(L) Last Exile -Fam, The Silver Wing-

[rulfo]

Originally Posted by stormwaltzing

The CGI in the episode was great, but the animation itself seemed to sadly lack (I guess they went all out on the first ep ;p)

I admit after airing my hopes after the first episode re: people being mad about the ~fanservice~, since the first series had a few moments of it as well, I have to retract that a little bit after this episode. The shot of Fam jumping onto the Vanship after the Luscinia and Liliana scene ... it made me sideeye. Please don't go overboard, guys, I'm okay with a little fanservice, but that was just kind of. >_>;

As for the rest of the episode:

What fanservice? I didn't catch any. I guess it depends on the eye of the beholder.

Frankly I think if I consider those scenes fanservice, then Guilty Crown has porn scenes in it.

[DangerMouse]

Purposefully avoided the most spoilery bits, so I can watch with the subs but oh man that fleet battle music, not only the great season 1 fleet battle music but OMG at that melancholy new music during the fleet battle...damn that was good powerful stuff. The soundtrack is so mine. OMG at the fleet battle visuals and vanship piloting, straight to my love of Last Exile, that was like pure "LE fanservice".

Agreed rulfo, way too much of an exaggeration, even from that angle they practically showed nothing it was such a quick cut to the outside shot of the ship, 99.9% of shows would have actually done a shot of incidental fanservice there, here there was practically nothing despite the first ep having that bit of fanservice.

The story, character moments and ship battles of the ep seemed awesome, I can't wait to watch, it looks like this show's going to be just as or more large scale as I'd hoped which is great, it doesn't look like they are skimping on the story.

[hiroshi5]

I saw the preview (raw)and the first episode (subbed). It seems that this show was plugged at overseas anime conventions before release - looks like many people have high hopes for it.
First reactions: the flying ships and smaller craft look great, and the girls look cute. The action is exciting and the funny bits are funny. I don't remember the original Last Exile having any comedy elements (I saw it on satellite TV with a foreign dub so I couldn't follow the dialogue so well). The fan service was kinda enjoyable.
However, I have the feeling that this new series is trying a bit too hard to please. It's not essential for a war drama to have fan-service and comedy in it - as I have suggested, the original series didn't. I also feel that it's going to irritate viewers who (like me) like their drama to make a bit of sense.

Consider: Turan is apparently ruled by two teenage princesses. In the real-life steam-punk era, in the UK, Britain really was ruled by a teenage queen (Victoria). But she had no power at all, and just did what her ministers and courtiers told her to do.
The sky above the lake suddenly darkens with an armada of flying battleships. At a plausible flying speed it would have taken the order of an hour to get this lot into position. Didn't Turan negotiate what the other side was supposed to bring, and wasn't anyone keeping a good look-out to ensure they complied?
I couldn't quite see what was the point of the Turan battleship shedding its wings - if they were holding it up it would auger straight into the ground - if they were ornamental the enemy would not be fooled.
As for air pirates, I don't recall the Japanese having had any contact with the Somali pirates. UK citizens have been kidnapped, UK shipping has been affected, and UK warships have been engaged in anti-pirate actions. So our feelings about pirates fall some way short of admiration...

One hasn't forgotten the Fractale fiasco (looked great, shame about the plot), so I hope this series turns out better.

[MrTerrorist]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Here's an irony... Animax Asia posted a link to the RC blog post about the first episode on their Facebook page. The same blog post where I say in the first paragraph, "Sorry this is three days late, but there's no stream available in the USA until three days after airing".

Originally Posted by creb

To add to the lol:

1) All blog enteries must link to: http://www.animax-asia.com/shows/lastexile
2) All blog enteries must display when it airs on animax.
3) Participants must be citizens or legal residents of countries in Asia where the Channel is available.
4) No submission shall make any visual or audio references implicitly or explicitly to alcoholic beverages, tobacco, drug paraphernalia, firearms, or any depiction or representation thereof, or be perceived as giving or threatening to give rise to criminal or civil liability, encouraging conduct that might constitute a criminal offense, or encouraging or providing instructional information about illegal activities--wait, do they watch their own show?

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Indeed, considering I put in no link or plug of any kind whatsoever and don't live in a country where Animax is available.

Heh, free pub is nice - but I'd rather have a same-day stream so I could review it sooner.

Such irony lol! It's too bad cause if you had live in any Asian countries where Animax is available, your blog could have won you a free 4 day 3 night accommodation to Japan and watch the Animax 2011 Fall Music festival.

[DangerMouse]

Originally Posted by hiroshi5

Consider: Turan is apparently ruled by two teenage princesses. In the real-life steam-punk era, in the UK, Britain really was ruled by a teenage queen (Victoria). But she had no power at all, and just did what her ministers and courtiers told her to do.

The sky above the lake suddenly darkens with an armada of flying battleships. At a plausible flying speed it would have taken the order of an hour to get this lot into position. Didn't Turan negotiate what the other side was supposed to bring, and wasn't anyone keeping a good look-out to ensure they complied?
I couldn't quite see what was the point of the Turan battleship shedding its wings - if they were holding it up it would auger straight into the ground - if they were ornamental the enemy would not be fooled.

As for air pirates, I don't recall the Japanese having had any contact with the Somali pirates. UK citizens have been kidnapped, UK shipping has been affected, and UK warships have been engaged in anti-pirate actions. So our feelings about pirates fall some way short of admiration...

One hasn't forgotten the Fractale fiasco (looked great, shame about the plot), so I hope this series turns out better.

Glad it sounded like you enjoyed it, I agree to some extent it's definitely been pitched to us just as much as Japan probably since the first series was rather well received here.

As to some of those concerns:
Turan isn't actually ruled by the two princesses, they are covering for their bed-ridden father, obviously especially Liliana. Apparently your example is the case for Ades though, supposedly a child is the actual ruler hence why Premier Luscinia has so much power.

I'm sure they did negotiate for what the Ades Federation was supposed to bring however it's pretty apparent that Ades has more military might and as they clearly had no intention of actually signing the peace treaty or even pretending to go through with the farce (they likely only even put up the act in the first place to force the princesses there since they wanted to capture them alive) they had no need to be coy about their large fleet. They probably were on the look out to see if they complied however this would seem to be a case where Turan is basically a heavy underdog, the princesses trying to meet for peace felt basically like a last ditch effort to come to terms with a far stronger power, in fact the reason the Grand Lake was chosen as the location was that they believed that to be the one place that Ades wouldn't attack them, as supposedly Ades has also considered that lake sacred. I imagine they had little choice but to try and meet them anyway even if lookouts saw a larger fleet than specified in the agreement. While it's true it would take longer than shown for all the ships to get overhead of the princesses and have the two fleets meet at the showdown location that's obviously a "sped up for TV moment".

Given the first series, the most important component for flight is the Claudia Unit(s). Some wreckage of the Lasas did go straight to the ground after the big faked explosion (probably including wreckage of those wings and some other parts all of which probably would look like it had exploded due to Dio detonating the wings after purging them) and end up in Grand Lake as Alauda reports to Luscinia (both of whom are clearly suspicious given that the clouds entirely obscured the ship's supposed big scuttling explosion and don't believe the Lasas exploded as it appeared, unlike Kayvaan who I imagine wrongly believes that there's enough wreckage that fell out of the sky to the water given the massive explosion).

Not sure what the real pirates comparison comment was for as these are obviously classic "action adventure" likeable semi-robin hood style pirates and scavengers rather than real pirates.

[MeoTwister5]

Just saw the Animax simulcast.

HOLY SHIT.

My reservations about the show's capacity for seriousness have been put to rest.

1. The music during the entire aerial combat just blew me the fuck away. It may as well be Kajiura at her best. Plus the OP and the ED tunes continue to grab me. Few people can mix techno and classical like she does. Quite possibly me favorite ED of the entire damn year.

2. Dio is clearly 3 things: one, that's a vanship he's flying. Two, he's clearly a badass. Three, he clearly knows more about all of this than he lets known. His stare at the guy who just haxed his way through Lasas and his reaction to Exile more or less proves this is the same Dio we know. There is indeed a far, far deeper connection to the previous series than the same Exile concept.

3. Luscinia all but confirms where the setting is and what's happening. Liliana is, as others have surmised, possibly the Alvis of this show. I guess it means that each Exile has a specific genetic bloodline that serves as activators for Exile, and that there are indeed multiple Exiles.

4. Quite a serious, violent and... bloody tone here. Animax did not censor the blood flowing into the lake for all of us to see. Animation takes a slight decrease in this episode for me, but understandable considering the sheer amount of CGI in this episode.

Episode just had me in pins and needles. Blog post to follow later when I finally process everything I've seen.

[Myssa Rei]

Spoiler for Episode 2:

So... It looks like the royalty of Turan, or at the very least its eldest daughter, has the same purpose that Alvis and house Hamilton had in the previous series then, meaning they're conduits of an Exile unit. Interesting indeed.

[MrTerrorist]

Finally saw episode 2.

Spoiler for ep2:

Well there was no OP as it was use for the ending which felt inappropriate which for the reason i explain why.

Turan and the Sky Pirates form an alliance to defend the Turan capital(I forgot the city's name) against the Ades fleet while Fam and Gisey escort Milia back to the capital to give battleplans to the King, the princesses father. After receiving Liliana message, the King asks Fam and Gisey to bring Milia to the Eastern Imperial villa for her safety. Meanwhile, Liliana plans to use the Lasas to ram and destroy Luscinia's flagship Impetus and causing a break down of command within the Ades fleet.

But things don't go according to plan. During the battle, Luscinia sends in Alauda to the Lasas where he kills the crew and kidnaps Liliana. Milia learns about this from Dio as she's about to leave and asks Fam to bring them to Impetus and rescue Liliana. After entering the Impetus' ventilation system, Fam, Giesy and Milia confront Luscinia at the command center where Milia is about to shoot him. Liliana arrives and begs Luscinia to stop the attack at the capital as she willing to surrender but he doesn't and tells them the history of Earth and the Exiles.

In a twist, Luscina recites one of the Mysteria which Liliana turns blue (just like Al from Last Exile) and shoots a light to one of the moons which drops down to Earth, revealing it is actually an Exile ship. Fam, Gisey and Milia escapes the Impetus as the Exile attacks the capital, killing the soldiers there including the King. By the time Fam, Gisey and Milia regains conscious, it's raining and they see the capital burning which leaves Milis shell shocked. And then cue the OP song.

What a downer. In the 2nd episode of Last Exile, it ended with a happy note but in this episode..... not so. Now i'm wondering what made Luscina into the man he is now since Liliana said he used to be a good person.

[winhlp32]

The character animation this episode takes a horrible dip, with Giselle look taking the worst damage in her face. Its like she switched nationalities at some point.

That said, the CG animation remains mostly gorgeous.

Spoiler for Episode 2:

I especially liked Fam's maneuvering inside the ship's engines and pipes en route to rescuing Liliana. The air battles remain great to look at - lots of things were destroyed in this episode, including certain people.

Last Exile's music in my opinion is the best this season, topping Guilty Crown's offering by quite a bit. The orchestra during the air battle was amazing, and really carried the sequence to have the impact that it had.

Spoiler for Episode 2:

This episode ended on a rather down note. I think people who thought this would be a light-hearted affair would be proved wrong after this episode.

Lastly, Fam Fan Fan is either the coolest name ever or lamest name ever. I wonder if she's Chinese...while Giselle on the other hand looked "Chinese" at some point due to the off-model animation.

[Last_Hope]

I´ve just recently seen the first episode and since you´re already discussing the second episode I´m a little bit cautious reading in here so forgive me if this has already been discussed.

Around 2:35 in to the first episode, in the opening, the one to the left in the helmet trio behind the long haired girl, doesn´t that look like Claus? I know the hair color might be a dealbreaker but I (want to) see similarities.

[Guardian Enzo]

Considering that most of the world will have no chance to see this subbed until 4 days after airing, I think a general use of spoiler tags in the thread for longer than normal might be a nice idea.

[azarhal]

Originally Posted by Last_Hope

Around 2:35 in to the first episode, in the opening, the one to the left in the helmet trio behind the long haired girl, doesn´t that look like Claus? I know the hair color might be a dealbreaker but I (want to) see similarities.

I'm 99% sure that all 4 characters in that screen are women.

[Kaoru Chujo]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Considering that most of the world will have no chance to see this subbed until 4 days after airing, I think a general use of spoiler tags in the thread for longer than normal might be a nice idea.

I agree. I'll try to restrain myself, lol.

Spoiler for ep2:

It seems to me that enough has happened in two episodes to fill half a series. And they have managed to deliver it with clarity, despite the compression.

The voices are generally good, but I am fascinated most by Sawashiro Miyuki as Liliana and Yuuki Aoi as Giselle. Miyukichi just seems to dominate the stage when she speaks. And Ao-chan is giving us a voice/personality I have never heard from anyone, matching the character's expression perfectly.

[creb]

Originally Posted by Last_Hope

I´ve just recently seen the first episode and since you´re already discussing the second episode I´m a little bit cautious reading in here so forgive me if this has already been discussed.

Around 2:35 in to the first episode, in the opening, the one to the left in the helmet trio behind the long haired girl, doesn´t that look like Claus? I know the hair color might be a dealbreaker but I (want to) see similarities.

Left - Claus Wannabe
Right - Claus

I think he looks a little young. It's been two years, and we've seen most of the other characters age a little (well, 'cept Dio, but who knows what the lifespan of Guildies are).

[wandering-dreamer]

Well this could be fun: Online game planned

[DangerMouse]

Awesomeness MeoTwister5.

Originally Posted by MeoTwister5

Just saw the Animax simulcast.
HOLY SHIT.

My reservations about the show's capacity for seriousness have been put to rest.
4. Quite a serious, violent and... bloody tone here. Animax did not censor the blood flowing into the lake for all of us to see. Animation takes a slight decrease in this episode for me, but understandable considering the sheer amount of CGI in this episode.

Episode just had me in pins and needles. Blog post to follow later when I finally process everything I've seen.

I love that they already followed through on upping the ante and demonstrating that when need be this show just like the first series can easily get to the same serious as well as occasionally darker moods. As hoped this won’t necessarily be any lighter than the first, which should now ease those concerns, so glad to see this show deliver.

Probably true since the CG looked ridiculously stunning still, and as you said they even provided a ton more of it given the huge scale of this ep, when I skimmed part of the raw. Plus the backgrounds and clouds were still in "omg territory" like the CG, and the shading and coloring and detail of stuff like the clothing of the 2D art was still quite great along with the great time of day lighting and well it fit the mood, so it's interesting and thanks to all that it still looked on par with most shows despite the slight hit from the flawless ep 1. I wonder if it's tied to the oddity that there was no normal OP and they played the OP in place of the ED, never seen that for a second episode before, usually it's the first ep that does that, maybe the second episode was finished first before the ED was completed since the first episode likely got extra time to make sure everything was perfect.

Originally Posted by MeoTwister5

Just saw the Animax simulcast.

2. Dio is clearly 3 things: one, that's a vanship he's flying. Two, he's clearly a badass. Three, he clearly knows more about all of this than he lets known. His stare at the guy who just haxed his way through Lasas and his reaction to Exile more or less proves this is the same Dio we know. There is indeed a far, far deeper connection to the previous series than the same Exile concept.

So great to have him show all of his sides already, Dio's still as awesome as ever.

Agreed Guardian Enzo, with the delayed simulcast it's definitely time to go to spoiler tags.

Originally Posted by MeoTwister5

1. The music during the entire aerial combat just blew me the fuck away. It may as well be Kajiura at her best. Plus the OP and the ED tunes continue to grab me. Few people can mix techno and classical like she does. Quite possibly me favorite ED of the entire damn year.

Hitomi Kuroishi is the composer [Edit: Oops, after re-reading I may have misread and you were just comparing the two composers and that that song felt like some of Kajiura's best tracks! Sorry.]
And yeah, OMG at that piece of music! (It did feel like a Kajiura piece in style, love her soundtracks too)

Out of curiosity, since you mentioned the ED theme, which I don't think the Japanese raw played at all this time (the OP started playing as the ep ends and in place of the ED), did Animax show the OP as normal then even though the couple of early raws of the Japan broadcast don't? Did they play the OP or ED song during the end of the ep? Or, were you just commenting that you like the great ED theme.

Either way, I wonder if there are two version of this ep around if they did and they apparently showed more of the blood?

[Last_Hope]

Originally Posted by azarhal

I'm 99% sure that all 4 characters in that screen are women.

Yeah, I have that feeling too. If it isn´t Claus it´s most likely a woman/girl. Although a boyish/Clausish one rather than one you go at.

Originally Posted by creb

Spoiler for Images:

Left - Claus Wannabe
Right - Claus

I think he looks a little young. It's been two years, and we've seen most of the other characters age a little (well, 'cept Dio, but who knows what the lifespan of Guildies are).

Yeah, you´re right about that, plus the hair color is wrong.

As for Dio, I´ll put it in spoiler tags since there seems to be people reading here who haven´t gotten the chance to see one of the best animes out there yet.

Spoiler for Dio:

Seeing Dio alive took me by surprise but seeing that Immelmann made me kind of happy that Dio is alive. Although a good explanation will be needed considering the situation. Also putting Dio right in there with the new main characters gives us a natural connection between the old and the new cast.

[DangerMouse]

Originally Posted by Last_Hope

As for Dio, I´ll put it in spoiler tags since there seems to be people reading here who haven´t gotten the chance to see one of the best animes out there yet.

Spoiler for Dio:

Seeing Dio alive took me by surprise but seeing that Immelmann made me kind of happy that Dio is alive. Although a good explanation will be needed considering the situation. Also putting Dio right in there with the new main characters gives us a natural connection between the old and the new cast.

Spoiler for Dio:

Yeah, it's great.

That's true, I hope they will put an explanation into this series when they get to his backstory, since they will probably have to for the new fans, so that however he survived is fully part of the storyline just within the anime, since currently the only small account of how he survived is in the Aerial Log art book.

Originally Posted by wandering-dreamer

Well this could be fun: Online game planned

Cool, might be a nice bit of fun.

[Friday]

Originally Posted by DangerMouse

Spoiler for Dio:

Yeah, it's great.

since currently the only small account of how he survived is in the Aerial Log art book.

and where can we find this book?

[Myssa Rei]

Originally Posted by Friday

and where can we find this book?

The usual places. If I remember right though it was never released in great numbers outside of Japan, which explains why many Western viewers are confused about Dio's survival.