Ginga Tetsudou Monogatari (The Galaxy Railways)

In the distant future, trains are no longer bound by their physical tracks. Instead, they take to the skies and travel across the universe on the Galaxy Railways, transporting mankind from planet to planet. However, the Galaxy Railways are no safer than traditional trains: criminals, terrorists, and vile aliens always find a way to stir up trouble.

Manabu Yuuki, a rash and hot-headed man, is the latest addition to the Galaxy Railways' elite Space Defence Force (SDF). These brave men and women are responsible for protecting the railways and responding to any unprecedented danger, risking their lives to protect the innocent from evil. But as this drama unfolds and the SDF's greatest crisis draws nearer, Manabu must truly learn what it means to be a member of the SDF before it is too late.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Alternative setting:	Ginga Tetsudou 999
Sequel:	Ginga Tetsudou Monogatari: Eien e no Bunkiten, Ginga Tetsudou Monogatari: Wasurerareta Toki no Wakusei

Inoue, Kazuhiko
Japanese

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Staff

Cook, Justin

Producer

Watson, Barry

Producer

Nishimoto, Yukio

Director

Kikuchi, Yasuhito

Episode Director, Storyboard

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Opening Theme

"Ginga Tetsudou wa Harukanari (銀河鉄道は遥かなり)" Sasaki Isao

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Ending Theme

"Ginga no Kirame (銀河の煌)" Sasaki Isao

Reviews

Jun 30, 2013

NimZaster

Recommended

I've watched many many anime to find the "one" with a great story, drama, and a hint of romance. The Galaxy Railways has all the things I was looking for. Interesting story, well developed characters. The setup is a bit unexpected, but it works! yes, flying trains maybe something not really of a sci-fi, but that is just the base ground to build up an interesting story around it. To anyone who looks for a bit serious anime, a conclusive ending, a hint of romance and some drama, I would definitely recommend to watch this anime. I wish there were more like this.

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Nov 23, 2017

camay1997

Mixed Feelings

Leiji, Leiji, Leiji… How many times can you rehash the same stories and tropes over and over and when will I actually condemn you for it? I’e stated before that I’ll watch anything with that man’s name attached to it and really wanted to watch it when I first heard about it last millennium. And as Leijiverse stuff goes it’s a base line. While the animation is fluid and smooth, the character designs are of Leiji’s era (meaning old) The stories are by the book, which is okay, but Manabu Yuki’s young man pursuing the only dream he ever had thing has been done in ...

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Feb 22, 2023

Zanryu1337

Not Recommended

Spoiler

Story: 3
Animation: 9
Sound: 7
Characters: 2
Enjoyment: 1

Total: 4

Ginga Tetsudou Monogatari does so many things wrong. But this is due to two very important factors. The theme and the story structure. And both are running the rest into the ground.

But let's start with the setting first, because it is weird. In the future, humanity has advanced space travel to such a degree that most of the inhabitable planets are connected via space trains, which are literally trains in space, varying in technological images. The main cast controls a steam train in all its retro glory. Steam from the stovepipe and connected wheels are predominantly featured in multiple ... shots. And the trains start from an ramp on the planet and rise up like dragons into space. The premise alone is weird enough, but when steam is constantly shown in space, not to mention the later fires and explosions, physics wasn't considered at all. This makes the visuals far more funny and mind numbing than probably intended.

Next it the theme. It run heavy through the whole show and every aspect of it. Fate and the connections people make during these predetermined times are the core of the theme of this anime. Every episode explains an aspect of fate and how the symbolism of the show works. Like how the train tracks represent fate and the train stations the points where we meet other people. After the second time I was already grained of how hand-fed this presentation is. It is like that they really want me to know how important the symbolism is.

<Minor story plot spoilers from here on.>

Which is heavily undercut by the last few episodes. Until then fate was deemed as this unmovable force and the tracks can't be changed once placed, which is not how any train track work, but I let that one slide. When an enemy force from another dimension threatens the whole space track system, the whole symbolism falls apart. In the show this one seer is heavily featured as she seems to have clairvoyant powers, not limited to the present. But when the invaders arrive, her sight got immediately destroyed. Which only suggests to me that everything the show wanted to tell me with its symbolism is plainly wrong. Fate can be altered, destroyed and changed if an outside force is applied. This makes it really frustrating to judge this show by its theme.

On the contrary the story is easily to judge. It is bad. It flip-flops between an arc based story structure and episodic episodes and cannot hold its feet still. It starts somewhat promising with 3 introductory episodes about the main character, the legacy he has to uphold and the concept of a returning antagonist. This quickly gets thrown out of the window as up until the last 6 episodes everything becomes detached and episodic. And while there where some callbacks to past episodes, most of them are stupid and confusing. Most prominently the worst episodes are the memory episode early on and the planet evacuation episode. Both deal with some heavy themes like depression and letting go of trauma, but they both handled by the occurrence of magic.
And the more one thinks about the circumstances of how the main cast blunders themselves into these situations, it only becomes more infuriating. "We need to evacuate the planet within 24 hours!" and the main cast is like: "Let's drive by car to gather the last people around here." Wh..... Why? Who thought that this would be a smart idea? You have planet-scanning capabilities. And the evacuation order was put out a year ago. It makes zero sense to even be there.

And this is the transition for the characters, because it too makes zero sense. Let's start with the overall group. We follow a cast of 6 people as they each fulfill a role in a long lasting squad in the Space Defense Force. Yuuki and Louis are new members as they graduated the academy at the same time. What role they specifically do is never really explained. But it seems that they have to do everything. Controlling weapons, flying a space ship, repairing and maintaining the space train and analyzing complex structures seem just a part of all the things they have to do. All while transporting military weaponry. It primarily feels like they are part of a police force, but it got militarized to such a heavy degree that it spun totally out of control. Especially since in the early episodes the actual military force is introduced as another branch. However, they still have to fight terrorists, pirates and rebels as if they were the special forces. And by the way: the whole shtick with the terrorists, pirates and rebels is also never explained. Of why they act the way they do, just don't think about it; we labeled them as such and thus they are the enemies.

I feel like I already have written too much and too little. I could go on and on about detailed structures and hierarchies within the animes universe, but it only would matter so much.

The art is very fine (even tho I only watched a highly pixelated version) and the sound can be catchy and serves the shows weird space western theme.

The Galaxy Railways just can't deliver with art and sound alone. Characters, and especially the main one, feel very grindy to listen to, not by the voice actors fault, but the stupidity of his sentences. The writing is, for the most part, atrocious and boring at the same time and the space setting isn't used at all. It quickly falls into the sci-fi trap of having one planet for one thing. Like the homebase planet and the gothic architectural Europe planet. The throat shoved symbolism is more hindrance than anything and vastly hampered the writers. Most of the episodes are about the expanding character cast and more often than not, they visited new locales in tandem. Which can be fine, but the episodic nature reduces the importance and mystique of these locales to nothing.

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Ginga Tetsudou Monogatari

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