War of the Worlds (for Anime, Anyway): Aldnoah.Zero

Greetings, everyone!  It’s Sunday, so it’s time for another review!  But first, I want to say, I hope all of my dedicated followers read my autism awareness post from earlier this past Wednesday.  This is an event I’ve been wanting to do for a while, plus this is a very personal issue for me.  I definitely opened up in that post.  So I very much appreciate all the support!  Anyways, back to today’s review.  This week, I’m doing a show that I’ve wanted to review for some time now.  I’m not through it yet- but pretty dang close-, but it has definitely been worth the watch.  I won’t go through any fancy introduction here, so let’s get started on this week’s review on the sci-fi anime hit, Aldnoah.Zero.

In Aldnoah.Zero, Earth and Mars share an uneasy bond with each other.  After a strange piece of technology called Aldnoah is discovered, humanity begins to populate Mars, creating the Vers Empire.  However, in 1999, war broke out between the two planets.  Eventually, this caused an explosion on the Moon’s surface, and a ceasefire was later established.  Fifteen years later, in 2014, the princess of Vers, Princess Asseylum, visits Earth on a peace mission, but ends in disaster when a rebel group attempts to assassinate the princess.  War breaks out once again between the two worlds, with only a team of military-trained teens left to defend the planet.

Having gone through most of the series thus far, I have to give Aldnoah.Zero a four out of a five star rating.  I said it once and I’ll say it again: this is a show I’ve been dying to review.  And with good reason, it’s pretty exciting.  So right off the back, story is definitely a strong point.  And one thing that actually fascinates me about the story is the different viewpoints of the story.  On one hand, you have a story that is focused on Inaho Kaizuka, one of the daring teens fighting for Earth’s survival, and then another that is focused on Slaine Troyard, a soldier for the Martians.  Both perspectives are woven together to create a suspenseful plot of a series.  Other than that, animation is pretty good.  I’m still trying to get used to the use of CGI in anime, but so far the robotic fighting units are pretty cool-then again, there have been other mecha-animes that have used hand-drawn robots.  Otherwise, most everything checks out.

One negative comment that I do have concerns the plot itself.  Though I do like the concept, the idea of having two different plots can be an issue.  Among the more glaring problems, I dare to ask, “who’s the main character?”  Between Inaho and Slaine, it was hard to tell.  Both perspectives portray them as the hero, and the overall plot of the show doesn’t make it clear either.  Granted, there are a lot of shows out there that use the same concept and are decent shows- Aldnoah. Zero is one of them-, but that is an issue if you can’t really identify whose the lead.  That is, if you didn’t have someone tell you or you looked it up on Wikipedia.  Still, despite that, I found the show overall to be pretty awesome.

So overall, Aldnoah.Zero is definitely the sci-fi anime to watch this year.  It’s certainly a delight for sci-fi and action anime fans alike.  Though I haven’t gotten through all of it just yet, I definitely give it a thumbs up.  The series is still in Japanese, so it’s not available for sale.  However, for those who are interested, crunchyroll.com does have the episodes online.  The series also has a second season out.  Anyways, that’s all that I have for this week.  Stay tuned for more, and be on the lookout for my first official “Hanime on Autism” post this Wednesday!  And before I forget, Happy Easter! J

-Hanime on Anime

Aldnoah.Zero Trailer