Fafner-Exodus (1-13)
You can't have despair without hope. That seems to be the running theme of
Exodus up to this point. The second season of Fafner kicked off with a bang, covering the Hawaii invasion by the Festum. The Hawaii invasion ended up being a bloodbath because of both the new Festum models and the Neo-UN deciding to nuke the base. It's a good preview of the season in that it shows how complex everything is getting. Unlike the first season, it seems like almost all the major players are broken up into different factions with many having large scale goals. On top of that, there is a potential doomsday clock having over everybody's head. Unlike many sequels,
Exodus feels very different than its predecessors even if similar events occur. For example, Tatsumiyajima Island's core takes on human form in both. However unlike Tsubaki who was aloof and friendly, Orihime is extremely cold and authoritative. Two similar events occurred but they are completely different due to the personalities of the participants. There's also less focus on Tatsumiyajima Island in particular as the show focuses on the world theater. As a result it definitely feels bigger and more theatrical than Dead Aggressor.
On the visuals side, I think I'm being a bit too anal. The background and setting shots look really gorgeous but it can have a processed feel to it at times. Sort of similar to Studio Easter's work although
Exodus would compare pretty well to the higher end of Easter's work. The quality definitely reminds me of Yamato more so than Dead Aggressor or the rest of Xebec's shows. The storyboarding for the anime is good but in a very subtle way. There aren't many shots done on the storyboarding side that blow my dick off but there's a lot of camera angles and a general level of confidence to the work. The character designs look vastly better than previous entries in the franchise for a number of reasons. The first is that many of the characters are older and so the longer hair or glasses make them pop out a bit more. The other thing is that the level of animation is much higher than Dead Aggressor or Right of Left. While I still hate Hiraiface, it's much less distracting than earlier entries. There isn't much on the character animation side in that the characters all look 'nice' but not any sakuga moments. That's generally true of the show in general in that it's not a real showcase for 2D animation despite there being a few very quick highlights you might pick up here and there. It's all about the art direction as a whole. If there is a showcase of animation for the show, it's on the CGI side. The transition from 2D to Orange has served the show well. Again there's a few times where a movement might seem janky but it's largely high quality stuff and at no point was I wishing for this to be in 2D. Maybe because I've seen how bad it actually was in 2D. Anyway the fights are significantly more dynamic in setup, motion, and camerawork. The fights almost certainly wouldn't be this lively in 2D. I really wanted to show the orbital drop sequence as an example but that's better saved for when you're watching the actual show. So here's two other examples:
Oh and of course the user interfaces and monitor design work are
gorgeous. There have been times when watching the show where I literally said out loud, "
Oh you're just showing off." I honestly can't think of a TV show that has monitor design work of this quality. It's both aesthetically pleasing and informative at the same time. It's generally a very good looking show despite my pet peeves. As for the music, I'm enjoying many of the newer pieces, particularly over the older themes. There's a bit more variety to them than the past. I also loved the insert song in episode 9 by Angela.
If there is a word I would use to describe the scenario in
Exodus, it would be powder-keg. On the writing side, there isn't anything particularly new, or fresh if you will, about the show but it does spend a surprising amount of time on the characters. I actually could see this being a frustrating show to watch on a weekly basis due to how slow the pacing could be. However in a marathon format, I think the slower periods work to break up the action and make the show feel less about the mechs and more about the situation as a whole. The show feels like it's heading towards Arthur Clarke's Childhood's End. The season's primary focus is on the Esperanto (I thought they were referring to esperanza which would be a Spanish name but I guess it's own thing?) and now the superhuman pilots. This ties into the 'bigger' element I mentioned earlier in that it looks like the human race is being forced to evolve, just like the Festum. In addition to that, the focus on India makes the world seem larger than in Dead Aggressor.
Something I thought was fairly clever on the writing side was the new Assimilation effects. Ubukata knew that the old threat of death or Assimilation wasn't particularly effective so he gets around it by adding in essentially body horror and these side effects that don't inherently threaten the pilot's life but makes their life off the battlefield hellish and gives them long term consequences. It's a way of keeping the threat that piloting the Fafners is bad while not having to go to the well of axing people off. Sort of like the difference between Madoka and Yuki Yuna.
The multiple factions component I'm finding genuinely enjoyable as there is a feeling of chaos to the plot. Everybody is essentially out to fuck each other over, even the Festum who were once one entity. Now it's just a big scramble except everybody is playing with larger guns. It's significantly more entertaining that the Festum are coming up with strategic plays and the battles are becoming something akin to chess. For example the Walker and the Island are both in a race to figure out the other side first. There's also the guerrilla tactics being used by the Festum in India. I'm also looking forward to the human vs human fights that are coming up. The ROE Alpha squad are talking like they're hot shit so I assume that's going to get messy. It should serve as a good test for Kazuki who hasn't really gone against human pilots and the one time he did, he lost. Of course humans love to backstab each other so I find the Neo-UN factions to be somewhat realistic.
Episode 9 was absolutely a peak for me hype-wise. They built up to it for most of the season and you finally get to see Kazuki and Soushi go ham. It's sorta like Kira appearing in Destiny. That insert song in the background too worked beautifully to just pump everything up.
I'll see whether the show sticks the landing but so far this season has been unquestionably solid. It doesn't come off as laughably grimdark nor as corny as the first season could be. The only thing that annoys me at times is Maya and that's more due to her VA than really the writing. There are some larger mysteries still at play in the show but I don't have a particular need to know right now. This is probably the best 'serious' mech show I've seen come out in the past five years. Yes, I know that bar is so low, it's below the London Underground.
Oh and this is how you know the show was made by Xebec staff:
