Sidonia no Kishi: Ai Tsumugu Hoshi

This is a direct continuation of season 2 and concludes the story. Though it takes place 10 years in the future, the time skip only serves to display some new minor characters. The main characters don't appear to have aged or have gained much wisdom. Everything looks slightly better with the movie budget, and improvements in 3D animation technology from 2014 to 2021. The choppy framerate, which was the largest criticism of the TV show, still appears at times, though this seems like a stylistic choice as there were some scenes that were animated smoothly.

Sidonia S1 was a bombastic marvel, and led to many people ... declaring it as Attack on Titan in space. It had the perfect balance of character-driven story arcs and action, and it seemed like a fresh take on the space opera, giving backroom politics a lesser role in favor of the frontline drama. Our hero, Nagate Tanikaze, had to make difficult decisions again and again. But S2 was a strange departure. The immediacy and horror of the Gauna threat took a backseat to rom-com antics with the introduction of Tsumugi. I felt S2 was a much weaker season than S1 and it left many questions unanswered. This movie needed a great payoff and return to the grim seriousness that made S1 so great.

The movie returned to its serious form after a short introduction that breaks the ice a little. But it's a jarring switch, as the rom-com elements were eliminated entirely, and there was no closure to the harem that Nagate accumulated in S2. Instead, Nagate swiftly and suddenly made his choice without too much on-screen brooding. This allowed more time for the space battles, which looked and sounded better than ever due to the movie budget.

My biggest criticism of the movie was that it tried to do too much and juggle too many characters at once. The screentime of the new minor characters took away from what could've been more screentime and development of the characters we were already familiar with in S1 and S2. Nagate himself felt like a minor character, as he wasn't the main focus for much of the movie. Giving a large cast enough time for each of them to shine is an issue that many anime adaptions must deal with. Notably, the two shows in which Sidonia evokes memories for me, Legend of the Galactic Heroes and Attack on Titan, had much more time to develop things. Sidonia had only 24 episodes and this movie. Though the movie clocked in at almost two hours, it really could've used some more time to explore the mystery of the Gauna.

The antagonist had great potential, but he wasn't given proper development. Instead, he ended up acting comical, delivering hammy dialogue instead of being nuanced and making an attempt to convince viewers that his grand plan had any merit. This is a shame, as S1 had the compelling drama and fallout from the fate of Shizuka Hoshijiro. S2 and this movie's writing were significantly weaker. The climax sets up the final battle as the Gauna's last major stand, but with a hammy villain behind it all, I didn't get the same thrills as the climax of S1.

The ending is satisfactory, and it is certainly the slickest space opera production in years. But while everything wrapped up nicely, I can't help but feel that we were cheated out of something completely epic. Nagate needed to be more than just a nice guy with amazing Garde combat skills, and the Gauna needed to be more than just an evil alien force. It's clear that underneath all of the technobabble, the Sidonia movie didn't intend to present a deep, substantial story that will resonate with viewers long after everything's over. But hey, if you want shiny space battles with some of the best sound production you'll ever hear in anime, this movie delivers that in spades.

Short Review: (heavy spoilers)

Baseline quality: 7.5/10. Not nearly as magical as Season 1 but still got some strong points.

A decent sequel and conclusion to the Sidonia saga, though too little and too late. It wraps up certain arcs and elements in a satisfying way, while leaving fans of the deep sci-fi Nihei is famous for a little disappointed.

Imagine the best, most profound Lovecraftian story you have experienced, and it somehow ends with a most conventional fairy-tale ending (where the prince and princess enjoys a happily-ever-after). If you loved Season 1 of Sidonia, skipped S2 and watched this movie finale, you might end up ... with that jarring impression. The tragedy and realistic dread in a cruel battlefield are even further weakened here. Challenging sci-fi choices that might doom or warp humanity are presented to the MC, but the dilemma solved itself pretty quickly. All will be good, all will be good. It's like Rapunzel 2010 except the Sidonia version of "Rapunzel" has a sentient tentacle instead of long hair. Oh and that sentient tentacle likes wearing kimono and cuddling with the MC. Romantic? Definitely! Deep? Never mind. (Edit: after giving it some more reflections, I realized another layer of cosmic horror in MC and Tsumugi's marriage: if the love of your life is perfectly replaceable by a copy of her personality in a clone of your ex, what does that say about human nature?)

Honestly, I am glad for the MC's final choice and happiness, as I felt for his lost love from Season 1. Following the trend of Season 2, this movie conclusion is even more mainstream than Season 2. One stoic character even becomes a pop star for a while without any sensible reason.

If the numbers on MAL are any indicating, the franchise had lost its popularity for good during the 6 years of waiting since S2 (more than 57,000 have rated S2, but only 285 have given this movie a rating). Still, kudos to the production team for finishing the story. Again, it's not a bad movie or bad production, and 3d elements are properly implemented as well. The battles are still gripping if not as white-knuckled as S1. If you are a fan of the Nihei and the previous seasons, I would say still give it a try.

THIS IS A SPOILER-FREE REVIEW

"Knights of Sidonia" has always been a special little show in the anime world. The fantastic first season introduced a dark, grim and interesting post-apocalyptic sci-fi world. The story was engaging, and felt a lot like if "Attack on Titan" was set in space. After the second season, the series took a huge pause up until now and decided to end it with a movie titled "Love woven in the stars". This is the final entry in the franchise, so i was eager to get back into this world.

Story - 7/10

Well, this series has had an insane amount of wasted potential. ... The setting was literally perfect for the story they wanted to tell, but this movie runs into the problem that a lot of these kind of shows run into : rushing an ending. A lot of stuff that has been a mystery up to this point gets kind off just glossed over in here. The pacing is incredibly fast, i have never seen a single movie move this quick in it´s storytelling. The events of this movie take place in the span of 6 months (!). This is problematic because this movie has a romantic subplot that definitely needed a bit more time to be fleshed out properly.
However, aside from all the negativity, this world still managed to pull me in just as it did in the first two seasons. The whole design of everything, the vibe, the mechs and everything else is exactly what i look for in an anime. The best thing about this show is how it portrayed the space battles. The fights are HUGE and spread over various front lines all over the galaxy. It can be a bit hard to keep up, but i think the movie gives just enough information for you to be able to follow the insane battles that take place. The stakes are bigger than ever before in this franchise and the movie conveys that very well from it´s first moments.
I also have to say that although the ending was rushed, i am still glad we even got one. This is definitely not a mainstream show, and for them to even put out another movie after so many years deserves some admiration. I can now safely say that Knights of Sidonia is finally a complete story.

Art - 9/10

Well, lets talk about the most obvious thing : this movie is entirely 3D animated. This is what in my opinion turned a lot of people off this show, because CGI has somewhat of a bad reputation in the anime community. However, Knights of Sidonia has always been the one show which i always thought would actually be worse if it was hand drawn. Listen, of course the character models can look a bit off, but the main point of this show is the space battles, and everyone who looks at the animation of this show and thinks it is not perfect for this kind of action has absolutely no idea. The insane angles, the fluid movements, the amazing effects and the sheer speed in which the mechs twirl around each other would be absolutely impossible to recreate with classical animation. This truly is mecha action from another star. The insane feeling of adrenaline and speed the show gives you is in my opinion unparalled in mecha anime.

Sound - 9/10

As always with this franchise, a lot of time has gone into the sound effects and you can hear every single beat of it. I highly suggest you watch this movie with headphones or a very good stereo setup to appreciate the immaculate sounddesign. This takes the fights to even higher levels. The music itself also makes a strong return with both new and old tracks thrown into the mix here. Of course the very first opening theme (Which is an absolute banger btw) gets used during one of the most hype scenes and it was just perfect.

Characters - 6/10

To be honest, this is the category that hurt this movie the most. The fast pacing and the fact that 70% of this movie is just one insane action scene leads to incredibly underdeveloped characters. Tanikaze, our main hero almost feels like a side-character in this movie because for some reason the movie decided to introduce not one, but 3 completely new characters into the mix and although they are all likeable, it takes the spotlight away from the already established characters. Hoshino, (the best girl of season one!) does not even make an appearance. The only characters that developed in interesting ways were the captain and Kunato. Kunato especially had an insane redemption arc and the final moment between him and Tanikaze was a big nostalgic high point of the movie. The main villain also falls a bit flat to be honest. He needed a lot more development and ended up just being evil for the sake of being evil.
I do have to say however that the characters were never the strong point of the franchise but a bit more time for the villain, and a stronger focus on Tanikaze and his romance could have made the movie a true classic.

Enjoyment - 8/10

Although this review should have made clear that i am still a massive fan of this franchise, you can´t deny that it could have been so much more and i know for sure that it will probably never get the recognition it deserves. But this show has what many anime don´t have and that is an ending.
I recommend "Knights of Sidonia" to everyone who likes "Attack on Titan" , "Darling in the Franxx" as well as "Gunbuster" and to everyone else who wants to see a truly good use of 3D-Animation.

-Marco_Yooo

FINAL SCORE - 8/10

"Peace is still a few hundred million light-years away," said the first OP of this saga. And it was kinda true, ‘cause we had to wait 6 long years to see the film that concludes this story. Was it worth the wait?

I first watched the two seasons of this anime time when I was just 15, and really enjoyed them. Luckily I had no prejudice against its 3D animation, which even today is better than the CGI of many modern anime despite being like the FIRST ANIME made entirely in CGI, and hadn't even seen Attack on Titan or another series remotely similar to it ... at the time, so it was my first time with a story like this. And I loved it. I rewatched the first two seasons before watching this movie -luckily I had forgotten details after all this time- and I can say it again: they're great. Not masterpieces, but pretty great. You can see the love and dedication that was put into the project in the subtle details, in the choreography synced up with amazing music, in the epic 30+ minutes season finales, etc. But what about the movie?

Visually, it has improved. While the character design may seem a bit lazy (10 years passed in the history since the end of the S2, but they all look either the same or unnecessarily different), in terms of fluidity of animation, choreography, atmosphere/setting, etc. is fully up to the technological advances in CGI. The same can be said for the soundtrack, which is at the level of the anime series, with a main theme (Hikari no Disco) that is appropriate despite not being from the great Angela as in the original seasons. The problem with this movie is in the story and development.

Sidonia's anime promised a great AoT-level secret behind the true nature of the Gauna. And a good reason behind the actions of the mysterious scientific genius Ochiai. And a recurring sub-theme of the series was the possible understanding between humans and gaunas, brought out by dialogues of important characters like Hoshijiro and the mere existence of Tsumugi. However, (really minor spoiler ahead) none of this will be fulfilled in the film; the Gaunas are just plain man-eating aliens, Ochiai is just an evil mad scientist, and the only option for humanity's survival is to destroy all the mindless Gaunas. What happened to the depth of this show? Even mysterious actions of characters, such as the strange blind obedience of the Captain towards "Kunato" in the S2, have been forgotten. Sidonia has always preferred to leave out the political subplot to focus on the fights, but this time, that has been taken a bit to the extreme.

Another great aspect of Sidonia, for better or worse, was the harem-ish theme. Especially in the S2 several characters presented themselves as potential romantic interests for the protagonist, with different levels of development in their relationships. I'm not going to spoiler, but in the movie, this aspect is left aside, focusing only on a single character, TOTALLY obliterating any important dialogue or obvious feeling that the other characters, the forgotten ones, could have had in the anime series. Come on, even the screen time of those characters during the film was minimal!

But not everything is bad. It’s evident that the film suffered from a little rushed pacing due to its short duration and the introduction of unnecessary new characters, instead of focusing on existing ones. But you can really tell that the team made an effort to answer as many questions as possible. In some cases the answers were not at the level of what we expected, yes, but at least we had answers. And, in reality, we should thank the fact that this film even exists. After years of postponements of the promised S3, this story could've been lost forever. But it wasn’t like that; there was a movie, a film that tried to give an adequate closure to the ambitious and misunderstood project that Polygon Studios had started, and to fulfill the promise that it had made to its fans 6 years ago. Even actively supervised by the original author of the work. And considering the end of the manga is even more criticized than the end of this movie, I think that the existence of this film has merit in itself. I've gotten emotional a couple of times while watching it. And I've been on the verge of tears too. I have returned to feel a bit of the love that the staff had put into this project in the first two seasons. I think they tried to do everything they could to give us a good ending despite the limitations of the medium, and the terribly low popularity this franchise has had, due mostly to mass prejudice towards its different animation.

Final score of the film: 6.5; more than fine.
Final score of the anime seasons: 8.4 each.

In short, this saga would receive a 7.76, a more than decent grade, which allows me to openly recommend it to anyone.
Watch Sidonia no Kishi, it's definitely worth the ride.

See you, space knight.

Sidonia no Kishi: Ai Tsumugu Hoshi (2021)

Didn't get around to watching this until the start of 2023 and honestly, you'd think it came out today. This is an end-of-an-era anime because the animation style is just godly and beautiful as is the soundtrack. I haven't seen shows do it this well in a long time in its specific way apart from the obvious ones like Blame! which is over also.

The story continues on from last time and I have seen people go into this fresh which is fine but don't deduct because of that, please! I can honestly say that like the manga the ... ending is not really what I wanted because both are kind of rushed but then it was animated beautifully.

The art is unbelievably gorgeous, for me, this is the pinnacle of current CGI usage. Like Blame! it looks incredible and just feels so real and not so animated. Odd to say I know!

The soundtrack keeps the old and adds the new in the right places. It does what things like Attack on Titan missed with reusing old pieces of music at the right time instead of new ones to bring that sense of nostalgia.

I love the clone girls, and I love the cast generally but no one will replace Shizuka Hoshijiro who even in the end was the most important girl and one that drives so much of the story.

Whilst in her human form she was cute I never really got the crossing boundaries for Nagate Tanikaze to fall in love with Tsumugi. I also much preferred the way she was drawn in human form in the manga with the odd eyes. Nagate is on a ship full of people that choose their sex and change based on their partners through choice, fantastic! so why did he go for the one girl that is Tsumugi. Whatever it is fine, I guess he can't get over Shizuka because I definitely didn't.

The show could have had a better ending but I respect them for sticking to the manga the best they could considering the factors behind it all. One thing the show did change slightly as I am sure they go to see if they can find the other seed ships, not just new horizons. Regardless, I will always love this show.

10/10. Deserved.