Marika’s life is about to take a few twists and turns as she learns her true family history.
What They Say:
Marika Katou is a normal highschool girl, living somewhere in space. At school, she enjoys being in the yacht club, and after school she works as a waitress at the Cafe “Lamp”. One day, she is suddenly asked to become captain of the space pirate ship Bentenmaru.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Based on the ongoing works of the light novel series which is called Miniskirt Pirates, the anime series translates as Bodacious Space Pirates, but that’s just a particular part of the flavor of the show. The series has some interesting interstellar aspects to it from the prologue as it firmly establishes itself well as a space opera kind of romp with big settings, political potential and a cast that’s using its resources and abilities to make money since they are pirates, but fighting on the side of right. Of course, it also gets to bring in all sorts of elements because of its setting and nature of the cast, which is why schoolgirl uniforms aren’t exactly out of place in a way when it comes to a story about a world trying to maintain its independence against a larger stellar government.
The series revolves around Marika Kato, a rather fun high school girl who is excellent at flying and generally comes across as something of a good kid as we see here from the opening where a group of pirates are scoping her out, both in general and at her place of work where she of course gets to wear a maid uniform. Marika has a bit of a family history that she may not have been aware of her as the pirates knew her mother who likely has quite a history herself, which explains why this group is interesting and surprisingly eager to bring her on board as a member of the crew. And not just any member of the crew, but its captain. It’s a neat little setup that I rather like, especially since Marika’s mother is still alive and fairly domestic at this point, which gives it a nice twist since it’s not played for laughs or gags.
Discovering that her dad was one of the big players in that war of independence years ago is a shock to Marika, but it’s also a shock that pirates still exist and that they want her to come out into space with her. What’s amusing about it all though is that because of what her father did, they gained a Letter of Marque that makes them legal pirates in the area since they were an instrumental part of the war, giving them legal authority to do what they do with an actual license. Marika’s discovery of this is fun and rather laid back, which is how the episode feels as a whole as the group inserts itself into Marika’s life, with one girl becoming a student at the school and another taking on the role of a teacher. We don’t really get to know anyone beyond Marika, but with this kind of approach and quality/detail of animation and design, we’re easily drawn into the show and the world they inhabit, even when they do something mildly silly like dealing with ice cream sweets.
In Summary:
Moretsu Pirates sets itself up well here for the start of a space opera series in a very good way here. It doesn’t go hugely big when you get down to it and there’s only a tiny bit of action towards the end that serves to start moving things forward. I really liked the background dump we got at the start as it covered a lot of things clearly and let the characters later go on about things without having to awkwardly explain them. Marika knew some things but not others and it helped to make it a bit more believable overall. There’s an interesting feel to the show, coming from its light novel origins more than anything else, and it has the potential to tell a really fun and interesting story. But not one that feels forced and overproduced. That’s a hard thing to really achieve but there’s a lot of potential to be had here, though the opening episode may underwhelm for some. It’s definitely a show that merits more attention, especially if you’re like me and miss having some real space/science fiction anime series on the air.
Grade: B+
Readers Rating: [ratings]
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
