What makes the first half of the show so great? The biggest strength of the first half was its character interactions. Each episode was stuffed full of fast-paced banter and discussion from a wide variety of characters, and it all worked extremely well. It led to episodes that could both be funny while still keeping the viewer emotionally invested in the serious problems each episode presented. Its very rare to find a show that does this better than Planates did.
Each episode also had a lot going on but never felt overwhelming. Instead many episodes had multiple, all equally interesting and engaging sub-plots that all softly intersected at some point. Each episode had at least some minor humor which worked well, but every episode was also fairly grounded and presented serious problems for either individuals or the entire crew.
The episodes also tied in nicely with the overarching story. At least for the first half, there was no clear end goal for the story, but rather it just followed the people in the debris sector doing their job as time moved on. This worked really well in my opinion.
The shows good character interactions were in large part due to the quality of characters. Each character was very memorable, both in design, personality, and goals. Each key character got at least some spotlight and it was consistently well done. The romance (in the first half) also worked pretty well. It is much better than most other similar dramas. They actually put a decent amount of focus on it in each episode. Because the show is a drama and not a romance I was very happy with how they handled the romance in the first half.
If the first half was so great, what went wrong in the second half? Well, pretty much everything.
Remember the banter that I said was so great? Well in the second half it's pretty much all gone. This is due to changes in the crew staff and in changes due to character development.
The biggest weakness of the second half was its character development. There were two types. The first were characters that had literally 0 development (or a very tiny amount). This was mostly secondary characters or characters who didn't really have much of a reason to change. This was fine. The 2nd type was characters who got significantly worse. The 3 in particular were Hoshino, Tanabe and Claire. All 3 of these characters went from enjoyable to borderline unbearable after episode 15.
Hoshino went from a good friend and co-worker to a self-obsessed egomaniac who cut off all contact with all his friends/family/girlfriend and told multiple people to their face to go fuck themselves basically when they tried to be friendly. He deluded himself for literally 0 good reason that everyone was a negative influence and became a massive dick because of it. This character development was pretty bad and unenjoyable, but the thing that made it really bad was that nobody cared. Even while being a dick to everyone, anytime anyone saw him they acted super happy and friendly with him. Nobody cared that he didn't talk to them for months. Nobody cared that he told everyone that he didn't need them and that they didn't mean anything to him. Very normal. Of course, he does a complete 180 at the end and changes completely because why not.
The biggest culprit of the blind Hoshino forgiveness train was definitely Tanabe. In the first 14 episodes, she was a normal character who was quite enjoyable and acted like a normal human. Then in episode 15 she becomes super cold and mean to Hoshino for basically no reason. After this episode, she becomes love-obsessed with Hoshino and basically doesn't care how poorly he treats her over a very long period of time because LOVE. He ditches multiple dates to run on his treadmill. He ignores the problems of the debris crew and starts to ignore Tanabe in their little time together. Then he ignores her for multiple months during his training, and once she finally does get in contact with him, he is a complete asshole to her? No problem. All of this and her respect and love for Hoshino doesn't drop one bit. Once he does his random little 180 they finally reunite and can be in love together. What a great ending to a great saga. Definitely felt very genuine and deserved...
Finally, there is Claire. They decided to push her to a bigger role in the 2nd half. I enjoyed her character in the first half so I was looking forward to it, but it was really bad. All she does is whine and complain. Anytime any character decides to try and be positive they get shut down by her and she makes them feel bad. I won't spoil what happens next, but if you follow the drop in writing quality and character development while watching the show then you could probably guess (I sure could even though I really hoped they wouldn't do it).
All 3 of these characters went from enjoyable to very unenjoyable.
The story overall was still pretty good. It had a nice realistic goal for some characters and progressed at a good pace. There were also some really good episodes still (the training/tryout episodes especially) but on average they were more boring and annoying.
Yet despite all this I still am thinking fondly about the show. I decided to write a review after all. Honestly, I'm not sure exactly how I should feel about this show overall.
Also worth noting the animation and music were both pretty good. The music was pretty solid and I enjoyed the animation a fair amount.
Overall I'd give the scores of:
ep 1-14:
9/10 characters
7/10 story
7/10 animation
6/10 music
10/10 enjoyment
9/10 overall
ep 15-26:
2/10 characters
8/10 story
7/10 animation
6/10 music
3/10 enjoyment
4/10 overall
Total:
6.5/10 overall (rounding down because its slightly closer to 6 than 7)
