Aldnoah.Zero - Overall Series Impressions & Total Series Rating

[00 raizer]

why there are no debate about who create the inaho's analytical eye??with that eye technology,why not equip it with the katapract??and more importantly,why inaho not replace the analytic eye with normal one??at least,he can see with 2 eyes...

[azurestratos]

Originally Posted by 00 raizer

why there are no debate about who create the inaho's analytical eye??with that eye technology,why not equip it with the katapract??and more importantly,why inaho not replace the analytic eye with normal one??at least,he can see with 2 eyes...

Because the eye requires to use Inaho brain for fast processing information.
And as you know, human brain is quantum computer. (episode 2-3 season 2)

The things the eye can do, such as distance measurement, 3D measurement, altimeter, radio transceiver, thermograph, optic magnification, and others are most likely already in the Kataphract.

The Kataphract however, does not have the processing power of a quantum computer, therefore cannot run realtime simulations, predictive analysis, and other functions of analytical engine, fast enough or good enough to be of use during battle.

The Kataphract however, have both capability of the eye (minus analytical engine) and more such as accelerometer, laser comm, and probably others.

As for why he replaced his eye, he didn't gave a proper reason but a possibility; having the eye causes pain even when not in use. This is mentioned in episode 2-3, where Inko asked, and Inaho mentioned he is taking pills and getting accustomed to the pain.

Out of the show, Inaho's VA Hanae stated that in episode where Inko saw Inaho grasping his eye, and Inaho pretending nothing happened, by that time the pain was enough to make a grown man cry out loud.

However our expressionless MC is ever adamant to not be Shinji and subvert the trope that mecha MCs are whiners and emos.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by azurestratos

Out of the show, Inaho's VA Hanae stated that in episode where Inko saw Inaho grasping his eye, and Inaho pretending nothing happened, by that time the pain was enough to make a grown man cry out loud.

However our expressionless MC is ever adamant to not be Shinji and subvert the trope that mecha MCs are whiners and emos.

Eh, that’s hardly amazing or worth mentioning. Back in 90s, Heero Yuy, survived many wounds that would kill a grown man without a single complain or whine, in-show .

And there’s really nothing to subvert at this point in time. Mecha MCs are already varied in characters today. There’s the badass and brooding ones, happy-go-lucky ones, whiny & EMO ones, the humble and easygoing ones, crazy ones, etc.

[00 raizer]

Because the eye requires to use Inaho brain for fast processing information.
And as you know, human brain is quantum computer. (episode 2-3 season 2)

The things the eye can do, such as distance measurement, 3D measurement, altimeter, radio transceiver, thermograph, optic magnification, and others are most likely already in the Kataphract.

The Kataphract however, does not have the processing power of a quantum computer, therefore cannot run realtime simulations, predictive analysis, and other functions of analytical engine, fast enough or good enough to be of use during battle.

The Kataphract however, have both capability of the eye (minus analytical engine) and more such as accelerometer, laser comm, and probably others.

As for why he replaced his eye, he didn't gave a proper reason but a possibility; having the eye causes pain even when not in use. This is mentioned in episode 2-3, where Inko asked, and Inaho mentioned he is taking pills and getting accustomed to the pain.

Out of the show, Inaho's VA Hanae stated that in episode where Inko saw Inaho grasping his eye, and Inaho pretending nothing happened, by that time the pain was enough to make a grown man cry out loud.

However our expressionless MC is ever adamant to not be Shinji and subvert the trope that mecha MCs are whiners and emos.

yeah,you explaination quite reasonable...thanks

[azurestratos]

Originally Posted by Hidetoshi Nakata

you're confusing things.
This antagonist, sympathetic villain that you describe, that is not focused on battles and on action, but is focused on the drama and slice of life, is the typical villain found in fairy tales and shoujo manga, this is the reason why you not find villains with these characteristics in anime mecha.
Villain in anime mecha have other characteristic.
You can find hundreds of villains with the characteristics of Slaine, in shojo manga and fairy tale.
But it's very rare you find an antagonist and villain within the mecha genre that has not its focus in the battles and in the action.
My favorite antagonist and villain within the Mecha genre is Char Aznable.

I beg to differ.
Slaine had fought in Tharsis, in multiple episodes. All his dramas are also mostly political involving the war and commanding his assets.

Just that he received more screentime of his relationships with his close characters. In mecha anime, this is only reserved for the heroes, which is a cliche' trope. For example, we know more about the personal relationships of Kira Yamato with a dozen different characters, meanwhile the villain Le Creuset, who for the majority of 40+ episodes remain enigmatic. At most we only see him interacting with few important characters.

The same can be said about Durandal, villain of season 2, who never once stepped into battle or in a mobile suit, but focused on political drama and manipulation.

The mecha trope usually is the villain never gets much screentime to showcase their human side. Only the heroes have that. We only know bits and pieces of the villain past, enough to sympathize or respect, but not more than how we sympathize the hero.

The hero gets multiple scenes of romance, if not everytime before an important battle, or one whole episode of beach and relationship drama. The villain never get that.

A/Z subverts this trope of unfair personal screentime and enigmatic villain. Slaine had as much screentime to show his motivations and human qualities, while Inaho is the enigmatic character that many fans only know him in his battles.

Originally Posted by 00 raizer

yeah,you explaination quite reasonable...thanks

You are very welcome. Its a pleasure to share these thoughts.

[Hidetoshi Nakata]

Originally Posted by azurestratos

I beg to differ.
Slaine had fought in Tharsis, in multiple episodes. All his dramas are also mostly political involving the war and commanding his assets.

Just that he received more screentime of his relationships with his close characters. In mecha anime, this is only reserved for the heroes, which is a cliche' trope. For example, we know more about the personal relationships of Kira Yamato with a dozen different characters, meanwhile the villain Le Creuset, who for the majority of 40+ episodes remain enigmatic. At most we only see him interacting with few important characters.

The same can be said about Durandal, villain of season 2, who never once stepped into battle or in a mobile suit, but focused on political drama and manipulation.

The mecha trope usually is the villain never gets much screentime to showcase their human side. Only the heroes have that. We only know bits and pieces of the villain past, enough to sympathize or respect, but not more than how we sympathize the hero.

The hero gets multiple scenes of romance, if not everytime before an important battle, or one whole episode of beach and relationship drama. The villain never get that.

A/Z subverts this trope of unfair personal screentime and enigmatic villain. Slaine had as much screentime to show his motivations and human qualities, while Inaho is the enigmatic character that many fans only know him in his battles.

The role of Slaine in Aldnoah.Zero is not the same role as Le Creuset and Durandal had played in Gundam, both were just villains, they were not directly linked how to antagonists and rivals from the Kira.
The role of Slaine in Aldnoah.Zero is Rival, antagonist and villain for Inaho.
Was explicit in the anime, that there was hatred and rivalry from Slaine about Inaho.
His role is more like those that were occupied by first Athrun and later by Shinn.
The same paper was played by Char in Gundam.
Another error his antagonists and rivals have personal screentime and romantic moments, Char, Athrun and Shinn they all had very screentime.
When you ask the question who is the antagonist and rival the Kira?
No one will quote Le Creuset and Durandal, because they are the global villains the anime.
You find as response Athrun and Shinn.
The same is repeated for Amaru, they remind of Char and not Zeon.
In Buddy Complex, The antagonist and rival Aoba is Bizon, not Zogilia which is the global villain.
The big problem of his argument is that Slaine is connected directly to an antagonistic rivalry on Inaho.
So the comparisons with global villains should not be used.
You must quote characters, through the antagonism and rivalry, just played the role of villain.

[zalem]

Originally Posted by MartianMage

Personally I don't really get the complaints about Inaho being better than everyone... so you have a main character that's better than everyone... is that really so bad?

He didn't get any challenge? Vlad almost killed him. Femianne almost killed him. Dioscuria certainly challenged him the first time around and would have died the 2nd time if Inko didn't follow him. The trio was certainly challenging. There are very few fights where Inaho did all the job by himself. Heck even against that laser kat all he did was spot...

And complaining about no one else coming up with his unorthodox strategies that usually involves uncommon science? They are unorthodox for a reason... did anyone here honestly came up with the same ideas as Inaho? Did anyone complain when Lelouch saved the black knights submarine with his knowledge of science when they have scientists on board the sub?

Lelouch wasn't perfect. Sometimes his plans came back to bite him on the ass. On top of that his brother was equally as scheming as he was. He faced a hell of a lot of challenges. That and he actually had charisma and a personality (like him or not).

Having a main character that flawless and having no personality to boot? Yeah, that's a problem. That's a HUGE problem.

And I don't call those "monster of the week" vers nobility a challenge. After it became apparent that Inaho and his super strategies were unstoppable I no longer felt any tension or doubt whatsoever that he would ever fail. And that, well that's just not very exciting. And then you throw Slaine in there as the main rival and he was just a terrible character to have up against Inaho, both because Slaine's personality is very weak and because well, he's just not even on the same level as Inaho. Do you have to have a main villain against the hero? Well, no, no you don't. But you need to have some kind of tension or challenge otherwise it's just dull writing.

And like I said, perhaps I could have forgiven him for being so perfect if he had even an ounce of charisma and an interesting back story.

[MonkeyDude]

Started watching for the possibility of seeing some highly tactical mecha fights reminiscent of 08th MS Team and AZ did not disappoint. Even if Inaho's combat style mostly revolved around being a 1-man demolition team with token support from his circle, his fights still involved exploiting key weaknesses in enemy mechs that allowed him to grasp victory on his technically inferior suit. How he defeated the dimensional barrier was a stroke of genius.

While I started watching AZ for the mecha fights, I stuck around in S2 for the NTR. The mecha fights were lackluster as Inaho's upgrade to keep him viable against Slaine removed what little tension was left during combat. At least it took Inaho some time to come up with a countermeasure in S1, usually taking up most of the episode or a second confrontation before he overcomes his foe. S2? Just watch the very first fight and you'll see how...boring it is. It's like the bad guy of the week except the bad guy doesn't even get to do his awesome evil speech before getting taken out.

Overall AZ is a show that deviated from it's main selling point. The actual plot/story or however you want to call it is lackluster in narrative. The only character development to speak of in S2 came from Slaine while pretty much every other character was left to rot, Rayet and her desire for revenge says hi! Then there's the contrived Slaine/Inaho "rivalry" they were peddling... AZ just felt like it suffered from an identity crisis and ran out of time trying to establish itself given the infodump ending.

Seriously the ending felt like a pink slip manga ending. You just don't cram that much material in the latter third of the final episode and call it a day. Though I suppose now we know what Inaho and Slaine were chasing after in the OP. Too bad the new count of croutons beat them both to it. The double NTR in the 11th hour almost made S2 bearable to watch...almost.

All in all I'd give AZ a 6/10 for the entertainment value. If you don't expect to get a decent story out of it, then AZ is a decent enough watch to warrant your time especially if you enjoy mecha combat.

[MartianMage]

Originally Posted by zalem

Lelouch wasn't perfect. Sometimes his plans came back to bite him on the ass. On top of that his brother was equally as scheming as he was. He faced a hell of a lot of challenges. That and he actually had charisma and a personality (like him or not).

Having a main character that flawless and having no personality to boot? Yeah, that's a problem. That's a HUGE problem.

And I don't call those "monster of the week" vers nobility a challenge. After it became apparent that Inaho and his super strategies were unstoppable I no longer felt any tension or doubt whatsoever that he would ever fail. And that, well that's just not very exciting. And then you throw Slaine in there as the main rival and he was just a terrible character to have up against Inaho, both because Slaine's personality is very weak and because well, he's just not even on the same level as Inaho. Do you have to have a main villain against the hero? Well, no, no you don't. But you need to have some kind of tension or challenge otherwise it's just dull writing.

And like I said, perhaps I could have forgiven him for being so perfect if he had even an ounce of charisma and an interesting back story.

And Inaho being in a lot situations where he could have died if he wasn't lucky makes him perfect?

I won't deny that Inaho's personality(he has a personality ok?) can be off-putting and that the show didn't do a good job of giving his fights tension... I won't argue against that. But pretty much the other claims where he's supposed to be perfect and he solo'd everything is pretty much false really. People tend to undermine a lot of the deadly situations he was in and the effort and help that he got from his so called "useless" allies.

[zalem]

I never said anything about him soloing everything. I said that his strategies (which obviously include using other people at times) were always flawless to the point where it basically ruined any tension in the series. He just didn't fail. Ever. I never felt he was ever given a real challenge up to his level. Not even once. I never doubted that his super strategies would fail. No tension, no real challenge, no personality. That just doesn't do it for me. But everyone is different obviously. Some people like him for whatever reason and that's fine. You can like whomever you want. Just giving some insight as to why I personally did not enjoy his character. It's a combination of things obviously.

[MartianMage]

Originally Posted by zalem

I never said anything about him soloing everything. I said that his strategies (which obviously include using other people at times) were always flawless to the point where it basically ruined any tension in the series. He just didn't fail. Ever. I never felt he was ever given a real challenge up to his level. Not even once. I never doubted that his super strategies would fail. No tension, no real challenge, no personality. That just doesn't do it for me. But everyone is different obviously. Some people like him for whatever reason and that's fine. You can like whomever you want. Just giving some insight as to why I personally did not enjoy his character. It's a combination of things obviously.

Except his strategies did actually fail(thus putting him in a deadly situation) sometimes so it's not flawless. Sure I can understand if you don't like Inaho. It's called an opinion and I understand that but what I cannot understand are the complaints that just aren't factually true at all.

[zalem]

I don't want to go back and rewatch this series because it's too boring, but when did one of his strategies fail spectacularly? What were the consequences of said failure? Like I said, it's about having that tension in the series. And I just didn't feel it.

[MartianMage]

Originally Posted by zalem

I don't want to go back and rewatch this series because it's too boring, but when did one of his strategies fail spectacularly? What were the consequences of said failure? Like I said, it's about having that tension in the series. And I just didn't feel it.

The first time he went against Vlad. His Kat was almost at it's limit and he would have died if Mizusaki didn't arrive.

When they were defending against Femianne. Inaho couldn't deflect the last arm and could have died if Slaine didn't arrive.

When he fought against Saazbaum the second time. He fell into Slaine's trap and would have died if Inko didn't follow him.

When they fought against Countess Rafia. Although the strategy of this operation cannot be attributed to Inaho it still doesn't change the fact that even when he was there he was unable to cope up with the situation and was forced to retreat.

As I've mentioned earlier... sure I won't deny that the show didn't really do a good job in giving Inaho's fights tension but it wasn't like everything went smoothly for him as some of you are claiming.

[Craxuan]

Actually, when I say all the MCs in Season 2 can do no wrong I really do mean ALL of them. Slaine's plan always goes exactly as he intends it to be, until some direct strong moves by Inaho beats him back. Inaho's fights never goes catastrophically badly for him and with the exception of that underestimation of Slaine at the beginning never makes another careless mistake. These 2 are constantly strongarming each other with someone coming out only slightly ahead or completely even at every encounter.

But no one is more OP than Seylum this episode. She woke up, escaped and with just one move screwed Slaine completely and ENDED THE WAR, which is in my opinion even more OP than either of the frequently argued characters. If you want to argue who's perfect you should say Seylum is utterly perfect this season, because she didn't even need to go through a hero's agony of growing up and jumped straight to final form.

[zalem]

Is Vlad the Argyle? Because that's not a failed strategy. In fact, he did exactly what he said he was going to do....buy time, which he succeeded in doing.

Are you talking about episode 15 where Slaine set up that trap that killed Saaz? Because that still shows the use of his strategies yet again to get him out of trouble (showing Inko the weak spot on Saaz's mech so she could shoot, using her to get out of the debris field which he spotted coming, which then destroyed Saaz). So you can say it's still his strategies plus help (which I never denied that his strategies do sometimes rely on help btw).

And the last one, again not a failure of any of his strategies and ultimately his strategies ended up defeating her.

Against Femianne he did fail his shot and yes, that would have seriously injured or killed them. And actually that wasn't even a failure of strategy, that was a failure of action. But I suppose a failure of some kind nonetheless. So ok, NEAR perfect strategies and actions and occasionally random luck. That doesn't really change anything though. He's still almost perfect most of the time and there still is no tension because if it's not him being perfect (which he is most of the time) then some other random factor comes in and saves him. He never once actually failed hard and faced serious consequences because of his actions. I suppose we can agree that the writers are at fault with this lack of tension in the scenes.

[azurestratos]

Originally Posted by Hidetoshi Nakata

The role of Slaine in Aldnoah.Zero is not the same role as Le Creuset and Durandal had played in Gundam, both were just villains, they were not directly linked how to antagonists and rivals from the Kira.
The role of Slaine in Aldnoah.Zero is Rival, antagonist and villain for Inaho.
Was explicit in the anime, that there was hatred and rivalry from Slaine about Inaho.
His role is more like those that were occupied by first Athrun and later by Shinn.
The same paper was played by Char in Gundam.
Another error his antagonists and rivals have personal screentime and romantic moments, Char, Athrun and Shinn they all had very screentime.
When you ask the question who is the antagonist and rival the Kira?
No one will quote Le Creuset and Durandal, because they are the global villains the anime.
You find as response Athrun and Shinn.
The same is repeated for Amaru, they remind of Char and not Zeon.
In Buddy Complex, The antagonist and rival Aoba is Bizon, not Zogilia which is the global villain.
The big problem of his argument is that Slaine is connected directly to an antagonistic rivalry on Inaho.
So the comparisons with global villains should not be used.
You must quote characters, through the antagonism and rivalry, just played the role of villain.

Lets be clearly honest, Athrun was never really an antagonist or rival. In fact, until one of his teammates died, he never went all out, and even then that was just 1 time. One time.

And how many romantic scenes he have? Season 1 I could count with my fingers. We see at least twice more romantic scenes of Kira x Lacus than Athrun x Lacus. Total with Kira x Flay, and Kira fake attraction to Cagali, until they found out they're siblings.

Athrun only got few scenes with Lacus, three important scenes with Cagali. By later half Athrun was also no longer a rival, but an ally.

In second season, Shin and Athrun were the main characters, so they got the main heroes treatment of more screentime. We see more of their romance and relationship, while Kira is side character antagonist rival who is unimportant until the late later half. Suddenly Kira became one of the good guy main hero, having more screentime and got to face Durandal, while it should've been only either Shin or Athrun. Shin got turned into antagonist/villain side.

Let's be really honest, almost all mecha animes give unfair amount of screentime and personal relationship to the heroes. The bad guy, especially the big bad, and rivals who don't turn friendly ally in later half, were never given fair treatment.

If possible the hero is a super likable person, while the rival (who stayed as enemies ex. Shin) and other villains may get sympathy, but never more than the main hero.

[Witch of Uncertainty]

I enjoyed it, but I doubt I'll ever rewatch it.

[DevilHighDxD]

Watching the finale again it seem that Vers didn't get any punishments for their war crimes. Seriously I will much prefer a ending where Terran lost the war but destroyed Earth rather than handing it over to the Vers, as Terran go extinct and they laugh how Vers won't have their blue planet. Due to the destruction of Earth and it's resources along with it, Martian has no choice but to continue to live on the Mars. Situation deteriorate further as time went on, the living conditions is so horrible that the lower cast Versian revolt against the government. Some sympathetic Orbital Knights sided with the rebelling army and wage devastating civil war that result the death of all Vers imperial family. Slaine fell into depression as the info of Asseylum's death went into his ear and as the rebelling rush into the imperial building, seeing Slaine and killed him. The war also result the extinction of the Martians and with some thinking how much better if they just never leave Earth to began with it. Seriously it hate Vers and Martian, I also hate Terran for not taking this war seriously.

Too little Martians died in the finale and no nukes is dropped on Mars, very disappointing. 7/10

[00 raizer]

Watching the finale again it seem that Vers didn't get any punishments for their war crimes. Seriously I will much prefer a ending where Terran lost the war but destroyed Earth rather than handing it over to the Vers, as Terran go extinct and they laugh how Vers won't have their blue planet.

nah,i prefer not...the fall on half moon already is make earth loss of many thing like many island and even country due sink in the ocean...

[iSuckAtWriting]

I just finished Nico-watching Aldnoah.Zero, and whoooaaa what a wild ride this show turned out to be! The Terrans are kinda boring next to the Vers cast, and Slaine is just so cooooooll~ Too bad Nico can't say the same for...everyone else.

Spoiler for Nico Nico looooooooonnnggg~:

There’s a splash of racism in Aldnoah.Zero (AZ) from the Versians toward the Terrans, and considering how bland the Terrans are, I really can’t blame them. Despite the screen time between both factions being roughly even, we learn almost nothing about the Terrans beyond their own brand of racism; what are each of the characters like? How do they fit into the story beyond the fighting? What are they thinking? All of this and more…are never addressed proper.

It’s especially egregious with the main character of the Terrans, the tactician Inaho Kaizuka. The good news is he’s a breath of fresh air from the folks piloting an overpowered mech, being a guy whose mind is the incredible weapon as strategy after strategy topples supermech after supermech. The bad news is we scarcely get a sense of who he is. It’s like the writers wanted to make a silent badass and instead created someone emotionally dead. A character like him can work, but it’s vital to know what he thinks else he’s just going through the motions.

There is a scene in the first episode where Inaho and his friends are out in the city. As a missile approaches for a terrorist attack, he says ‘We should get out of here. A missile is coming’ with no sense of urgency. To call him emotionally reticent would be an understatement. I could possibly explain that Inaho’s required military training might have made him stoic, except the Terran veterans are more reactive to everything than he is. There’s a better sense of what he’s like in season two, but his strong sense of non-reaction makes for one of the weakest characters of the entire series.

Sorry, I ranted too much and didn’t explain the situation proper. The story goes that people from Earth (Terra) have managed to colonize Mars (Vers) thanks to the discovery of super technology from thousands and thousands of years ago. But, the technological superiority of the Martians (AKA Versians) has somehow sparked a war between them and the Earthlings (or the Terrans). I’m not sure how this causes war since they moved to Vers of their own will, but the series does a decent job at explaining how the conflict started as the story goes on.

After a terrorist attack on a Vers diplomat visiting Terra, the Versians see fit to continue fighting a war that had halted some 15 years before the story. With the super technology of Aldnoah at their backs, the 37 Orbital Knights of Vers crash Terra with supermechs that are more than a match against the greater Terran numbers. Unfortunately, it’s hard to care for the Terrans despite the Versians being initially painted as the ‘bad guys’ of the ordeal. Like I said earlier, the problem with the Terrans is we don’t get a sense of who they are.

Not that knowing who they are necessarily makes anything better. We have one character who suddenly becomes a love interest of sorts for Inaho during season two, another character whose war scars don’t add anything to the story, and a bunch of other characters whose most noticeable thing about one being an ironic name. We’re supposed to care for the Terrans because the Versians are clearly the ‘bad guys,’ but we should be able to care about them on their own merits.

I say this as if the Versians are awesome, but overall they’re a few ranks short of well written. A lot of them range from stereotypically evil to a hilarious degree to some genuinely nice characters who are somehow more likable than most of the Terrans. Saazbaum’s story especially shows why there’s a war at all, and it’s difficult not to sympathize with him despite his actions. And while we don’t see it much in the story proper, flashbacks of the relationship between Asseylum Vers Allusia and Slaine Troyard are just decent enough to anchor the struggles they face through both seasons.

Speaking of, let me talk about Slaine AKA the only well written character in the series. Aside from his backstory giving a sense of why he fights, it also ties into the overall story by acknowledging that even the Orbital Knights can only achieve so much without Terran help. His conflict in season one explores what it means to want to serve your country (or…planet) despite all opposition, and during season two his relationship with Asseylum becomes the perfect metaphor for Terra-Vers relations; the further apart they grow, the more hostile Terra and Vers are to each other.

The only complaint I’d make here, is how Slaine is so often short-ended that his struggles almost feel unnatural, as if the world was made for him to suffer in rather than him suffering in the world. The amount of times he’s literally and figuratively kicked around just stop him from being anything more than a good character. Otherwise, every action he takes even during season two is mostly believable. It’s easy to find him unlikable for some of the things he does, but the story takes care to explain the actions he believes he must take despite himself.

And when Slaine, Inaho, or anyone else take action, a fight often follows. In a word, AZ’s aesthetics are positively slick. The coloration between the characters and backgrounds meshes flawlessly with the mecha CGI, while the mechs themselves adhere to a design philosophy to easily tell them apart; the Versian supermechs are sleek, smooth, and shiny, while the ordinary mechs of the Terran side are rusted rundown robots. There’s a real sense of bullet for bullet superiority from the Versians, to say nothing of how the fights often play out.

The fights themselves are almost a microcosm of real robots VS super robots. The Terran mechs are slow but methodical, as they won’t be doing too many crazy stunts if at all, and don’t hold well if a strong round of bullets so much as crosses them the wrong way. Compare this to the Versian supermechs, who can take it as well as they dish it out, and can dish it out faster than most of the Terran mechs can keep up with. The only thing keeping the fights down is also its greatest strength; the fights are tactics VS power, and because ‘power’ is on the ‘villain’ side,’ most fights are a foregone conclusion. Still, knowing who’s going to win isn’t the same as knowing how somebody wins.

Accompanying the epic visuals is an equally grand soundtrack. There aren’t that many tracks in and of themselves, but what’s there is instantly recognizable. ‘Keep On Keeping On’ and ‘aLIEz’ are excellent pieces that perfectly set the incoming mood whether things are going to change for the better or worse. Series’ music composer Hiroyuki Sawano does an excellent job elevating action scenes that would otherwise be hard to care about, and despite all the bombast the show knows when to dial down the music as some of the more intense moments revolve around deafening silence.

Unfortunately, ‘deafening silence’ is a philosophy that ended up going to Inaho and brought down the Terran side of the story to a large degree. Honestly, I do LIKE AZ, but my gushing for Slaine isn’t nearly enough to suggest this series even as something passably enjoyable. The Terrans are completely ineffectual while the Versians are decent at best. Aldnoah Zero isn’t a bad anime, but its efforts to be decent have been absolutely Slaine.