Tag: space

Knights of Sidonia quick anime and manga review

Still easing myself back into watching and blogging about anime regularly. Gundam 00 really did a number on me. From now on I will know better than to marathon a drama-heavy show, and if the fandom says to stay away from a movie I will consider their responses more carefully. Today, let’s talk about Knights of Sidonia. I watched both seasons of the anime and finished up by reading the manga, which was only 78 chapters long and thus a quick affair. The ending was… umm… Well, we’ll talk about that in a bit. First the summary:

Knights of Sidonia (シドニアの騎士) is a mecha manga series by Tsutomu Nihei. After destroying Earth many years ago, the alien race Gauna has been pursuing the remnants of humanity—which, having narrowly escaped, fled across the galaxy in a number of giant seed ships. In the year 3394, Nagate Tanikaze surfaces from his lifelong seclusion deep beneath the seed ship Sidonia in search of food on the upper levels, only to find himself dragged into events unfolding without his knowledge.
When the Gauna begin their assault on Sidonia, it’s up to Tanikaze to defend humanity’s last hope for survival, and defeat their alien foes.

What I liked about Knights of Sidonia
  • It’s short. You can marathon both seasons of the anime.
  • The enemies are truly threatening. Although Tanikaze starts out overpowered, he can’t keep up with the Gauna’s speed of adaptation so he’s almost always in danger. This isn’t one of those “Boring Invincible Hero” shows.
  • That said, Tanikaze is a pretty boring typical shonen hero who tries to save everyone all the time. But he’s a nice, earnest guy and easy to root for, which is more than I can say for many protagonists.
  • There’s plenty of action in every episode. Sometimes it gets a bit much.
  • The ending is happier than I would have expected, given the overwhelming odds they face.
  • It seems to be a love-hate kind of thing, but I rather like the CG art style. It’s different from the other stuff I’ve been watching.
  • She takes some getting used to, but Tsumugi-chan is kind of cute. Best girl ftw!
What I didn’t like about Knights of Sidonia
  • Some of the gauna are kind of gross.
  • Some of the scenes are kind of gross, like the living catheter (ick) and the romantic piss-drinking (double ick).
  • A little too much time is wasted on romantic hijinks halfway through the show/manga. It brings everything to a screeching halt to have girls fighting over the hero when the world is collapsing around them.
  • I don’t approve of certain relationships in the ending (to explain would be to spoil, but it is an abomination).
  • Some of the characters look a little too similar, which makes it hard to tell people apart at first.
  • Certain characters get away with murder, literally, and are quickly and easily forgiven. Like it’s not even an issue.
To watch or not to watch?

It’s probably faster to read the Knights of Sidonia manga, since it’s only 78 chapters. But the anime isn’t bad at all, plenty of action and tense moments and the body count of a small civil war. There are many unanswered questions at the end concerning the origins and intentions of the gauna and the history of the world, so this probably isn’t for anyone who likes complete closure. For anybody else, y

Watched Gundam 00 Season 2 + the movie

Yes, I said I would watch it and I did… and it almost killed this blog. Was it bad? No, honestly I enjoyed most of  Gundam 00 Season 2 more than the first season. The ending was highly implausible and a little overly optimistic given the nature of human beings, but it was… serviceable. Acceptable, even. The movie, I shouldn’t have watched. It was exhausting, pointless, aliens? in my Gundam? It’s more likely than you think! And by the end I was all Gundammed out. Not just Gundammed out but anime-d out, it took me two weeks to touch any episode of any other show.

Final thoughts: I marathoned both seasons so fast that they’re a blur now. I want to forget I ever watched any of this stuff. It was such a cheerless, joyless, tedious show. At least I did learn that I prefer the Gundam Seed/Wing-type BOOM POW KAPOW overpowered Gundams to these useless weaklings with their ridiculous ideas and incompetent leadership. So from an anime watcher’s point of view it’s good to know what you like and what you don’t like.

Apart from that, I’ve got nothing left to say about Gundam 00. It’s good to get it off my backlog. It doesn’t mean I won’t watch any more Gundam. And it got me pretty involved when I was watching. But… now that it’s all over… what did I watch it for? It was so crappy, so unsatisfying, such a waste of time… *sigh* I want those 2000 minutes of my life back… <— That’s how I felt when I finished the whole show + the movie.

Oh. I supposed I’d better comment on my wishlist from last time:

The overall story needs to make sense – It did, more or less. I won’t spoil. I don’t care enough to spoil

Better planning, strategy and reconnaissance from all parties but especially the Gundams – NOPE. There were flashes of brilliance here and there, but everything always fizzled to naught. Nobody ever had a backup plan in case the first one didn’t work, it was just ridiculous. And I lost count of the number of battles that turned into skirmishes – you hit me, I hit you, we kill a few grunt pilots, everyone retreat!

More Tieria back story – This we got. Pretty straightforward stuff, and Tieria becomes much less of a jerk and much more of a useful, sympathetic character as the show progresses. This part I enjoyed.

Less Saji and Louise – Ha. No.

Less Setsuna, less Mari-whatshername – Ha. Of course not, Setsuna is the main character. But there was less focus on Marina and she didn’t turn into the second coming of Lacus Clyne, so we should be grateful for that much.

Enough talking about Gundam 00. It wasn’t bad but it made me feel bad. It’s that kind of show. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to hunt for something light and fluffy and actually interesting to clean the bad taste from my mouth.