 |
2 of 7 people found this review helpful
|
26 of 26 episodes seen
|
Another series by Goro Taniguchi or should I say his first series as a full fledge director. I guess my perspective on it is different because while it is his first work it isn’t the first series he made that I watched. While it does have its flaws it is a good series and you can definitely feel that Taniguchi vibe as you proceed into the second half.
Opening sequence: 7/10
Ending sequence: 6/10
My Age Rating: PT: The violence isn’t graphic and the sex isn’t depicted but it has very mature situations such as implied serial and gang rape, gang beating and murder.
The story seems fairly simple, a group of people are trap aboard a ship and must survive until they are rescued while escaping an unknown enemy. It has some government conspiracies but it remains a background focus. During their trip they face great difficulties such as leadership, order, survival, test of friendship, betrayal… They have to manage to stay together and learn to use to ship to survive. The series starts out slow and almost uninteresting but as the story progresses you realize the beginning was laying the ground work for the later episodes and without it the later half would have been devoided of any impact. The first episodes are a necessary evil but they are more enjoyable during a re-watch.
Some who watch it may also find some alarming similarities between this title and the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, it appears the creators of Galactica’s remake saw this show before making their own: The girl with a religion in her room had a huge Baltar vibe, then there’s the entire premise of escaping from an enemy while having to survive on the ship (I’m ready to give them this one since its from the original Galactica series that came before Ryvius), the girl who gets abused in prison, the mutinies… At least it explains why a bunch of adults were going through major teen angst on the Galactica.
The characters were great and realistic. Most are teens and they each have their own friends, loyalties and relationships. At the beginning you become familiar with the characters and their stories as well as their personalities and this allows for the second half of the series to have some real impact on you: rooting for certain relationships, hoping for certain events and even having some tragedies that hit you in the guts. When you get the lay down of the show it seems like a regular story about friendship and pulling through together but you’d never expect the serious and horrible turn it takes as it goes on. Depicting realistically what such a situation would entail, you see betrayal by friends, prison rape, corruption, mutinies, gang beating, murder and how some members even snap under the pressure or in the wake of certain events. Out of all the cast the only character that will really get on your nerves might be Koji who seems to be the twin brother of Shinji Ikari so much so he looks and acts like him.
Out of all the characters they are only three that really made me react or care even though the cast is well established:
-Ikumi: He starts as mister nice guy but certain circumstances flesh out his character and reveals a really twisted past as well as a very unstable individual. Though I might be one of the few who actually thought his actions were not only warranted and necessary in the last few episodes but I also thought he should have gone farther.
-Kuzoe: She seems like a spoiled brat and she is but what happened to her is really horrible and undeserved. Her situation made me care for her and hoping she would pull through and piece her life back together somehow.
-Aoi: You can definitely understand her pain and some may even be able to relate to it. Her struggle and her relationship as it develop are really one of the greatest in the series.
The voice acting seemed fine aside from Neya, but I think her tone was intentional even though annoying.
The action is never truly elaborated as they seemed to have avoided graphic content and the space battles weren’t much to look at so you don’t watch this series for the action but for the characters and the drama.
Now since the show leaves much to the imagination I will clarify a few details that are nebulous for those who have seen the show (I found these answers from more than simple deduction, I searched through the internet as well). Below are spoilers, huge ones:
-Michelle does indeed get serially raped in prison even though she doesn’t seem very affected by it afterwards. Considering she was waiting for the right time to escape and purposely stayed captive until she acquired the code of her friends’ cells, I’d say this kind of stuff doesn’t bother her too much, she was more shocked by the betrayal of Blue than anything else.
-Kuzoe gets taken away during the series by jealous girls and we are left wondering what they did to her. The answer is they had her beaten and gang raped by a group of guys at a party. Her mental instability afterwards and how Ikumi snaps into a frenzy are easily explainable when you have the facts. The guys we see Ikumi as beaten who were at a party after Kuzoe was attacked are the culprits and this is why he lashed out this hard on these guys even though he went more easy on the random bullies he finds later on. It also explains why he beat the crap out of a bunch of people who seemed to have done nothing more than to party at first glanced.
-Fina isn’t following the real teachings of her religion but a version she exaggerated herself and she indeed killed her former boyfriend as well as one other person to cut ties with her past. Even so Koji still seems to be willing to forgive her, there’s nice but this is just too much if you ask me.
To finish, the series really makes you think and feel, whether it be anger, sadness or sympathy for certain characters and their situations, and is truly something that should be watched by any Taniguchi fan and pretty much any fans of character development or drama and of course, survival stories. I also recommend watching all the way through, the show may not start out exciting but the later episodes are definitely worth watching the beginning.
Opening sequence: 7/10
Ending sequence: 6/10
My Age Rating: PT: The violence isn’t graphic and the sex isn’t depicted but it has very mature situations such as implied serial and gang rape, gang beating and murder.
The story seems fairly simple, a group of people are trap aboard a ship and must survive until they are rescued while escaping an unknown enemy. It has some government conspiracies but it remains a background focus. During their trip they face great difficulties such as leadership, order, survival, test of friendship, betrayal… They have to manage to stay together and learn to use to ship to survive. The series starts out slow and almost uninteresting but as the story progresses you realize the beginning was laying the ground work for the later episodes and without it the later half would have been devoided of any impact. The first episodes are a necessary evil but they are more enjoyable during a re-watch.
Some who watch it may also find some alarming similarities between this title and the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, it appears the creators of Galactica’s remake saw this show before making their own: The girl with a religion in her room had a huge Baltar vibe, then there’s the entire premise of escaping from an enemy while having to survive on the ship (I’m ready to give them this one since its from the original Galactica series that came before Ryvius), the girl who gets abused in prison, the mutinies… At least it explains why a bunch of adults were going through major teen angst on the Galactica.
The characters were great and realistic. Most are teens and they each have their own friends, loyalties and relationships. At the beginning you become familiar with the characters and their stories as well as their personalities and this allows for the second half of the series to have some real impact on you: rooting for certain relationships, hoping for certain events and even having some tragedies that hit you in the guts. When you get the lay down of the show it seems like a regular story about friendship and pulling through together but you’d never expect the serious and horrible turn it takes as it goes on. Depicting realistically what such a situation would entail, you see betrayal by friends, prison rape, corruption, mutinies, gang beating, murder and how some members even snap under the pressure or in the wake of certain events. Out of all the cast the only character that will really get on your nerves might be Koji who seems to be the twin brother of Shinji Ikari so much so he looks and acts like him.
Out of all the characters they are only three that really made me react or care even though the cast is well established:
-Ikumi: He starts as mister nice guy but certain circumstances flesh out his character and reveals a really twisted past as well as a very unstable individual. Though I might be one of the few who actually thought his actions were not only warranted and necessary in the last few episodes but I also thought he should have gone farther.
-Kuzoe: She seems like a spoiled brat and she is but what happened to her is really horrible and undeserved. Her situation made me care for her and hoping she would pull through and piece her life back together somehow.
-Aoi: You can definitely understand her pain and some may even be able to relate to it. Her struggle and her relationship as it develop are really one of the greatest in the series.
The voice acting seemed fine aside from Neya, but I think her tone was intentional even though annoying.
The action is never truly elaborated as they seemed to have avoided graphic content and the space battles weren’t much to look at so you don’t watch this series for the action but for the characters and the drama.
Now since the show leaves much to the imagination I will clarify a few details that are nebulous for those who have seen the show (I found these answers from more than simple deduction, I searched through the internet as well). Below are spoilers, huge ones:
-Michelle does indeed get serially raped in prison even though she doesn’t seem very affected by it afterwards. Considering she was waiting for the right time to escape and purposely stayed captive until she acquired the code of her friends’ cells, I’d say this kind of stuff doesn’t bother her too much, she was more shocked by the betrayal of Blue than anything else.
-Kuzoe gets taken away during the series by jealous girls and we are left wondering what they did to her. The answer is they had her beaten and gang raped by a group of guys at a party. Her mental instability afterwards and how Ikumi snaps into a frenzy are easily explainable when you have the facts. The guys we see Ikumi as beaten who were at a party after Kuzoe was attacked are the culprits and this is why he lashed out this hard on these guys even though he went more easy on the random bullies he finds later on. It also explains why he beat the crap out of a bunch of people who seemed to have done nothing more than to party at first glanced.
-Fina isn’t following the real teachings of her religion but a version she exaggerated herself and she indeed killed her former boyfriend as well as one other person to cut ties with her past. Even so Koji still seems to be willing to forgive her, there’s nice but this is just too much if you ask me.
To finish, the series really makes you think and feel, whether it be anger, sadness or sympathy for certain characters and their situations, and is truly something that should be watched by any Taniguchi fan and pretty much any fans of character development or drama and of course, survival stories. I also recommend watching all the way through, the show may not start out exciting but the later episodes are definitely worth watching the beginning.
I found this review Helpful Not Helpful