While out of town, I had limited access to Internet, but I was able to catch up on Last Exile. Years ago, Ender had suggested it to me, and I watched bits of the first episode and lost interest. However, with all this time to kill, I decided it was time for a second viewing; actually a bad idea, because I got way less sleep than I needed marathoning the whole thing across three nights.
Last Exile is a really beautiful story about Claus and Lavie, two Vanship pilots who have a dream to cross the Grand Stream like their famous fathers. As luck would have it, they end up getting embroiled in a complicated and grand conflict over the control of the world. What makes Last Exile so wonderful is the way the spectacular cast of characters and the deep mystery all fit together to tell a simple story of dreams, survival, and freedom. Of course the fantastic (almost unbelievably good) production values and complimentary music (I love the ED) do much to sweeten the taste even further. With a great set of characters and a engaging storyline, Last Exile has its share of really memorable moments. Some of my favorites include Wina lying to Sophia about Alex’s final words, Dio’s turning around to find that he has been piloting without Luciolus, and the revelation that Mullin Shetland managed to get that last medal, the promotion, the girl, and two kids. Rock on, Mullin, that chant was worth almost as much as the Mysteria. I’d probably tap Dio and Sophia as my favorite characters in the show, but most of them were pretty likable.
Of course there were moments that I was snickering as well, such as the increasingly absurd dishes that Maestro Delphine was trotting out for Claus. She seriously had to have been making that stuff up, or she is incredibly gullible. I know Alex’s demise was supposed to be sad, but he went in a way befitting of a brooding bishounen, with roses all around him and sparkles aplenty. Also strangely amusing was the scene where Sophia was coming onto Claus really hard. That’s workplace harassment to be sure, although Claus was quite the stud of the ship at the time. Towards the end of the story, the focus tended to wander a little, and I was saddened at how Lavie was pushed out. It was like the writers were making the point that anyone could be a Navi, even that stuffed goat Alvis was always carrying (I want one of those). Also, they never really explained what was going on with EXILE and what the point of the Grand Stream was. Even some voice-over at the end would have been enough, but I felt like the ending had several loose ends.
Not that these quibbles do anything to lessen the impact that Last Exile had on me. Really an A+ effort all around, with amazing animation and production values. It’s a classic to be sure, and if you passed it by the first time like me, maybe it’s time to make an Immelman Turn and give it another chance. I don’t know if that actually makes sense, but I wanted to work “Immelman Turn” into this writeup really badly.
Kabitzin’s Rating: 5/5
14 Comments
That’s part of why I like piloting the jets in BF2 so much! I use the Immelman Turn a lot in dogfighting (though the improved Stingers make it hard to have a real air battle now…), and every time I think of Claus shouting its name with his Engrishy accent
Yeah, I never caught why exile had been “locked up” and left floating around for so long…
Oh, and about the goat, I’ve got one! I saw it at RightStuf and just had to buy it. It’s awesome, but - while the bell works - it doesn’t go “Baaa!”. Oh, well.
Hmm… ah, here’s the link:
Hm *scratch head*
Interesting how different perceptions can be. To me, Last Exile had the most bland and nondescript set of lead characters ever. Especially Claus was so utterly devoid of anything original or interesting that it was impressive. You worded it perfectly right - Alex’s demise was SUPPOSED to be sad, but was it, really? For you? It left me completely cold, just like I could never warm up with him (unusual for me, because I tend to like his character template). If it hadn’t been for Lavi, Sophia and Dio, my character rating would have been a straight D instead of a weak C.
Animation was awesome indeed, and if it doesn’t rub you the wrong way to have soldiers unleash bayonet barrages on neighboring airships, I guess it also had an interesting background setup. Nevertheless, the most memorable thing about Last Exile was to me how unmemorable it was for a very-high-budget show.
A 3/5 from me.
I marathoned Last Exile last summer with a friend in two days (first day 20hours, next day three) and I have to say the show did not have the effect on me when I watched it (although I already quite liked it), but it did not stop to bother me afterwards. The animations is superb and story catching. Well, Alex…my friend and I suggested he must have hemorrhoids, because he is sitting on that damn seat with his legs crossed for about 25 episodes *lol*
All in all it turned to one of my favourite shows ever, and I own a plush goat, too ^^
I suspect I would have liked it more if I had marathoned the series instead of catching it weekly over 1/2 a year. While I love the tone and very outstanding scenario, I honestly could not identify with the sluggish character development nor the meandering plot. It did however finish stronger than I expected and is indeed much MUCH better than GONZO’s previous work of Kiddy Grade then, but still, I found it difficult to recommend the series wholeheartedly except to folks who put high production values over all. :P
I love the ED too. Brought out so beautifully Claus and Lavie’s relationship. Still on my playlist.
At first, I thought Alex Rowe was a similar character to Captain Harlock but in the end his character was rather shallow. Even though I found Last Exile quite awesome I agree with Mentar that the extremely well-done and polished surface had to cover a couple of defictis in especially missing depth and several loose ends. What I really liked about it was the unconventional setting.
I’m somewhere between Kabitzin and Mentar on this one. I felt the series had incredible potential, and of course the production values were flat-out amazing. In my book, LE wins massive points for its vivid world setting (something I’m particularly biased toward). There aren’t many series with well-characterized otherworldy settings - most of the current crop are not focused on world-creation, and use a modern universe. Execution was decent, depending on your taste for SoL elements (which I’m quite fond of). However, the lack of depth in key characters and the meandering, unfocused plotline marred the sparkling sheen. Overall, a worthy effort though. Btw, Shetland was a total stud - now all he needs is an axe, and his collection would be complete.
Ender’s rating - 4.1/5
Mentar, concerning your musings on Alex’s character template; usually such characters are cold on the outside, but eventually reveal a very warm and human personality over time. Alex, however, didn’t have that other side, and remained a machine-like man nearly devoid of passion to the end. I think this turns a lot of people off, but at least it’s different (albeit somewhat boring…). He didn’t really get enough screentime to display any “versatility” anyways (though he may have well done so in the Derek Zoolander sense).
I’ve seen only 5-6 Eps, dubbed (ita), on MTV some time ago. I wasn’t caught by this anime, so I can’t really make comments about it. I can recall the top-notch overall quality of the (Gonzo) animation, but the story and characters didn’t impress me at the time, and I dropped it. Maybe I can put it on my list for a rematch.
Claus definitely was not a very deep main character, but towards the end, the story started moving away from him anyway. Without a doubt, LE is a series that should be marathoned. I can’t even imagine watching it one episode at a time, with the way the plot meandered between episodes. However, watching it in long doses was great. As for Alex, I thought he was a great character, a real dead man walking. As nice as Wina’s lie was for Sophia, I don’t think that Alex was capable of living a normal life anymore, and so his final end didn’t strike me as particularly sad.
I guess this is further testament to the power of marathons. Even mediocre series like Trinity Blood are watchable in large chunks. I’ll be writing about that one in a bit
Yes, the point is that Alex is already dead in a way, just a machine that wants to extract revenge, and I really liked it, it’s different and highly possible (not everyone warms up because kids and hot women are around them).
There’s also this false death that really disturbes me at the end…did he die, or not? What’s the point?
>>not everyone warms up because kids and hot women are around them
LOL…
I have only just finished watching Last Exile myself actually after going though the final five volumes inside of a week, I’ll probably write a review tomorrow on my blog but I do pretty much agree with everything you said although I kinda felt that Gonzo could have made a better job of some of the CGI sequences. One moment that springs to mind immediately is the sequence when part of what I recall from memory to be the guild fortress is cut off and falls to earth landing in the sea resulting in some hardly convincing tidal waves. I probably have some other gripes with the series when I sit down to think about it but over all it was quite enjoyable which I guess is all that matters at the end of the day.
do you understand th death of dio?
was it a symbolic or not….and why did you hear his voice in the last episode?(26-3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja-FqzKRwIA this is the episode ^_^
thank you very much.
One Trackback
[...] favorite part of this episode was when Saito was able to recognize the acoustic signature of Siesta’s heaving chest. I wonder where that vendor got the school uniform from, and I [...]