Innocent Venus 1 & 2
Opening: "Noble Roar" by Yousei Teikoku (starting with ep 2): The single was out before the show started, and after listening I wondered exactly what an OP to fit the song, which is similar in style to "Senketsu no Chikai" (OP for Magipoka, also by Yousei Teikoku), would look like. What we got fits pretty well. It's more on the abstract side, and there are some images in it -- Sana as the proverbial "caged bird" at the beginning, for example -- that might or might not have significance. I'll pass on trying to analyze it for now, though ;)
In 2010 the "Hyper Hurricane" devstated the world, cutting the population by 5 billion and sending North America, Russia, and Europe into ruin, with Japan left (of course). The government of Japan started a rebuilding program, setting up special economic development districts, all of it made easier by the invention of "powered suits". However, outside of the special economic districts, the cities fell into slums. The elite of the world, calling themselves "Logos", put the powered suits to military use, and shut the poor in the slums, the "Levinas", out.
Fast forward to 2035 -- a young man, Jin, and a girl, Sana@Kaori Nazuka (14... supposedly) flee from the military, and are cornered when someone in a mobile suit mecha gets them out. It's Jo, Jin's buddy -- both of them were in a special squad named Phantom whose mission is to observe the Levinas and supress rebellion with Logos, but have fled taking Sana with them. Jo's the rather cool and quiet type, but Jin's more friendly -- Sana seems rather attached to Jin, but hesitates to approach Jo. A kid that's a troublemaker, Gora, joins them as well, thinking he might have something to gain. He and Sana don't seem to get along too well, with him calling Sana "Hime-sama" all the time ;)
As for Phantom.... we see them carry out their anti-terrorist duties, with plenty of blood to go along. Scary guys there...
Jo and Gora go out to scout and see if the military's come yet.. and it looks like they're going to be there shortly, so they've got to get away. A powered suit squadron attacks, but Jo and Jin take care of things easily with the ridiculously powerful robotic suits they have (apparently called "Gladiator" or something), and manage to escape with Sana and Gora... on to episode two after the jump.
A group of terrorists calling themselves "Resistance" takes over a nuclear power plant and plants a bomb inside, threatening to set it off if their comrades aren't released to them. Vice commander of Phantom, Renee, comes in to handle the job. In a call to the leader of Resistance she says she's going to follow their demands, but to give her some time to do so... of course, she has no intention of doing so, instead ordering Phantom to break in and get rid of the terrorists. Phantom carries out the plan with ease, with plenty of gore as usual -- Chinran, the guy with the cards, and Kyoushirou, the one with the daggers, are especially scary (((( ;ﾟДﾟ)))ｶﾞｸｶﾞｸﾌﾞﾙﾌﾞﾙ
Meanwhile... Gora leads Jin, Jo, and Sana to a run-down grocery store. While Jin and Gora look around inside, Sana stays with Jo back in the truck. Sana can't stand that Jo won't even try to have a conversation with her. He starts to say something about Gora, but then says it's nothing big. Sana asks him when he got to know Jin, but he stops her -- some cops have pulled into the parking lot and want to take a look at the truck. Jo knocks both out then punctures the tires on their car. Gora comes back with some food they found in the store -- corn beef's only two years old, it's still good!... (^^;;)
While having some of the surely delicious food he brought back, Gora asks Sana who Jin and Jo are -- she doesn't know. Then why did she go with them? She's sure they'll protect her... as the sun rises they drive along a road next to the ocean. Sana's rather excited to see the ocean since she's never seen it before -- well, she has riden in an airplane once. Gora's rather suspicious of Jin and Jo. He knows those suits in back are from the army, so they must be on the run. A submarine suddenly surfaces offshore nearby, and apparently Gora knows it's a Wakou (lit. "Japanese pirates") vessel. It was Gora's plan all along to take their suits... and to make things worse, miliary helicopters arrive. Jo tells Jin to take Sana and run away, then gets in his PSP suit. Onboard the ship there's a guy that looks very much like a pirate
Well, they are Wakou after all ;) Anyways, episode two ends without us knowing much more about anything that's going on. There's more detail on the show's website than has been revealed so far, actually. There's only 12 episodes, so the pace of things is going to have to pick up a bit here -- still looking forward to seeing how interesting things turn out using such a stereotypical post-apocalyptic setting. Reminds me of Tactical Roar or Tide-Line Blue, if you're talking about recent stuff ;)
Since there's not much in way of story development so far besides Jin, Jo, and Sana being pursued by the military, I'm definitely watching for characters -- well, mostly Sana, of course. Yet another young girl teamed up with an older guy, though the age difference isn't as great as it is between Mister and Franca in Coyote Ragtime Show ;) Anyways, Sana kawaii yo Sana!.. if I didn't make that clear already. In Sana's character profile on the website, she's described as being one of the "Seven Children", and also called "Venus" (hence "Innocent Venus", I guess). I suppose we'll find out what that means later on, hopefully sooner rather than later ;) Of course, there's still plenty of questions surrounding Jin and Jo as well. Why did they leave Phantom? Why did they help Sana?
Sana's constantly changing expressions remind me a bit of Yurie-sama@Kamichu!, which isn't surprising given that Brains Base animated that as well. Very nice job by them again with the detail put into each character's expressions of emotions and movement, as well as very high quality animation in general. The CG for the mecha isn't quite so good, but it's acceptable. I'm not watching for the mecha stuff anyways ;)
Next time, looks like Sana and the rest will board that Wakou ship and meet that pirate guy that's the captain. Hoping for more story development -- at least enough so I can figure out what the heck exactly is going on -- but I can keep on watching just for Sana regardless of that. I apologize in advance if I end up not doing much more than talking about how cute Sana is in my Innocent Venus posts after this ;)
curses.. i'm downloading the raw for ep 2 now because i want to see the OP animation (had already heard noble roar) ^^;;
thanks a lot :D
50 billion people? There's not more than 12 billion people alive today - how'd they do 50 billion? :D
Well, this sounds pretty standard, at least so far...
Haesslich: Ooops, extra zero there, fixed it ;) Actually, the world population now is estimated at around 6.5 billion -- in Innocent Venus' setting, that grows to 8 billion in 2010.
another nice little touch I liked.. when they're showing the hyper hurricanes you get a nice view of what is supposed to be the ISS (international space station).
the pirate guy looks kind of like Howl. ^___^
12 episodes... I guess I`ll give it a try. The grapics look really nice.