Anime review
6 May 2010 11:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
salineaPlanetES
Space, baby, space. And not any space; realistic, gritty, hard science space like you've never seen hard science on a TV or cinema screen before.
The year is 2075, space exploration is continuing at a steady rhythm, leaving a trail of a bunch of junk in orbits, and one day of course one piece of garbage causes a big accident, so various programs of debris collection are organised in the corporations that deal with space exploitation. Since of course, this is no profitable business, those programs are underfunded and a place to send employees nobody else wants. But they do their job nonetheless. Our story deals on one such agency, and in particular with a young Japanese woman Ai Tanabe, a clumsy, spunky, hard-working, idealistic busybody who just joined the program and needs to learn everything, and with Hachimaki (thus nicknamed because he always wears one) her senior astronaut, also Japanese , a jerk with a heart of... actually I don't think he's got much of a heart, but who loves space and dreams of owning his own space ship one day. The focus of the story starts very low key and episodic in a slice of life way with a side of romance, painting a broad and complex picture of space exploitation and exploration in the future along the way, then develops a more continuous dramatic storyline in its second half, brought to an impressive and emotional climax both on the global scale and the smaller scale of the characters.
Unlike most everyone I've seen talking and reviewing Planetes, I actually have mixed feeling about this anime. On the one hand, yes, it does some brilliant, beautiful and heart-wrenching things, and more over, does it about themes and situations that you almost never see anywhere else. Planetes does space like nothing else does it (but documentaries, I guess), and Planetes does personal drama excessively well, and both of those by themselves make it worth watching. But Planetes also does a number of irritating things I can't quite ignore; and also does a few problematic things that are so involved and complex I have difficulties even properly articulating them. I'll probably have to make a second spoilery post to even try addressing them.
For one the comedy is atrocious. Mostly based on having a couple of characters (and then a few more here and there in individual episodes) act like complete clown, so it triggers my embarrassment squick as well as being very much unfunny. A lot of other things are based on the low grade romcom that is Tanabe and Hachimaki's romance story. Basically their characters clash a lot, and there's a lot of bickering, and Tanabe being clumsy and naive, and Hachimaki being clueless and impulsive, and not only have we seen this a thousand times, but 750 of those times were done much better. It doesn't help that I have a hard time liking those characters. Hachimaki is very much a selfish and self-centered jerk, through and through, and while he does have certain ordinary person with the determination to reach his dream appeal, I have a hard time caring about him at all. Tanabe is a bit better, being fundamentally well meaning and kind, has well as having some backbone and grit underneath, though her naivety and idealism are being played in a frankly stupid enough way that I had to grunt a few times. Also there's the fact that despite the realistic depiction of the future, the gender dynamics don't appear to have progressed at all, or at least not in Japan (note that only Tanabe, Hachimaki and their family are Japanese of the cast of characters, the rest is very multinational as well as multi-ethnic, though they behave to very Japanese social standards quite a few times). Add to this the fact that Tanabe's the first character introduced as view point before the story turns out to focus much more on Hachimaki's story and dreams, whereas Tanabe's storyline is mostly about her feelings for Hachimaki; you've got a pretty irritating result.
The show makes up for this a little with some of the secondary characters. There's Fee Carmichael, who is an unabashedly awesome and tough woman of colour (and to the show's credit, has children back on Earth, yet is never portrayed as a deadbeat mother for it, even though we get that sort of treatment for a couple of male characters) and the pilot of the team. Fee gets one episode dedicated all to her, about that one time when she really, really wanted a smoke, the one good comedy episode as well as being downright epic. There's Yuri Mihairokov, a quiet, gentle, efficient astronaut whose backstory reveals one of the most beautiful and graceful personal drama of the series. There's Claire Rondo, an elite member of the control section, an overachiever with a background of being refuge from a (fictional) Latin American country to the United States as a child; whose characterisation and storyline aren't without reminding me of one Felix Gaeta in nBSG (I could ship them, too, they'd be snarkily and bitterly competent together *sighs*) and while I also have a few misgiving about her story she was probably my favourite character in the show. Other secondary and tertiary characters are pretty interesting, complicated and unique, and provide good drama (or in other cases, atrocious comedy). And even Tanabe and Hachimaki have dramatic moments that are breathtaking in their execution, intensity and depth.
The animation is excellent and detailed, very much played for the sake of the rendition of both the sense of wonder from space scenes and the grittiness of the hard science. The soundtrack is orchestral and in perfect adequation with the storytelling, although I kinda hated both the opening and ending sequences (despite the awesome summary of space exploration imagery that the OP does).
Thematics are also pretty damn awesome most of the time. The wonder of space exploration clashed with the politics and economy of space exploitation and the inequity it creates between countries on Earth; the bravery and dedication of people working in space contrasted to the cost, personal, selfish, in health and human lives as well as the lack of glamour and general lack of consideration given to the work of most of the cast, and a solid core of humanism remaining through. Those themes are woven deftly through the stories beginning to end and at both personal and global scales, painting a complex and though-inducing picture. There too, I have however some misgivings: while it's pretty damn awesome to see acknowledged the fact that space exploration, also, is political, and that it profits mostly to some selected few leaving Third World countries in the dust (and quite purposefully so), I would have liked if the point hadn't been done using fictional countries, as if it wasn't worth doing the research of using real countries, as if third countries are all equivalent and similarly easy to summarise by the reality of their oppression. Not to mention how it all ties to terrorism in a way that is, all at once, horrible, sympathetic, and the summum of cynicism (This is where I recognised the makers of Code Geass in this show). At least I can say those thematics won't stop making me think, which is already no mean achievement.
It's adapted from a seinen manga series, from which it diverges significantly at some points, which I probably ought to check as well.
In conclusion, Planetes is a very unique series, which has enough qualities it is definitely worth checking, especially for people with any interest in hard science and also for the beautiful human drama it draws at times, despite a number of flaws.
Space, baby, space. And not any space; realistic, gritty, hard science space like you've never seen hard science on a TV or cinema screen before.
The year is 2075, space exploration is continuing at a steady rhythm, leaving a trail of a bunch of junk in orbits, and one day of course one piece of garbage causes a big accident, so various programs of debris collection are organised in the corporations that deal with space exploitation. Since of course, this is no profitable business, those programs are underfunded and a place to send employees nobody else wants. But they do their job nonetheless. Our story deals on one such agency, and in particular with a young Japanese woman Ai Tanabe, a clumsy, spunky, hard-working, idealistic busybody who just joined the program and needs to learn everything, and with Hachimaki (thus nicknamed because he always wears one) her senior astronaut, also Japanese , a jerk with a heart of... actually I don't think he's got much of a heart, but who loves space and dreams of owning his own space ship one day. The focus of the story starts very low key and episodic in a slice of life way with a side of romance, painting a broad and complex picture of space exploitation and exploration in the future along the way, then develops a more continuous dramatic storyline in its second half, brought to an impressive and emotional climax both on the global scale and the smaller scale of the characters.
Unlike most everyone I've seen talking and reviewing Planetes, I actually have mixed feeling about this anime. On the one hand, yes, it does some brilliant, beautiful and heart-wrenching things, and more over, does it about themes and situations that you almost never see anywhere else. Planetes does space like nothing else does it (but documentaries, I guess), and Planetes does personal drama excessively well, and both of those by themselves make it worth watching. But Planetes also does a number of irritating things I can't quite ignore; and also does a few problematic things that are so involved and complex I have difficulties even properly articulating them. I'll probably have to make a second spoilery post to even try addressing them.
For one the comedy is atrocious. Mostly based on having a couple of characters (and then a few more here and there in individual episodes) act like complete clown, so it triggers my embarrassment squick as well as being very much unfunny. A lot of other things are based on the low grade romcom that is Tanabe and Hachimaki's romance story. Basically their characters clash a lot, and there's a lot of bickering, and Tanabe being clumsy and naive, and Hachimaki being clueless and impulsive, and not only have we seen this a thousand times, but 750 of those times were done much better. It doesn't help that I have a hard time liking those characters. Hachimaki is very much a selfish and self-centered jerk, through and through, and while he does have certain ordinary person with the determination to reach his dream appeal, I have a hard time caring about him at all. Tanabe is a bit better, being fundamentally well meaning and kind, has well as having some backbone and grit underneath, though her naivety and idealism are being played in a frankly stupid enough way that I had to grunt a few times. Also there's the fact that despite the realistic depiction of the future, the gender dynamics don't appear to have progressed at all, or at least not in Japan (note that only Tanabe, Hachimaki and their family are Japanese of the cast of characters, the rest is very multinational as well as multi-ethnic, though they behave to very Japanese social standards quite a few times). Add to this the fact that Tanabe's the first character introduced as view point before the story turns out to focus much more on Hachimaki's story and dreams, whereas Tanabe's storyline is mostly about her feelings for Hachimaki; you've got a pretty irritating result.
The show makes up for this a little with some of the secondary characters. There's Fee Carmichael, who is an unabashedly awesome and tough woman of colour (and to the show's credit, has children back on Earth, yet is never portrayed as a deadbeat mother for it, even though we get that sort of treatment for a couple of male characters) and the pilot of the team. Fee gets one episode dedicated all to her, about that one time when she really, really wanted a smoke, the one good comedy episode as well as being downright epic. There's Yuri Mihairokov, a quiet, gentle, efficient astronaut whose backstory reveals one of the most beautiful and graceful personal drama of the series. There's Claire Rondo, an elite member of the control section, an overachiever with a background of being refuge from a (fictional) Latin American country to the United States as a child; whose characterisation and storyline aren't without reminding me of one Felix Gaeta in nBSG (I could ship them, too, they'd be snarkily and bitterly competent together *sighs*) and while I also have a few misgiving about her story she was probably my favourite character in the show. Other secondary and tertiary characters are pretty interesting, complicated and unique, and provide good drama (or in other cases, atrocious comedy). And even Tanabe and Hachimaki have dramatic moments that are breathtaking in their execution, intensity and depth.
The animation is excellent and detailed, very much played for the sake of the rendition of both the sense of wonder from space scenes and the grittiness of the hard science. The soundtrack is orchestral and in perfect adequation with the storytelling, although I kinda hated both the opening and ending sequences (despite the awesome summary of space exploration imagery that the OP does).
Thematics are also pretty damn awesome most of the time. The wonder of space exploration clashed with the politics and economy of space exploitation and the inequity it creates between countries on Earth; the bravery and dedication of people working in space contrasted to the cost, personal, selfish, in health and human lives as well as the lack of glamour and general lack of consideration given to the work of most of the cast, and a solid core of humanism remaining through. Those themes are woven deftly through the stories beginning to end and at both personal and global scales, painting a complex and though-inducing picture. There too, I have however some misgivings: while it's pretty damn awesome to see acknowledged the fact that space exploration, also, is political, and that it profits mostly to some selected few leaving Third World countries in the dust (and quite purposefully so), I would have liked if the point hadn't been done using fictional countries, as if it wasn't worth doing the research of using real countries, as if third countries are all equivalent and similarly easy to summarise by the reality of their oppression. Not to mention how it all ties to terrorism in a way that is, all at once, horrible, sympathetic, and the summum of cynicism (This is where I recognised the makers of Code Geass in this show). At least I can say those thematics won't stop making me think, which is already no mean achievement.
It's adapted from a seinen manga series, from which it diverges significantly at some points, which I probably ought to check as well.
In conclusion, Planetes is a very unique series, which has enough qualities it is definitely worth checking, especially for people with any interest in hard science and also for the beautiful human drama it draws at times, despite a number of flaws.
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no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:10 pm (UTC)It's the only anime series I ever bothered to watch completely(well I watched Dragonball as a kid but that does not really count).
Anime is certainly a very good medium for SF however the few other series I tried to watch have a lot of fanservice I'm not interested in and I dislike mechs.
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:18 pm (UTC)Anime is certainly a very good medium for SF however the few other series I tried to watch have a lot of fanservice I'm not interested in and I dislike mechs.-
Ever check out Crest of the Stars? No mecha and little fanservice.
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:27 pm (UTC)Also, while I really liked Tanabe and thought her character was overall very well done. I've seen her character type done in ways that are far more earnest and less exaggerated and annoying. Rakka from Haibane Renmei was actually an excellent example of an idealistic and naive young woman and the storyline stays focused on her as well as another female character.
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:28 pm (UTC)Anime seems like the prefect medium for real large scales space battles to me and I would love to find an entertaining series which has lots of space battles.
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:31 pm (UTC)I might give it a try.
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 10:54 pm (UTC)Haven't wtached Haibane Renmei yet (well, I tried once, but found the first episode boring, I guess I'll have to try again someday).
no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 11:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 6 May 2010 11:52 pm (UTC)mmmmm now I want to reread the series, even though I need to finish a project by tomorrow.... T_T
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 03:26 am (UTC)I read some article a while back about it being common for Japanese housewives to divorce their husbands after they retire, take as much money as they can from the divorce and live a few exciting years before settling down to a peaceful rest-of-their-lives as their own masters. No wonder. I'd rather die alone than walk three steps behind, but then I'm more stubborn than many, and I'm too clueless to want children, ever.
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 03:53 am (UTC)But I already have one fucking epic Sci-Fi series to watch and I don't like sci fi that much-
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 05:48 am (UTC)As much as I loved it, I admit Planetes is a rather cheesy series.
Haibane Renmei is excellent and highly recommend it! You neeeed to see it! It's tied with Princess Tutu as my favourite anime series. It does drama extremely well and IMO, it does personal drama better than Planetes!
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 06:11 am (UTC)Même si, à voir ta description, ils ont aussi rajouté des choses plus sympathiques. ^^
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 07:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 10:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 01:19 pm (UTC)hehehe, that's two very different anime ^^
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 01:22 pm (UTC)Yeah the second half I think is basically what's added, with two main storylines that end up crossing, one of which is strongly about terrorism. At least it makes for good drama.
Ooops sorry, good luck for your project ^^
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 01:24 pm (UTC)I read some article a while back about it being common for Japanese housewives to divorce their husbands after they retire, take as much money as they can from the divorce and live a few exciting years before settling down to a peaceful rest-of-their-lives as their own masters.
Haha, go them.
I'm not much for domestic ambitions either ;)
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 01:26 pm (UTC)Which one?
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 03:40 pm (UTC)Noted for Haibane Renmei :)
err, may I ask you why you always edit your comments so much?
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 06:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 07:38 pm (UTC)faut que je trouve le manga ^^
no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 07:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 07:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 07:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 7 May 2010 10:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 8 May 2010 01:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 9 May 2010 01:51 am (UTC)Maybe I will finish some day?!
no subject
Date: 9 May 2010 01:53 am (UTC)I kind of think it's worth keeping forward, because there's some really intense things in the ending. But, errr, there's a lot of awkwardness again so.
Yeah.