We start off with a flashback of Ralph Werec at his parent’s grave saying he is going to be a captain in a war 130 light years away. His younger sister Sara doesn’t want to see him go, but he dances a box step with her and gives her a matching pendant to hold on to. His bold proclamation doesn’t fool young Sara; she’s already seen Voices of a Distant Star and knows she’ll be dead by the time he comes home. Cue the extremely appropriate sponsor splash screen.
Fast forward and we get the setup for the whole global/personal aspect of war thing. Humankind has been split in two ever since the discovery of Mercurion led to sorta light speed. All the Reasoner-trainees at the Glabella Space Research Center are working to become awesome Strain pilots to help the Union defeat the Deague. We see that Sara is a great pilot and she has loyal friends (Mary and Colin) and a potential suitor (Sedi).
Unfortunately, the night before graduation a ton of Tumors break through the barrier and attack the research center. It looks like a typical mecha battle, but before our heroes can get all cliche, a mysterious red Strain comes out and one-shots everyone. Sara tails the Strain to the research center and finds a bishie with long white hair grabbing a mysterious girl out of a container. He’s got a scar over his left eye, and he looks a lot like war hero Ralph Werec. Sara is quickly dispatched, and the mysterious traitor escapes unscathed.
Well that was certainly depressing, and unexpectedly thrilling. There were so many potentially cliche moments where it looked like our protagonist and friends would go all shounen on us, only to be deflated quickly by the power of long white hair. While the ever present acronym babble (MIMIC: a Ministerial Instrument of Mercurion Interface Core) was present, not much else went as I expected. In fact, everything was delightfully depressing. It also reminded me of Epcot.
We never did get to see what exactly a Mimic is (aside from being a harvested brain cell from the pilot), but the fight scenes were awesome. No doubt Mimics will play a big role later on. However, just to keep the whole thing from spiraling too far into a sad morass, there was a touch of Sara fanservice thrown in to sweeten the deal.
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About Kabitzin: One of the founders of Sea Slugs, I handle most of the blog admin tasks while wearing my I AM BOSS shirt. I like my action series well-choreographed, and my romance series extra trashy. I also have a soft spot for puns. |
4 Comments
This show is awesome! Too bad the quality is pretty low and it’s only 13 episodes…
Although the mech aren’t too bad, and the fight scenes are decent, I have to agree with your statement about the overall art. Sara especially looks kinda rough, and her hair is pretty bad. It’s not bad enough to really complain about yet, but for a first episode it makes me worry about the rest of the series’ production values.
Aww… I’m a bit sad that Sedi died, coz I kinda liked his voice. Quite unique in my opinion.
Sigh.
Animation quality low? lol maybe I didn’t notice it but I thought it was above average haha. Well besides that the Mechs look effing amazing, and the designs are better then what I’ve seen in most mech anime’s!