Customer Reviews

Planetes (Vol. 6)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Indeed, the series is one of best Anime I have watched in the past couple of years, as per previous review. And I'm not even a fan SciFi as such.

The mastering is also very good, with an anamorphic widescreen(!), good subtitles, and bonus disks you don't get with a HK pirate collection.

BUT I just bought the complete series, and 5 DVDs out of 6(!!) had visible defects!! On 3 they are minor, but on the 2 disks I am returning, they are interfering with the playback.

- If you buy this series, make sure to immediately CHECK the disks for DEFECTS -

I have never seen such poor manufacturing, and these are official U.S. releases from Bandai, a large company if there ever was one. With sleeves and more than enough protective tape around the box to protect Fort Knox. Even the sleeves were glued together the wrong way, with the inside tab glued to the outside. I intentionally pay a premium for the official release (to support the actual artists/Studio that created this great series and encourage more U.S. releases), and at the very least I would expect better manufacturing than a crummy HK copy...

That said, again, this series is well worth the money.

One of the most common failings for any anime series, or in fact, any extended series tv or otherwise, is the ending. Often, what starts off as a genuinely intriguing premise tapers off at the middle, than somewhat picks up near the end, but than often totally blows up into unrecognizable chunks of nonsense and questions. A classic case of this, I think most anime fans will agree, is Evangelion the TV series. Even after multiple viewing of the ending, most of us were left scratching our heads, or trying to come up with haywire explanations that tried inm vain to make sense of the complex mess that were its last 3 episodes.

It's all the more surprising, and thankful, than, that Planetes maintains a steady pace of good storytelling and logical sense from start to finish. While PLanetes is not a series dedicated to a single, continuous storyline from the first to last episodes (like Berserk... or the more recent Gankutsuou) it managed to keep its focus right on its underlying themes even on the stand-alone episodes. And as we view the final episodes of this magnificent series, I think most of us will agree that its ending, while subdued, was both appropriate and, dare I say it for an anime series?, beatutiful to behold.

As I've also written in my review of disc 1, Planetes is one of those rare anime that you can recommend to your skeptical friends or even parents with a straight face and clean conscience. Disc 6, with its moving finale, absolutely justifies the premise that even japanese cartoons can achieve the stature of great drama.

Buy the first, before any comment about how it ends your little bit of curiosity gets squashed.

As Planetes concludes, the Jupiter exploration ship Von Braun -- with Hachi and his father aboard as crew -- has been hijacked just as the UN-analogue is holding its first summit in space to decide who will get the exploitation rights to resources on the moon and elsewhere in space. While the terrorists fight the spirited resistance of Von Braun's trainee crew and attempt to assassinate project head Werner Locksmith, the political bigshots are held hostage with the threat that the ship will be crashed into the moon's largest city, a disaster which could mean the end of all space exploration (or so the terrorists hope).

Tanabe and the crew of DS-12 are caught up in the plot, Tanabe having talked her way into a visit to Von Braun to finally have it out with her negligent boyfriend, while DS-12 is itself hijacked from within Half Section and used to deliver part of the terrorist strike force to Von Braun.

When that crisis is over (you can guess how it ends, but you should really watch the specifics for yourself), Hachi's friends and family must heal him emotionally; in his current state he's in no shape to set out upon a seven-year mission to Jupiter. Nothing his coworkers have tried has had any effect upon him, and Hachi drifts apathetically through life in his confused, self-centered haze.

The conclusion of Planetes leaves the characters in rather different situations than in the manga, but I couldn't say which ending I like better. In the manga, Hachi doesn't really find himself until the Von Braun's arrival at Jupiter, while the series ends with the ship launching (with several father/son hijinks on international TV in the process). Hachi's internal struggles dominated the latter half of the series, but Tanabe's own journey through life is no less interesting -- I'm actually sad that more of her backstory wasn't explored in the TV series, as it was in the manga, but then, that's a good reason for people who would like to know more about her to read through the manga. The crew of DS-12 was gradually pushed to the side as Hachi and the terrorist plot stole ever more of the spotlight; this makes for a good mix of action and character development, but I definitely wish that the show had taken the time to squeeze in more development for the secondary characters, even though it already gives them more air time in the final episodes than most other shows. It's not all Hachi, but while Planetes begins as the story for Tanabe's struggle finding her place in the world (or above it), by the halfway point that focus has been turned to Hachi's journey in search of the same end.

I've thoroughly enjoyed this series from start to finish, I came to it late, starting around the time that disc 4 was released, but found myself axiously awaiting delivery of this final DVD. All three of the last episodes have Japanese commentary; if you haven't been watching those, you're missing out on one of the more entertaining sets of special features this show has to offer.