Legend of the Galactic Heroes – Die Neue These First Impressions

“Per the commander’s orders, I will take over command of all fleets. Do not worry. Obey my orders and you will be saved.”

Legend of the Galactic Heroes is one of those classic anime titles that carries significant weight. It is often been dubbed a classic anime masterpiece alongside the likes of Utena and Akira. This is one of those instances where my aversion to older anime has proven to be my downfall, as I have never actually watched the original OVA series. However, despite having essentially no knowledge of the narrative details of the franchise prior to watching this episode, I can definitively confirm I was on the edge of my seat by the end of the episode, and am currently lamenting the wait for the next one. With several dozen of new anime coming out this season, I can’t yet begin to predict what will be the front-runners for best of the season, but this may potentially prove to be one of my personal favorites of the season.

If someone doesn’t care for this first episode, I can, on some level, see why. We’re given limited backstory, most of the action occurs in only a few rooms on a handful of spacecraft and we are only introduced to a handful of characters. However, I find this less-is-more tactic ultimately works in the episode’s favor as it allows one of the series’s protagonists, Reinhard, to establish himself in an impressive fashion. My knee jerk reaction is to draw comparisons to calculating characters like Lelouche and Light, but the irony is Reinhard is probably a progenitor of the calm, calculating archetype in anime which these characters fall under. In this first episode, we watch as he tackles a space battle that has him at a distinct disadvantage and ultimately turns it on its head. He’s an immediately intriguing character as his calm cockiness clearly gets under the skin of the older military tacticians, but he is aided by his subordinate Siegfried who appears to have a fierce loyalty to him. The proceedings for this first episode have a dramatic space opera quality to them that merges the grand epic nature of something like Star Wars with the tactical edge of something like the Ender and Shadow book series. Again, I get why that combination won’t necessarily work for everyone, but it’s practically tailor made for me.

On the production side of things, it’s Production I.G. As someone who doesn’t have a strong connection to the original character designs, I can’t provide much commentary on the aesthetic changes from the OVA’s beyond saying that I like how the show looks. There is a sizable amount of integrated CG, but given the scale of the space battles we see in this first episode, it is to be expected, and it is done as unobtrusively as could be expected. When it comes to moments of strong action, there are only a few instances that really stand out, but this is due to the distant Star Trek-esque space battles that form the bulk of the episode, though I suppose open warfare isn’t exactly Star Trek-esque. The OP and ED both lend to the sense of grandeur. I’ll confess I’d like to see a version of the OP with subtitles since despite being in English the lyrics are actually pretty difficult to make out. Also, if the name ‘Binary Star’ is not a reference to the famous Star Wars track ‘Binary Sunset,’ then it is a hell of a coincidence.

If I were to find issues with this first episode, one could certainly argue it is all prologue. I wouldn’t be surprised if the second episode was centered entirely on our other lead so as to provide a similar snapshot of his personality and standing. I found the gradual pace to be satisfactory, and I liked how I almost didn’t notice the ramping up of the action that occurs in the last few minutes. It put me in a similar state of mind to Reinhard as he gradually realizes something isn’t right, and I was impressed by how it played out. I will note that Reinhard’s line about lamenting the absence of a proper challenger was a bit on the nose. It’s also odd, given the state of modern media, to have a show that so thoroughly fails the Bechdel Test. There isn’t a single female officer to be seen on any of the ships, and, based upon the intro and outro, I suspect the overwhelming majority of the cast is male. This doesn’t make or break the narrative by any means and the 19th century attire and terminology results in it feeling more appropriate than it would otherwise, but it is noticeable.

Before I wrap up, a few Notes and Nitpicks:

• I’ve never watched Star Trek, so any allusions to what is “Star Trek-esque” could be grossly misguided.
• I ended up listening to ‘Binary Sunset’ a bit while writing this …also Twenty One Pilots, but that’s just normal listening for me.
• I spent way too long collecting my thoughts on this one. I need to move on if I want to even have the illusion of keeping up with this season’s releases.