What They Say:
As Mutta and his teammates try to keep warm in the cold desert night, Mutta is reminded of recent events.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With a couple of recap episodes behind it already, it can be kind of problematic for ongoing fans to have another recap episode, especially as it once again delves into recent material overall. But there’s also the real reason for it, beyond giving the animators a chance to catch up and be ready for the kinds of episodes that are yet to come. The series changed to a much better time slot recently and these episodes help to introduce them to the years worth of episode that have come out so far and makes the show a bit more accessible to them going forward. It’s just one of the downsides to dealing with same-day viewing in that we have to acknowledge the actual broadcast realities in the home territory. And frankly, if they can get more viewers and run longer – since there’s a lot of material in the manga yet to cover – then I’m all for taking a few weeks to do this.
Having focused on Mutta and Hibito’s aspirations separately previously, with plenty of ties between the two, the show jumps to a different point here in bringing everyone up to date. Here, we get to see some of the jealousies that lie between Mutta and Hibito when he sees his younger brother launch to the moon, becoming the first Japanese astronaut there and the youngest person as well. Bringing these motivations into things is good, and honest and natural, but it also makes sure to show the admiration from Mutta and the understanding of where he is by Hibito. The two have an interesting orbit to their lives where in some ways one seems ahead of the other, but they’re so connected in so many ways that it’s hard to say either is truly ahead as they’re just bringing each other along at different rates. The show focuses on this part of the relationship, while also covering a lot of other smaller bits with the rest of the cast, by showing the wonder of space for Hibito and then digging into some of the trials that Mutta had to face in his extensive NASA training.
In Summary:
With the third and final part of the recap, Space Brothers does a decent job of highlighting some of the key aspects of the series in order to help new viewers in its new time slot. The first episodes focus on Mutta was spot on as was the look at Hibito’s life in the second and his pivotal journey on the moon and the dangers there. Here, we get a bit more of a look at the brothers as a pair, together and apart, and a look at the events that have set the current survival training mission in motion. Recaps are tough things to do but with a show that’s been running for a year, with no filler, and that has a lot of content and things going on, I can’t really get fired up in an upset way about it because it has logical reasons for it. I’ll skip them in the future when the eventual home video hits, but in the meantime it was welcome to revisit some of these scenes and to get excited about the ongoing storyline which kicks off next episode.
Grade: B-
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.
