Story: The story is set in the far future, when mankind left earth due to climatic circumstances, that lead to the earth being completely covered with ice. Now humankind is battling flowerlike creatures called Hideauze in space, using mechas to extinct them. In one battle the young soldier Ledo gets sucked into a wormhole and gets to a planet completely covered with water, where people live on huge fleets, not knowing of others living in space and seeming to be pretty much left behind in techonology.
The story itself is mostly about Ledo adapting to the way people live on the world that he now is in. This certainly is not a Urobuchi like show. While I did enjoy the story of it, it was not what I expected and it felt like everyone was just waiting for the dark plot twist to happen. The twist came and he was as good as expected but it didn't go into the dark direction after that either. This being said, it still is not a bad story, just surprising.
In total the story stayed pretty long at the basic concept of adapting to a new life style, but when the pacing got faster, it got pretty good, but nothing mind blowing! The ending also wasn't quite satisfying as it was and it could've been executed better!
8/10
Characters: The chararcters are the things the show is mostly based on. With the plot moving forward really slow in the beginning, the characters are what carries the show on and that's what they do pretty good. Even later on when the show decides to speed up a lot, the characters still have a major role in bringing the plot forward. The characters are all rather lieable and almost none of the important onesd remain without depht. The only problem I have with this is that the love story we have in here feels a bit rushed. While I do like both characeters involved, it did feel kind of rushed.
9/10
Art: Production I.G. didn't leave us unsatisfied again! The animation of Gargantia was incredible! Everything was fluent (my favourite scene animationwise was the dancing scene :3) and the colors were pretty. The characters being designed by a hentai artist looked gorgeous!
10/10
Sound: The Soundtrack of Gargantia was pretty much decent. It mostly fit the scenes quite well and I don't have anything to complain, but it wasn't anything superb. The voice acting was ok as well, but still nothing too special.
7/10
Enjoyment: Even though most parts of this show were only Ledo adapting to a new lifestyle, the characters were what made it interesting. I found myself really enjoying this even though I was surpriserd to see this kind of story being handled by Urobuchi Gen.
8/10
All in all I think Gargantia is a show that can be liked by many, since it is something that has a lot of parts in it, ranging from Slice of Life on the fleet, to action filled battle scenes to some dramatic and darker moments. I like this but it isn't anything outstanding and while being handled quite well, it still has flaws!
All in all a 8/10
