So once again, we find ourselves facing the jaws of the beast: the start of another Mini-review Rampage. In order to try and post more frequently (but no promises!) I'll probably be restricting myself to 5-10 items per post, otherwise I'd have a 20 item post, not counting the 40+ albums I have listened to this semester and which will probably be receiving separate, music-only review posts. And so, without further ado:
Caprica
Given my enthusiasm for the re-visioned Battlestar Galactica series and how much I enjoyed it overall, I'll admit I was very intrigued by the idea of a prequel series. Caprica takes place approximately 58 years before the start of BSG proper, and as one might expect details the creation and beginnings of the Cylons.
To begin with, it's quite interesting because it fleshes out a lot of the society, technology, and interactions that are hinted at in BSG but never fully shown due to the war and desperation aspects of the original series. The biggest and perhaps coolest thing is the virtual-reality version of the internet, which I doubt we'll see in our lifetime, but is still a cool idea in concept.
Another nice aspect is we get to see a young William Adama, and get a better context for how he grew up the way he did. It also gives up a nice gangster/mafia story, which is a genre I've always enjoyed.
Overall the series manages to combine enough aspects of action, sci-fi, and political drama to keep me suitably hooked and get involved in. If anything, my biggest complaint is that almost every teenage character is incredibly annoying, but they're annoying because they act like real-life, misguided youth. I suspect that because I never went through their kind of rebellious/screw authority point in my life, I feel it especially more irritating that I would have otherwise, but nonetheless I don't feel a lot of sympathy for the stupid situations they end up in.
The series also continues BSG's interesting explorations of what AI truly means in relation to "real" humans, and other such philosophical ideas, as most good sci-fi does.
Overall it was a quite enjoyable series, despite some minor faults. It's annoying that the final episode reveals some very tantalizing details about what was to come in the second series, all of which looked very interesting, but unfortunately the series was not renewed for a second season, and thus we are stuck with the single one. If you can stomach a series not resolving many of the key points and want a good political intrigue + action sci-fi series, it's definitely worth trying out.
Heroman
Heroman is an odd subject, for me. To begin with, I only watched about half the series, or 13 of the 26 episodes; basically a little past the conclusion of the first arc.
It's odd because there's technically nothing I really dislike about the series (except Heroman's legs, which always looked really ugly to me, but it's a minor quibble). I can't really go into specifics, because there aren't any; I don't remember explicitly being annoyed by anything except the leg thing.
The key point is that it just didn't really hold my interest, and I couldn't say why. It was entertaining while I was watching it, but it was sometimes a little difficult to work up the will to watch the next episode. I eventually ended up giving up on it purely because I lost interest. Perhaps it was a little too generic, perhaps the characters weren't interesting enough; I'm honestly not sure the exact reason. I'd say it's worth trying out, but if it doesn't immediately catch your interest it might not necessarily be worth pursuing further.
(Normally I don't review series I don't finish, but I have been told that the second half is not all that different from the first; I'm willing to stand corrected if that's the not the case, though.)
Macross Zero
Since Macross Frontier is probably one of my favorite animes of all time, I realized this summer that it's odd I had never tried watching any of the other series from the universe. I set out to rectify this, starting with Macross Zero, a 5-episode OVA that's technically a prequel to the original Macross series. It's also notable for being the movie that Macross Frontier recreates in-universe in Episode 10. Thus, the events were a little familiar to me, albeit in backwards order than most fans of the universe are accustomed to.
Basically, pilot gets stuck on desert island as the first Variable Fighters begin to appear, major battle over Precursor (or whatever they're called) technology that will eventually lead to the technology in later Macross fights. As is typical of Macross series, the OVA mixes singing, dogfighting, and romance, featuring not just one, or two, or three, but four major romances (cool huh).
Overall I quite enjoyed the series; it had a good mix of elements and all of them were done fairly. If anything, the biggest problem is the brevity of the series; although it's all done well, none of the characters/problems last long enough for the viewer to get seriously attached to them, or at least how I got attached to the character in Frontier. It does work surprisingly well as a stand-alone series, though, given that I don't really know the events of Superdimensional Fortress Macross. If you like any of the above-mentioned elements, or are a fan of Macross, it's definitely worth checking out and won't take long to watch.
Time of Eve
I didn't know much about Eve no Jikan (in English Time of Eve) before going in to the 6-episode series, and thus was pleasantly surprised by the brief series. The show itself is heavily inspired by Asimov's "I, Robot" (which I have read) as it features robots who follow the 3 Laws of Robotics, and like the book, each episode focuses on one robot in particular and how it defies the expectations of robots.
Time of Eve is quintessential philosophical sci-fi series; most of the time is spend in the café from which the show draws its name, and most of the "action" comes from the protagonists interactions with the patrons of the cafe, where robots and humans are indistinguishable. While there is technically an overarching plot, it's secondary to the exploration of each robot's story as the show explores the line between robots and humans, and whether there even is such a line.
I suspect if the show had more episodes it would have started to drag, but at 6 episodes it feels a perfect length. We get a variety of stories and situations, and all of the characters are fun and interesting which is especially important given how the show revolves around the characters. It's also quite pretty, which helps some. If philosophy or classic sci-fi is your thing, definitely worth a watch.
Cowboys & Aliens
Ahhh, Cowboys & Aliens. This was a movie I was incredibly excited for from the first time I saw the trailer: with James Bond, Indiana Jones, and 13, how could you possibly go wrong? Add in two of my favorite genres of movies, westerns and sci-fi, and it seemed like you had a perfect combination for a me-movie.
Did it live up to my expectations? Well, yes and no. I definitely enjoyed it, and don't regret going to see it. It has the actors being awesome, excellent fight scenes, and a cool atmosphere. However, the story is a bit subpar, and I felt the pacing was not the best it could have been. I can't pin exactly what the problem is, but the movie never quite leapt from the "good" into the "great" category for me. I'll admit, I had somewhat high expectations going in, but I don't think that influenced my feelings towards the movie all that much. I suppose the best reaction I can give is that I enjoyed it, but I'm not sure I would necessarily go out of my way to re-watch it. It's solid, but not out of the ordinary, and I'll admit I'm a bit disappointed at the lost potential.
Macross Plus
On my quest to watch more Macross, I went on to watch the 4-part OVA Macross Plus, which is a sequel to the original story. Unfortunately, unlike Macross Zero, I didn't enjoy Macross Plus nearly as much. The characters weren't as interesting, the animation felt a lot more dated, and the dogfights weren't that exciting. Add to that that the main singer of the series is a robot (seriously) the OVA basically removed all my favorite aspects of Frontier. The story is basically a competition between two test pilots over which new VF is better, and then there's some love triangle, and then... something climatic happens. Bottom line is that I don't remember the show that well even though it's only been a couple months, wheras I remember the events of Zero much more clearly despite my watching Zero well before Plus. Only diehard fans of Macross need watch Plus, and I don't even count myself among that number.
The picture is unrelated, but Ricecakes is awesome and made this GIF for MEEE from one of my favorite scenes from Wakfu, a show I am currently watching, and I needed something as a space breaker :-P
Anyway, that's all for now, tune in soon for more! (oh emperor why more)
-HTMC
You would request that gif.
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