Just finished nostalgic rewatching and show greatly manages to stand the test of time. For me, it’s a solid 8/10, CG aged well and already became vintage. Traditional animation parts, especially faces did not, but they’re more than bearable. For me still to this day the best part of the show - are pacing and screenwriting, the narrative of the story being solid throughout the 26 episodes(except the ending), and no “one episode-one story” structure relevant to the absolute most of the shows nowadays. The overall designs and art style still hit hard, probably thanks to Murata.
Graphics aside, for me the biggest problem were plot and characters from the 11th episode. And especially Vincent was A LOT of missed potential. His feelings for Sophia were barely noticeable throughout the series, as well as his background with Alex. Only after I checked transcription of Aerial Log artbook, where not only him having feeelings towards Sophia are mentioned directly, but also Vince and Alex being roommates back in academy. Reading that I was like “excuse what the actual-“, because such massive parts of characters past were completely thrown away from the show and I’m dying over missed potential between Vince and Sophia and overall love triangle. Even at the fight between Silverna and Urbanus main focus is set onto non-resolving complications between Claus and Tatiana, and the older cast of characters is thrown into background. Alex and Vince were extremely promising rivalry duo, but they were overshadowed by love harem around Claus and not getting even a single flashback together. Even Alex, being the main drive of the story, gets like one repeating flashback about grand stream and Euris, and only in context of Claus and his father, for me this is like a warcrime in writing. Too much story in the equator of the series is spent around non-resolving love interests around Claus, when older characters more significant in the world around them get little to no exposition. And for me this kills of a lot of depth in the series, when this much of major facts about characters past are left in artbook notes.
With the introduction of Urbanus several plotholes got opened, especially about Anatoray building independent Claudia-powered ships, who built them and who even operate human-built engines, all is left unanswered. So does the role of Maurius, the prime-minister, in all the politics and Alex’s past is left with more holes than answers. First half of the season is built around kids and their affairs, and right from the beginning in the second part we get a ton of chewed up lore exposition with appearance of Vincent, who clearly was intended to have more depth than what was shown in the series. Not only he had a promising and endearing personality, but he could greatly expand Sophia and Alex relationship.
In my opinion, love triangle between Alex/Sophia/Vincent was much more prominent than the Claus/Lavie/Tatiana, but it also had a ton of potential in flashbacks, even resolving some holes in world-building around the series. In the end they all were left pretty shallow. Especially the ending itself - rushed, all cramped, with little to no exposition around anything, it was just lazy writing, and even one more episode could have made the situation far better. I really don’t get how in the show with such great structure, the accents on the characters could be so uneven.
I would die for more Sophia and Vince interactions, especially after the final battle, but their arc is left unresolved at all. All the romance in the show is executed pretty badly, because even the dynamics around main cast are cut off in the end, resolving into nothing, as is with more background characters. Really, why even have this much accent on the romance part in adventurous show, when all the relationships are left completely undone.
Overall, it was pretty good nostalgic rewatch, still craving to see more depths about this prominent and unique world such old series told about. |