The Winter 2015 Anime Preview Guide

Fafner Exodus

Rebecca Silverman

Rating: 3.5  (out of 5)

It's been some time since we last saw the cast of Fafner: Dead Aggressor, but something still holds very true: although it involves mecha, Fafner is not a mecha story, but a war story. There's a tension even to the most mundane of scenes that belies the tranquility of Tatsumiyajima, the man-made island where the characters live in the 22nd century. The world, a prologue reminds us, has been ravaged by strange golden beings known as Festum, and only by piloting Fafners, special mecha that incorporate a bit of Festum in their makeup, can people strike back...and that doesn't always work. The prologue is narrated by Soushi Minashirou, a key character in the climax of the first TV series and whose return the film brought about, but judging from his opening lines, he may not be around forever. Now back on the island, Shoushi's goal is to find a cure for his best friend Kazuki, the ace pilot of the previous series. Kazuki suffers serious health problems from piloting the Fafner, and while Soushi has restored his vision, he still only has about three years left. Kazuki chooses to live those years as a cook in his family diner, something Soushi doesn't seem to entirely understand.

Most of this episode is spent reintroducing us to the characters of the last series and film, all of whom have aged a bit, given that the story commences in 2151. For the most part there are no surprises; in fact, the major one comes from the child of two of the old protagonists, little Miwa. Miwa spends a lot of time coloring on the porch and talking to “Emery,” her imaginary friend. While this in itself isn't strange, given Miwa's toddler status, the fact that she has a reaction the moment a Human Army airship is spotted approaching the island sets off some alarms...especially since the vessel appears to be carrying a little girl named Emery. The Army calls her their hope, and they have brought her to Tatsumiyajima to meet ALVIS's hope. But is that Miwa, or Tsubaki, the girl in the incubation tube? Soushi's narration, plus the combination of an early scene of a failed attempt to kill a Godzilla-like Festum that cost many human lives and the subtitle of the show (Exodus), does not give us much hope that this will be a happy or even a hopeful story. But like its predecessor, it is sure to be an interesting one.

The visuals will be immediately recognizable, with virtually no updating of character design (apart from natural aging) or landscape, but the animation is vastly improved. The few Festum that we see no longer look like poorly animated plastic models, and there's a seamlessness to flight and movement that is lovely to behold. All of the male voices tend towards the understated and soft while the female voices are much louder and more brash, which is interesting but not entirely unexpected, given what Kazuki and Soushi lived through last time. Simply put, Fafner EXODUS looks from its first episode to be a worthy successor to the original, tense even in supposed peace, and with the looming threat of war never far enough away for anyone to say with great certainty that peace will prevail and everyone will survive.

Fafner EXODUS is available streaming on Crunchyroll.