SOUKYUU NO FAFNER

DESCRIPTION

CAST

SPECIAL DramaSoukyuu no Fafner: RIGHT OF LEFT - single program
MOVIE DramaSoukyuu no Fafner: Dead Aggressor - Heaven and Earth
MANGA ActionSoukyuu no Fafner: Dead Aggressor
NOVEL ActionSoukyuu no Fafner: Dead Aggressor
MANGA DramaSoukyuu no Fafner: Dead Aggressor

REVIEWS

• 

  BMAP

  40/100
  This is a review of Fafner

  __Context__ I watched this anime on the SAVE Blu-ray published by Funimation, which also includes the movie Heaven & Earth. [I reviewed that here.](https://anilist.co/review/3123) I place most importance in a story-driven anime on the story; if this were a comedy anime the characters would take priority. I enjoy mecha anime, so the fact that this is a mecha anime does not mean I automatically hate it. Trust me, it's got enough problems otherwise. __Short Version (Spoiler-free)__Fafner is a barely-animated 2004 anime series that fails to offer anything worthwhile in its 26 episodes that separate it from many other better alternatives. For me, though, it is the first time a series has been carried by its music, which is amazing. I cannot think of anyone I would recommend this to other than __People Who Use Anime To Fill A Void In Their Boring Lives.__ __Long Version(CONTAINS SPOILERS!)__"Anime" is the Japanese word for "Animation." When something is referred to as "anime," you of course probably first picture the visual aesthetic that is associated with the medium, but also think of the fact that it is animated, a series of moving images, whether hand drawn or computer generated. What I'm getting at is that it's hard to judge Fafner on animation quality, when so little of it is really animated. I don't want to harp too much on this, since it can likely be chalked up to lack of funding or a time crunch, poor management, etc., factors that lie outside of the artists control. But it just feels like there's no effort. There are hundreds of scenes where people just talk to one another, with nothing done to spruce it up. Just people, with about six frames between them, just talking. Some of the fights are entertaining, but the thing about the Festum- the alien enemies of the show- is that they all attack by flashing a purple light that makes the same blackish-purple CG circle appear on things, before erasing them... quite literally, as if someone just took an eraser to the picture they were looking at. So, one thing that makes the story suffer at the start is the confusing first battle. See, there are a couple important characters who get killed in the first episode- who I did not know immediately had died because their deaths were not properly animated. In fact, I don't even know their names, even though one of them was a main character's father. So, as the story starts with quite a few people being killed, you strap in for the melodrama and get ready for characters to start getting offed. The best way for this story to work is with a lot of character development, using the looming alien threat as a backdrop for personal conflicts. Not quite. This story has three main characters, Kazuki Matabe, Soshi Minashiro, and Maya Tomi. The supporting cast is rather large, almost to a fault. Kazuki is the leading character, and his arc consists of him trying to figure out ways to understand the people around him, more specifically Soshi, his best friend, whose eye he cut out when they were children. Soshi has alien powers for reasons mostly left unexplained, which scared Kazuki as a child, and the story of them becoming friends again is probably the most compelling one in the whole show. Maya's story is also good, as she overcomes her fear of fighting and 'changing' or losing her sense of self, to become a hero and savior of her friends. Those friends- the other Fafner pilots- unfortunately take up more screen-time and have objectively worse arcs than the mains.Let's start with Shoko- she's an invalid whose only clearly defined traits are: she's sick, and *drumroll please* she's in love with Kazuki! One-sided-ly! So, when the show focuses on her for a couple episodes, you immediately think she's going to die. She does, and here is where I think the show best establishes its major theme: it's alright to fear change and loss, but these things are necessary for survival. Despite that being the only theme I could notice in the whole show, Mamoru's arc, rushed in towards the end of the show's run, seems to contradict everyone else's arc. Koyo and Sakura both refuse to change, and both suffer greatly as a result, tortured from the assimilation phenomenon which slowly kills the pilots as they operate Fafners. Mamoru, however, gives up his Goubain personality, expresses both verbally and in his actions a desire to protect his friends and to change, and just when he's become stronger and more self-actualized- he dies. This guy undergoes more development than 95% of the supporting cast, and his reward is death? Oh, are we going to play the nihilism card, Tow Ubukata, you f***ing hack? Speaking of terrible writing, let's talk about what this show calls 'world-building' and 'story'. I should honestly add about 20 more quotation marks to each side of those words. Very little is of the 'science' of the technology the characters utilize is actually explained, which would be fine if it had any discernible rules. How can the Festum read minds? Why can they predict some attacks but not others? Why do the Fafners block the mind reading, and why has the technology not been implemented so their island can never be found? How did the humans develop a drug to implant the 'Festum factor' that allows them to be Fafner pilots? How did the Festum sterilize the Japanese? Why? And if that wasn't enough questions, let's look at some story elements that raise questions. Shoko's grave gets defiled because she self destructs her Fafner. Why are there no consequences to this? How are there Neo U.N. spies on the island? Why do they not initiate a coup? Why does Dr. Bertrand not forcibly take over the island? Exactly how many Festum are there, and why do they not reinforce the North Pole more efficiently if it is the 'backbone' of their operations? Who is Tsubaki? Why do she and her older brother have alien powers? How do they 'teach' the Festum things? Why don't all assimilated humans teach them things? Wouldn't the 'war' end after they assimilated, like, one human? The dialogue is terrible, which I think is a crime because there is way too much of it. Despite being a visual medium, so much of the show is devoted to just talking, which usually falls into one of two categories when it isn't main characters talking. The first is boring crap, fluff that seems to only exist to draw out screen time, such as romances and mini-arcs that are forgettable and add no value to the plot. The second are opaque, overly complicated messes of exposition and pseudo-science that just make absolutely no sense. For all I know, some of those questions I listed earlier may have been answered, but I could not tell you because this story feels like it was written to be as complex as possible, which is ironic when you consider the fact that most of the main characters spend their time trying to understand one another better. So to sum up the story and characters together: Most of them are pointless. It all feels like wasted potential. There are so many scenes where I was supposed to feel happy or sad, but I didn't because the story just fails to make me feel attached to most of the characters or their fate. One thing that did make me feel emotion consistently, however was the score. The music in this show is god-tier. Even while the writing fails to make you feel anything, the music will do the trick. Even the kicking opening and mellow closer are packed with more emotion than the actual show. As I stated in the short review of this show, what kept me invested was the score, and it's what kept me coming back other than the fact that I spent $20 on the BD. To conclude, the only way I can recommend this anime is if you just have nothing else to watch. Trust me, you'll think of something better to do while you're watching this, like going to the DMV or filing your taxes. That's right, dealing with the f***ing bureaucratic nightmares presented by the American government is more enjoyable than watching this dumpster fire. __Final Scores:__Animation: 1/2 Story:0/2 Sound: 2/2 Characters: 1/2 Enjoyment: 0/2 __Total Score: 4/10__
  Continue on AniList
• 

  lanszzZ

  70/100
  An old fan's review and some info you may wanna know...

  I am new to this platform but I am old enough to watch fafner when it was on air the very first time. I just want to write a neutral review on it after this anime literally changed my whole life so many years after its release. How I felt then and how I feel now are quite different considering the current era of anime are filled up with so many eye-catching dramatic contents just to keep your eye and attention not moving away.

  In short
  If you are determined to overcome the gap of the time, you might find this one having a rather unique sci-fi world, some very good anisongs and quite good robots.

  Some background
  Hisashi Hirai, the character designer, dominated the anime world with his works in Gundam Seed, and every sci-fi anime project would definitely wish to have Hisashi as their character designer.

  Tow Ubukata, the main writer of the whole series, just won the national sci-fi award for his light novel, Mardock Scramble. Fafner, commercially quite successful at the time, was one of the works he started to be more involved in other media scripting than just writing light novels.

  Angela, the band of the anisongs, just changed their company and started to gain some popularity.

  Also XEBEC, the company, was eager to have a successful work to build their brand.

  I'd say everyone was very happy about the anime becoming a hit that time. It definitely helped them to develop their career years after. That's why you see the main team remained the same when they did sequels. Yes, they did sequels 10 years after, with some movies in between.

  The story
  It starts with a normal daily life on a Japanese fishing island (the original fishing town actually exists and fans visit it from time to time), followed by a sudden attack from strange creatures. Adults seem to hide a lot of things from their younger generation but as the story going on, you will realize it is not a simple normal island and the whole sci-fi world would gradually become more and more clear to the audience. While the teens need to pilot those robots, they did not know who exactly were their enemies, nor do they know what consequences they have to pay to pilot Fafner, even how they themselves were born.

  It is a tragic story of teens fighting against aliens. You would definitely think about those earlier works like EVA or Bokurano, yeah, but I still felt it was rather unique in Fafner's settings. You would start to wonder whether the alien creature actually has a good point not to have the concepts of individual at all, since the communication between the human individuals seemed rather unsuccessful, especially between the parents and their kids.
  Every teenage will struggle those problems, but Fafner brought it a higher level because of the sci-fi world. And every teens in this show chose differently but they all somehow followed their true heart, which brings the tragic story a deeper meaning and diverse expression of freedom.

  What I feel about the script from today's view point is that you can strongly feel a production thing very popular at the time, which is to make everything mysterious, or having connection with myth. They did not need to expose every setting of the story to the audience at the early stage because teens watching this did not have social media or any other content to distract themselves. The opening of the world is rather slow-paced, You will have to finish quite some episodes to understand how far the world had always been. That might be a significant weak point after comsuming so many "engaging" shows.

  My forever internal score: 5/5; my objective score: 3.5/5

  The songs
  As I wrote above, these are the songs quite popular that time and really helped the band to expand their audience. The opening song was quite different and very special for the band as well. The vocal has been performing that high note in this op song for 20+ years now and in live you will realize how difficult to reach that note. They even went a bit more experimental in their other Fafner related CD lineups (yes, I bought all of them).
  For me, they will be all forever masterpiece.

  My internal score: 5/5; my objective score: 4.5/5

  The robots
  The company actually built a whole mecha team after Fafner and continue to expand their mecha works. I would not say the design was that unique, but they look great. Honestly, I'd say I love their 2D works rather their late ones with 3DCG. Now as the company itself was reformed, some of the mecha team went Sunrise and some went back to mother company Production IG.

  My internal score: 4.5/5; my objective score: 4/5

  The fandom
  I am not Japanese, but I learned the language and moved to Tokyo (well, 50% for Fafner) when they were doing sequels. I am of course surprised to see how huge the fan base was when I attended the live events because it was never huge in my country,
  Consider mostly female would go live event, I actually did not expect lots of males also were there for Fafner after 10 years. People just remember this show in their teenager times, the struggles of teens in the story, how they fought out their own way of living rather than just following their parents, the good songs, and of course, there are new fans only for the sequels as well,
  Lining up for limited goods, I had to team up with Japanese ladies, that's why I had the chance to talk with them and got to know how they started to watch Fafner.
  It was a dream come true for me and I of course bought everything I could get and keep them with me til today.

  Some final words
  Thanks for reading my review to here. Fafner did literally change my life. I wouldn't have the mindset so determined to go outside my country because it was rather difficult for my financial situation then. But I made it anyway and I have a lot of emotions towards this work even though I do not see it very "charming" from today's perspective.

  If you are interested in Fafner's story, I would also recommend some of the early works from Tow Ubukata, the main writer. He made some really beautiful worlds in his novels, some of which may not being made into anime that popular.

  Continue on AniList

SIMILAR ANIMES YOU MAY LIKE

• ANIME

  ActionShin Seiki Evangelion
• ANIME

  DramaRahXephon
• ANIME

  DramaMugen no Ryvius
• ANIME

  ActionGinga Kikoutai Majestic Prince
• ANIME

  ActionHeroic Age
• ANIME

  ActionZegapain
• ANIME

  ActionDarling in the Franxx
• ANIME

  DramaBokurano
• ANIME

  ActionArgento Soma
• ANIME

  DramaDensetsu Kyojin Ideon
• ONA

  ActionBounen no Xamdou
• ANIME

  ActionKidou Senshi Gundam SEED