power he has, which is quite powerful. He and his people have been hanging out in a huge ship they call the Shangri-La, but everyone else calls Moby Dick due to its resemblance to a giant white whale. The series actually differs a bit from the movie here in that this is their only ship for the most part, and it actually kind of looks cool instead of completely fugly. Anyway, they hang out in the clouds of this child-rearing planet in order to rescue kids like Jomy who get found out to be Mu, hopefully before they actually get found out. This doesn't work out so well for them when they rescue Jomy because they get found out and have to leave the planet.

Jomy ends up becoming the leader of the Mu, having inherited the job and the memories from Soldier Blue. Blue isn't doing very well as he's actually 300 years old and he never had a very strong body to begin with. He ends up staying in a coma until it's convenient for him to heroically sacrifice his life, after giving Jomy the cool headphones. In the meantime, Jomy's childhood friends have passed their adulthood exams and have become students at one of apparently several high school/university stations used for the final education of humans designed to fit them into a cog within society. It also just so happens this is the station experimenting with making designer humans who are resistant to psychic attacks in addition to being obedient and unemotional pricks. This is where we meet Keith Anyan, said prick.

Actually, the nice thing about Keith is that while it's obvious that he's supposed to be the bad guy, and they really drill it into our heads that humanity has become Nazis, they do show a sympathetic side to him through his friendship to Sam Houston (possibly more than friends in Keith's head), who was actually Jomy's best friend during their childhood. There are times that he's both a complete monster, and yet it's slowly revealed that he's simply acting this way, and truly does regret the vast majority of the things he's done. It's bit confusing why he still does them, but I love the complexity in the character, as I do in any character for that matter. It's just too bad about the Nazi thing

Space Nazis – a staple of sci-fi since 1946.

I guess they thought they had to make it really obvious that humanity was Nazis to make sure that we knew the Mu were supposed to be space Jews instead of space gays, which really, if you think about it, it could totally be interpreted that way. Not only are they usually found out in the beginning of puberty, but even though they're still the same exact people they always were, they suddenly get treated like monsters by everyone they've trusted their entire lives. But really you could insert any minority group there and it would work; I just found something to amuse myself with a little bit. That and how practically every sound effect has been ripped off from either Star Trek or Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Really though, the whole argument about who's a monster is one of the best things about this show, because really both sides have shown they can be monsters. The humans as monsters part is pretty obvious, but while the Mu start out being more of the mind to run and hide out, they also tend to treat people different from themselves like crap. Jomy at first exhibited no outward sign of being a Mu, then turned out to be even more powerful than all the rest of them. While some were cool with him and even really admired him, there were also plenty of them that treated him like a freak. Then later on there were some other really powerful Mu that looked down on the other Mu because they thought themselves so superior, and even suggested killing Jomy and all the Mu elders. Then Jomy leads the Mu on a war of attrition in which he orders the wholesale slaughter of humans, even if they try to surrender. The only exception he makes is for a woman who was a friend of his as a child. Even some of the Mu are appalled at this, though many others are totally for it because of how humans tried to slaughter them.

There's a definite parallel drawn between Jomy and Keith as well. Both go through journeys in which they learn the truth about their paths and lament how things have come to pass, though each of them reacts to it differently. This is another aspect of the story I liked, even if it was kind of hammered in as a completely obvious parallel. Both men had protégés they'd rescued as well, though Jomy definitely treats his much better. He's actually fortunate for that, because Tony, the first naturally born Mu, is so fiercely loyal to him that when the others like him suggest taking over the Mu through a bloody coup, he makes them fall into line and stop talking like that. Keith, on the other hand, has Jonah Matsuka, a Mu who gets found out long after he should have been, but stays loyal to Keith despite Keith treating him like crap and intimating that he's be killed soon after the Mu were wiped out. One of them dies to save their leader while the other becomes the leader of their people. Can you guess which one?

So the Mu eventually make it back to Earth, only to find out that 300 years apparently hasn't been long enough to restore the planet. This contrasts it with the movie, which showed that the planet had mostly recovered. Of course the series stops just shy of blowing Earth up in the climax of the series, and the Mu end up having to leave until Earth can recover, made all the more difficult by the set-back Grand Mother's destruction caused. Also, while Keith asked early on in the movie's story about why the Mu simply aren't prevented from being born rather than being hunted down, this question is saved for the series's climax. Really the answer is much more obvious since it actually makes more sense than the odd explanation the movie seemed to give. Basically the idea was to see if the Mu actually were the next step in human evolution by making the Mu and humanity fight each other to see which would go extinct and which would survive. So basically Darwin taken to the extreme.

Overall, I really did find this series satisfying. It had a nice even pace that didn't drag too much or try to pacify with action or fan service. Actually there wasn't even much fan service to speak of, which was refreshing in a way. It had complex, interesting characters and a story that, while it could also be simplistic in some areas, was fairly complex and interesting as well. Mostly its weaknesses come from the anvil-to-the-head environmental message which is combined with the anti-technology message that stems from a premise that doesn't really make all that much sense. It may just be a personal bias, but I can't see humanity handing over everything to a computer that kills them if they try to step out of line. Talk about a robo-Hitler. I would still recommend this series though, despite its flaws, because really it doesn't ruin the story. 8/10.

There we go! I was waiting to see what you thought of the Toward the Terra TV series. I watched the TV series first actually, and man, the movie was like a terribly put together cliff notes or something. I describe it to people as a cliffnotes, you'll get the gist of the story, but with none of the emotional impact or excitement you'd get from reading/watching the full version.
Curious if you've read the manga though, it does some things better then the anime (the human society of Ataraxia is a bit creepier for example, though the anime most certainly does the entire Naska arc better) and some things are a tiny bit different, and then the entire ending is different (the Mu spoiler[go back to Ataraxia and take it over and several other colonies after that, allowing the humans and Mu (especially children) to mingle freely]), and I'm still not 100% sure who the characters in the epilogue are (I'm curious what your thoughts on that would be). Not sure how much manga you do and the TV series is probably still better then the manga, but the movie is an embarrassment to both. Who knows, maybe it was cooler back in 1980 and it certainly meant more before the TV series was made, but all I know is the TV series and the manga are both on my shelves and the movie isn't.

I haven't really read any manga, I'm afraid. I have a bunch lined up to read, but I'm way more interested in anime for the time being. As for your question about the epilogue, I guess it's been long enough since I've watched it that I've forgotten about it.

The Vision of Escaflowne
(26 episode series)

My first experience with this series actually came with the heavily edited version Fox Kids aired during the summer before my senior year of high school. As soon as I saw it I was interested in it, but soon afterwards Fox cancelled it, much to my disappointment at the time. I actually went looking for the series on DVD, but since Fox Kids had changed the name along with everything else, I didn't realize what I was actually looking for. As you can see, though, I eventually figured it out and I've finally gotten around to watching it the way it was supposed to be seen. The story is definitely better and makes a bit more sense, but I have to admit that I liked the Fox Kids opening better than the original one.

The setting of this show is kind of an anachronistic mix between a medieval fantasy land with dragons and a kind of steampunk world that uses technology that is seemingly out of place there. This is how they're able to have giant mechas in an otherwise non-technological setting, I guess. Actually it's kind of cool because the story lets itself touch on various aspects of how these things came to be, and a lot of it has to do with the main antagonist, Emperor Dornkirk of the Zaibach Empire. They also have a kind of natural levitating stone that many of the locals have used to harness the power of flight for everything from a small plane-sized craft up to floating castles.

The series itself focuses on a female protagonist, Hitomi Kanzaki from Japan. She was a mostly typical high school student (those sure do seem common in anime) up until the male lead, Van Fanel, king of Fanelia, appears in a pillar of light, followed shortly afterwards by a dragon. I say "mostly typical" because the series explains that she's always had something of a psychic gift, though until the series starts, this has been limited to tarot card readings. Shortly before Van shows up, she starts having full on visions. To make a long story short, she ends up being taken back with Van to his home planet, Gaea, on the surface of which can be seen both the moon and Earth, which the locals call the Mystic Moon. And if the dragon showing up wasn't weird and threatening enough, some furries show up and greet them.

At first there isn't a whole lot that happens, but soon Fanelia is invaded by invisible mechas, called guymelefs, from the Zaibach Empire. This also introduces us to Dilandau Albatou, a rather young and bloodthirsty antagonist who leads a special forces group called the Dragon Slayers on this attack. Fanelia falls and is burned to the ground, but Van and Hitomi escape. This actually provides much of the excitement and drama early on, as Van and Hitomi try to escape from Dilandau and the other Zaibach forces that have been sent after them by Emperor Dornkirk. Dornkirk has some kind of massive "fate" machine he is using for seemingly evil ends and he sees Van's guymelef Escaflowne as a threat due to its somewhat mystical nature. It's actually technologically inferior to Zaibach's guymelefs, which can shoot fire and use a liquid metal to form spikes and swords not unlike the T-1000 from Terminator 2. Van also isn't exactly the best fighter either, but Hitomi is able to help level the playing field with her psychic abilities, such as being able to see through the invisibility cloaks Dilandau and his forces use.

Once Van and Hitomi meet up with second male protagonist Allen Schezar, the story becomes much bigger, as there is now a fight on with the entirety of Gaea at risk. Not only is Zaibach seemingly bent on world conquest with a technologically superior military, but the planet itself is apparently at risk from the same technology that had destroyed Atlantis.

That's right, Atlantis was apparently behind the creation of Gaea, following the destruction of Atlantis itself. This is also why there's apparently so much going on with dimensional rifts on Gaea, as well as between Gaea and Earth. Van's mother was actually one of the decedents of the Atlantians, called Draconian by all the normal humans on Gaea due to the wings they sport and the seeming black magic of their technology and abilities to alter luck and fate. This means that Van himself, as well as his apparently turncoat brother, Folken Fanel, also sport wings.

I don’t think there's much more I can say about the story and the setting without just summarizing the entire series, so I'm going to stop while I'm ahead. I'll just say that it was a really interesting story that took place in an intriguing world. The pacing of the story itself was nice and even, never dragging to slow as it explained and set things up, or surrendering entirely to the action and battles that also took place.

The characters were also very interesting, and even though there are quite a few of them, they all tend to stand out on their own enough to be memorable. As you might guess, not all that many of them get developed much, but what development does take place is, for the most part, pretty good. Hitomi herself is a refreshingly different female protagonist in that while the male leads at times get pushy and want to exploit her powers more, will stand up for herself and refuse. She does tend to get kidnapped a lot, and can't really defend herself outside of her psychic abilities, but it's worth noting that she wasn't at the complete beck and call of the male leads either, especially since the visions she had took something of a toll on her.

Van and Allen are also somewhat interesting characters with complex backgrounds, though at times they seemed a little underdeveloped. Allen is basically the noble knight type, a natural leader who's easy to like. However, he hates his father for going off in search of the Mystic Valley of the Draconians and never returning, as soon afterwards his mother also died and left him and his sister alone. Then not long after that, his sister disappeared. This did serve to give him a connection to Van, however, as Van's mentor also finds Allen and mentors him. As for Van, he's somewhat different in that he doesn't like to fight, though he is soon hardened by having to do so.

The antagonists are also given somewhat interesting backgrounds, too, and even made not so completely evil. Take Van's brother, Folken. Not only did he defect to Zaibach when he was supposed to be doing the dragon hunt we later see Van go on in order to become king, but he also ends up leading the attack that would end up razing Fanelia to the ground. Van ends up hating his brother for good reason because of that and because of his continued efforts to capture Van along with Escaflowne. But it's also completely obvious that Folken still cares for his brother, and after Emperor Dornkirk shows what a cold bastard he is, Folken later comes over to his brother's side.

Then there's bloodthirsty Dilandau. He totally comes off as the stereotypical stuck up royal pain in the ass to go along with being a completely evil bastard who likes killing and destroying. But he also has an interesting background, and even before we learn it, the series actually manages to paint him in a semi-sympathetic light by having him go through a mental breakdown following the wholesale slaughter of his Dragon Slayer squad by Van. And then we find out "he" is actually Allen's lost sister, who was turned into the bloodthirsty Dilandau by Dornkirk's scientists through cruel experimentation. It also kind of complicates things when this is revealed to Allen.

Hell, even Emperor Dornkirk is given some ambiguity to his character, even though he's easily still one of the most evil of the main characters. It's strongly hinted at that he's actually Isaac Newton, resurrected on Gaea through sheer force of will alone upon his death on Earth. When he first appears in Zaibach, it's basically a third world country, and he helps them to become a world power through his scientific knowledge. So basically he's a Hitler analogue, but unlike Hitler he isn't after world domination so much as he actually wants to create a peaceful world where everyone can be granted their wishes. Unfortunately, he's so obsessed with the Atlantian technology to make this happen that he no longer cares about human life, and will kill anyone who gets in his way. His conquering of other kingdoms is solely aimed at getting what he needs for the machine he's built, but that doesn't change the fact Zaibach has devastated so much of Gaea.

What it comes down to is that everyone is given believable motivations for what they are doing during the story.

That being said, this series isn't without its own weaknesses. The first one is kind of understandable in that while the pace wasn't exactly all that fast, they didn't want to slow things down too much. This resulted in a lot of things happening solely for the benefit of the story. Right off the bat, there's no explanation for how or why Van and the dragon ended up on Earth, or most of the other times they're conveniently transported somewhere by a beam of light. Then there are things like Dilandau/ Celena ending up where he/she need to be so Allen can see the change take place to know that Dilandau is actually his sister, right before being conveniently beamed back to Zaibach.

For me, though, the biggest weakness of this series was the soap opera romance story. Basically Hitomi already likes a guy on Earth when she ends up being spirited away to Gaea. It also just so happens that Allen looks a lot like this guy, so she ends up having a crush on him. But then, Van is the male lead and the first guy from Gaea she ever met, and since they both end up saving each other's lives more than once, she also has a crush on him. So the series tries to make this dramatic by bouncing her between her love for each of these three guys, and I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at all of it. I can tell that this was a story element aimed at the teenaged girls in the audience, but in my opinion it rang false and actually hurt the story and the characters a bit. It was also completely obvious who she was going to end up deciding on.

Oh, and just in case the teenaged male demographic felt left out on the whole pointless fan service area, the show gave them this:

Not only are they furries, but they're twin sisters. I'm sure some people will like this, but I didn't. At least the bottom one there wasn't really into it. Eh, it's not like they end up being all that important anyway, aside from helping Folken to switch sides again.

Anyway, I can definitely say that for the most part I really like this series. It has something that can probably appeal to most anyone, and even though its age is showing a bit, it's still very enjoyable to watch. I would definitely recommend this series, especially if you can get into medieval fantasy stories. 8/10.

Well the epilogue is manga only which is why you probably can't remember it happening in the anime: it didn't. Long story short, spoiler[these two kids meet up in the future and it's very obvious that they're reincarnations of some of the characters from the series. They touch hands and they know instantly as evident from series characters showing up in the background. But they show like a bunch of characters in the background so I'm really not 100% sure who they're reincarnations of. Physis and Soldier Blue are obvious choice, but Blue dies before the end of the series, I'm not sure that Jomy's headphones were enough to see him to the end of everything, y'know?] You could probably read this epilogue just from having seen the TV series and have it make perfect sense, it's only about 10 pages anyway.

Maybe some day. Doubt anytime soon, though.

Voices of a Distant Star
(single episode OVA)

Unfortunately, while I kind of liked this OVA, there isn't a lot I can say about it, because there simply isn't a lot there. The OVA itself is only 25 minutes long, and much like Pale Cocoon, it left me wishing that there was more. It also leaves its protagonist with an uncertain fate that actually looks kind of bad for them.

The story is about a long-distance relationship between Mikako Nagamine and her boyfriend, Noboru Terao, and by "long-distance", I mean interplanetary and then interstellar. By some magic their cell phones' texting abilities are still able to reach out across this impossible distance to allow Mikako to talk to Noboru, though the texts only travel at the speed of light, meaning her messages, though sent out basically one right after the other, reach Earth at longer and longer spans of time apart. So for the most part the story focuses on this drama. In fact, the plot, which is about a war between humanity and an alien race known as the Tarsians is actually pretty much in the background. That's somewhat unfortunate, because there was so much there that I found interesting. Actually, while I like character drama, I feel that in this case too much emphasis was placed on it here, because while character drama can really add to a story, when it becomes the story itself it tends not to be as good or as interesting in my opinion.

There are some problems I have with the show aside from that misplaced focus, but for the most part this is detail oriented thanks to that misplaced focus. For instance, Mikako is 15 years old, but she was recruited by the United Nations Space Army to go fight aliens with giant mecha (called Tracers here). So basically this is one of those animes that Sky Crawlers was criticizing along with other shows, like Evangelion. Maybe there would have been some convoluted explanation for the UN using children as combat pilots as well, and maybe even the laughable use of giant humanoid mecha in space, but for me these are both weak points against shows like these. This is actually somewhat heightened by the fact Mikako doesn't wear a military uniform, but instead stays in the same skirted school uniform we see her in during the flashback that takes up most of the OVA.

As for the characters, well, again, there just isn't much to go off of. I mean, they're both sad at their separation, but that's about all we can get out of it other than that they both also undergo a little growth – Mikako is a little hardened by her combat experience and Noboru goes from being depressed because he initially flunked out of the Self-Defense Force and was thus separated from Mikako to working hard to get into it at the end of the OVA. He's also pretty much gotten over her by that point, or so it seems, and who can blame him?

This OVA was interesting enough to watch, but I can't help but feel a bit indifferent about it because there just isn't much there. Maybe if this had been a pilot to a fully-fledged show it might have been better, but that just isn't the case unfortunately, and it feels like the show ended without a resolution. And as for the character drama, well, I've seen this kind of stuff before and it really wasn't all that special on its own, so I just didn't really get emotionally involved at all. It isn't bad exactly, but it didn't impress me either. 6/10.

Yukikaze
(5 episode OVA)

This is one of the better shows I've watched. While it's superficially about humans fighting it out with aliens and flying cool airplanes that aren't very aerodynamic, it also touches on a few other things that are actually somewhat contemporary.

The most obvious one is how this conflict is treated on the home front. Initially, when a mysterious portal forms in Antarctica and some aliens (eventually called the JAM) randomly attack an Antarctic research base, people all over the world are shocked and the world rises up to respond against this new threat. The UN manages to pull together and coordinate a military response that successfully pushes the alien invaders back through their portal. A special military force is then assembled to take the fight to the other side of the portal, in order to keep the aliens from ever making it back to Earth, or so the story goes (and yeah, it's obvious where they were going with that, too). But after the war moves to the other side of the portal and is no longer obviously visible, people start pretending that the war never even existed, to the point that when an author writes a book about the ongoing war, it's popular and sells a lot of copies, because everyone says it's a well thought out science fiction novel. When some pilots from the other side of the portal briefly reappear on Earth, they're treated somewhat coldly by the naval force gathered to keep an eye on the portal, even though these pilots just saved a lot of their asses. In other words no one wants the conflict to be there anymore, so much so that they pretend it doesn't exist, and they shun any reminders that it does. Fortunately at least some of them manage to pull their heads out of their asses, but by then the JAM are stepping things up.

The other contemporary issue touched on is the introduction of AI controlled combat aircraft. Not everyone is sold on the idea, and in fact the weaknesses of AI-controlled aircraft are shown quite often. However, the series focuses on the idea of a pilot and an AI developing a kind of bond that makes the both of them together practically unbeatable. The suggestion seems to be that we shouldn't be afraid of technology, but rather than make it do everything itself, we should develop a kind of symbiotic relationship with it.

For me, though, the interesting part was the conflict with the JAM. They were tough to beat as it was, but during the part of the conflict that the OVA covers, they've developed some new strategies which made things a bit more interesting. Basically this involved the same old cliché of "conquered from within", because as we find out, the JAM have figured out how to imitate humans and their aircraft. This is also the point where things tend to get a bit confusing, because not only is it hard to find out who may have been replaced with an alien, but the show seems to skip around a bit and it almost feels like I missed something at a few points. In one instance it appears that the main character, Lt. Fukai, his friend, Maj. Bukhar, and the fighter they're flying in (Yukikaze) have been replaced by copies, since they are attacked and it appears beaten ... except they weren't, apparently.

There's plenty of action, and it's all quite visually interesting. They even managed not to go completely overboard with things like having impossible missile barrages ... at least until the end. The mad dash back to the portal so all the remaining humans can escape and close the portal behind them is naturally the biggest battle, but this is also where things tend to go way over the top, at least as far as the attacking JAM forces. Mostly this comes from the fact that the writers have essentially set the JAM up so that they are impossible to beat, because they have millions of these tiny aircraft that can literally swarm the human aircraft and rip them to shreds. Yet somehow the humans win, spontaneously developing some new laser weapons, just because, apparently. I'd say the ending is somewhat unsatisfying because of that, and because the short epilogue doesn't really do justice to the massive battle, it just sort of ends and wraps everything up quickly without telling us much.

As for the characters, none of them really stood out that much. Lt. Fukai and his plane, Yukikaze, are both stereotypically "mysterious". At points both of them come out a little, the plane even admitting to being afraid a couple of times, but for the most part they are stoic, pragmatic, and do pretty much whatever they want while getting away with all of it because they are just so awesome at killing aliens. Hell, they even figure out that the JAM are replacing humans for everyone so the plan we see come into fruition at the end of the OVA can be developed. Major Bukhar is supposed to be a kind of buddy commander to Fukai, I think, but they tend to go over the top with him. At one point he's actually pretty pathetic. It was just hard to like him at all because he tended to either be a whiny loser or a prick. Pretty much all the other characters were just kind of weird and until the end kind of hard to figure out.

Probably the most interesting "character" was the JAM. Their nature and purpose was always shrouded in mystery, and while the human characters made some guesses about them, the JAM are simply left as being the mysterious creatures (or creature) that they (or it) are. The idea that the entire planet and all of the JAM were in fact one single entity was especially intriguing to me, as was the idea that the war was just its way of studying humanity and testing itself.

Overall it's pretty fair to say that I was fairly impressed by this OVA. It's not perfect by any means, but it's still pretty good and I'd definitely recommend it. 9/10

Well, considering Shinkai did everything but the girl's voice and the music, it is his Anime and he can put in it what he wants to. If he chooses to have a teenage girl piloting a giant robot while wearing a school uniform and texting on a cellphone, who are we to argue?

Of course, that it was made by one man doesn't mean the work is great. Heck, it's alright but not the Masterpiece many would have you believe. But it is his work, and given that he gave up seven months of his life, I don't think he should be too harshly criticised for not making it longer or changing his vision of what he wanted.

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