Ozma

[Kraco]

"In the far future, the elevated irradiation from the sun has destroyed the environment of the earth and the birthrate of humans has drastically decreased. The government controls society with an army of cloned soldiers called "Ideal Children (IC)". Sam Coin is a trader in a desert. One day, he saves a beautiful woman Maya, who has been chased by Theseus, a corps of IC. He shelters her in his trade ship, but the destroyers of Theseus surround Sam and Maya." -MyAnimeList

Links: AniDB, ANN, Official
Genres: Sci-fi
Episode 1 - HorribleSubs






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First thing to say is that this looks really old-school. I haven't seen designs like this since 80's or early 90's shows. There's also something disneyish or something in the designs of the more comedic minor characters. But other than that blast from the past, this seemed quite interesting. Dune hits in the face during the first moments in a good way. Adventure is a genre favourite of mine, and while I wasn't bold enough to list it after sci-fi up there (since no site really lists genres extensively for this yet), this first ep showed enough of it already.

How could it be anything else but adventure, when Char himself makes an appearance (even if he dyed his hair darker and got a less flashy coat):


Anyway, the voice cast was nice enough, with Kakihara Tetsuya (Natsu of Fairy Tail, Simon of Gurren-Lagann) as the main character dude, Tanaka Rie (Sammy of Eve no Jikan, Lacus Clyne of Gundam, Chizuru of Ika-Musume) as the girl in white of the screenshot, and Fujimura Ayumi (Azaka of Kara no Kyoukai, Misaki of Kaichou, Eiko of Ika-Musume) as the jealous childhood friend girl. We also hear Tanaka Atsuko (Caster of FSN, Motoko of GitS, Konan of Naruto Shippuuden) as the enigmatic captain (dressed in red in the ss).

I'll keep watching.

[Buffalobiian]

First thing to say is that this looks really old-school. I haven't seen designs like this since 80's or early 90's shows.

I saw the promo pic above without reading anything and immediately thought "Captain Harlock 2012???"

[MFauli]

The pacing is terrible. I hope this was just some f*** up of this first episode, but things proceeded way to quickly. I´m not normally one to complain about a quick plot progression, but we went from "hero meets unkown girl" to "hero saves unknown girl" to "unknown girl is introduced to hero´s group" to "enemy fleet re-appears at hero´s group" to "captain risks it all for unknown girl" in the span of one episode. Wow! Would have preferred if they had taken their time and made this one episode into the frame of five episodes, slowly introducing the world and characters. Oh well.

As for the art, I really like that character design, but damn, if it doesn´t feel cheap. The coloring of the characters looks cheap, the animations are rough and too simplistic. It also doesn´t help that the dialogues are really shallow, too. I´ll certainly give this a few more episodes, but it´s not so much feeling old as it is feeling cheap that is this anime´s problem imo. But, again, maybe they wanted to show a lot of different stuff for this introductory episode and take it slower from ep 2 onwards.

Sidenote: I´d really like to know what it is that makes the silver-haired girl a "beauty". Personally, I think the blonde girl is way prettier. Is it the long hair that makes a girl beautiful per default in Japan or what?

[Kraco]

Would have preferred if they had taken their time and made this one episode into the frame of five episodes, slowly introducing the world and characters. Oh well.

They couldn't do that because this series is apparently only six episodes long.

[MFauli]

Ah, okay. Then I´ll probably watch it completely anyways.

[Kraco]

Episode 2 - HS





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This show sports even more techno jargon than Star Trek... Although it didn't break the flow in my opinion and could have even contributed to the immersion. Not that it would have appeared to be of any particular importance. In any case, this episode reminded me of submarine movies in a good way. One third of the show is now over, if the six episode length is true, so I hope the next ep will reveal more of the bigger story.

[EpyonNext]

Late 80/early 90s character design: Sold.

[Kraco]

Episode 3 - HS


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Even I'm starting to get annoyed by the main character dude. There's something wrong with his personality, and in that sense learning he worships his lost brother comes as no surprise. He's clearly obsessed with whatever strikes his fancy to an unhealthy degree. If I interpreted the scene from Theseus correctly, some old scumbag will take over his brother's body. Or maybe create a clone based on it. Either way, it certainly opens a path to a scene where Sam will meet his brother - only to realise it's not his brother in reality. I pray this won't happen, because knowing Sam's personality, it would be vexing beyond belief.

I thought Ozma was a giant sandworm, but it seems to be a giant machine. Interesting. Who's piloting it? Or is it an AI?

[Buffalobiian]

Ah... so I finally get a spiritual sequel to Submarine Super 99. Nice.

ven I'm starting to get annoyed by the main character dude. There's something wrong with his personality, and in that sense learning he worships his lost brother comes as no surprise. He's clearly obsessed with whatever strikes his fancy to an unhealthy degree. If I interpreted the scene from Theseus correctly, some old scumbag will take over his brother's body. Or maybe create a clone based on it. Either way, it certainly opens a path to a scene where Sam will meet his brother - only to realise it's not his brother in reality. I pray this won't happen, because knowing Sam's personality, it would be vexing beyond belief.

A lot of his characters are like that Kraco. In a large majority of stories (if not every story) the younger boy always chases after his missing father and/or older brother into outer space or some other wilderness. Likewise the long-haired, supernatural "Maetel" mold is also another favourite of his.

It looked more like his brother took over Gido to some extent more than anything else.

I thought Ozma was a sandworm too. The robot that it turned out to be didn't even look elongated in shape particularly..

Out of all the women though.. Bainas is hot as hell. If there's something I like more than pure elegance, it's the perfect strike between tastefulness and wild agression. Mimay's not bad, but compared to her captain she gets shot down.

Sidenote: I´d really like to know what it is that makes the silver-haired girl a "beauty". Personally, I think the blonde girl is way prettier. Is it the long hair that makes a girl beautiful per default in Japan or what?

Long hair has a lot to do with it. It's more or less just because she's the princess archetype (and the Maetel mould as talked about before).

[Buffalobiian]

HorribleSubs - Episode 04

[Buffalobiian]

HorribleSubs - Episode 05

[Buffalobiian]

HorribleSubs - Episode 06




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Nice little story. I don't really get how releasing lifeforms that were dying outside (I presume) just like that would restore the world's ecosystem.. or if they're just leaving it to chance, but whatever.