New truths are revealed as Ao gets some face time with Eureka.
What They Say:
Bobbing in the ocean in the Gekko, Ao faces a strange reunion with Eureka. At the same time, the Allied Forces, Japan, Generation Bleu, and Truth close in on the prize – Eureka, her Nirvash, and the Gekko.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With the series having been fairly uneven for me for most of its run, things ended in the previous episode with the start of a make or break moment. Introducing Eureka once again, putting her with Ao and showing us the Gekko are key things for fans of the previous series and important parts of being able to properly tie the two things together. And the team here knows that what they’re doing has to go big at some point during it, so much so that the end credits are done over the animation after the opening credits, giving you hope that when they do get to the end, they go as big as they need to in order to secure the viewers.
The show spends a lot of its time doing quiet material for the most part which certainly has its moments. The time spent between Ao and Eureka is pretty interesting as we see that she’s six months pregnant and longs to return to the world she came from, where people live above the Scub Coral and Renton is there as well. The two have a calm kind of talk and in a way you get the feeling that Eureka is definitely far more comfortable with him than anyone. Where it gets curious though is when Ivica ends up getting involved in the situation, finally arriving on board the Gekko.
Not surprisingly, some of the truth finally comes out in that Eureka and the Gekko aren’t from the past or some alien world but are instead from the future by some twelve thousand years, which shows us how the Scub Coral progressed. Ao’s coming to grips with this is amusing since it means he understands that he’s the baby in her belly now and her survival is tied to his own. And as more people get involved and the threat is there, we get some nice little tweaks from a variant of Eureka that shows up on the scene to indicate that the Secrets aren’t an enemy, just as Truth is doing his best to kill Eureka. The tension builds well towards the end to be sure and there are some great scenes for Eureka in particular and definitely a strong dash of Renton that enters the picture.
In Summary:
Eureka 7: Astral Ocean continues to be a series that is really challenging me to continue on with it. There is the general gist of the series to be had that’s been there to varying degrees since the beginning, but it feels like it still has no really clear narrative. In the end though, I keep coming back to the problem in that the cast here as a whole, even including Ao, really aren’t all that appealing. When you do the comparisons to the original cast, which is warranted since this is a directly connected series, you had personalities that stood out on all sides and grew as more of the web was revealed. Here, we haven’t really had anyone that’s stood out in an engaging way or made any better distinctions about the sides, connections and so forth. It’s just feeling like a mess, sort of like life if you want, in how it’s all just barreling along. Perhaps I’m on the outs with the fans on this one, but as much as I desperately want to love this series, it keeps me at a far, far distance.
Grade: B-
Streamed By: FUNimation
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.
