Legend of the Galactic Heroes Die Neue These – 25-30

I am uncertain as to who is so committed to LOTGH that they continue to remake it even four years after the debut of the first season but I am certainly grateful for their efforts and the efforts of the animation team. Jumping into it again reminds me just how different it is to any other anime with its pseudo documentary approach to storytelling. Watching it is like watching history and I find it funny how often it goes to the effort of naming every minor character on screen, as though these were people of note in their own right. But I think the show realizes that there is no possible way for anyone to remember the names of all these characters(Especially for Japanese people to remember all these foregn names, not even counting for the fact that this used to be a novel which would make that straight impossible) as it does the equivalent of a sizzle reel naming every member of Reinhard’s court. I find though LOTGH deals with fairly broad subject matter, it never truly leaves the viewer behind and often puts information clearly enough in bite size chunks for them to get the current situation. It’s the difference between convoluted and complex in like how Kingdom Hearts storyline is simpler than you would think but the problem lies in how utterly convoluted it’s presentation is. Where with LOTGH we have the story getting across the cost of the coup by talking about the free planets needing to gain new soldiers with the loss of so many experienced ones and tying it into Juilian getting inducted into the military. Through Juilian we see the training and first battle jitters, as well as the classroom setting to exposite about the importance of the Iserlohn corridor. On the surface you have a basic A plot of Juilian entering the military and within that is many small bits contributing to worldbuilding at large. LOTGH in general makes frequent use of a microplot to give a greater sense of the bigger picture. Unlike Game of thrones for example it doesn’t jump between three different ongoing plots but instead focuses each episode on one specific topic and rarely if ever deviates(Though to be fair that’s based on this season as my memory of previous seasons is misty due to it being literal years ago.) Look at the last of the episodes here on Fezzan where every scene is about Fezzan and characters within Fezzan. We never switch to Yang or Reinhard to see how their current stories are going, but stay laser focused on just the events of Fezzan. So we are never overloaded with information as the anime sticks to showing you the details you need to know for the current episode.

In regards to the corridor I admit there is some rather funky space logic at work as the writer is essentially inventing a reason why there is a massive divide separating the two warring factions which can just so happen to only be crossed with two small tunnels. Unnavigable space is the term used to describe these out of bounds zones neither army can cross but despite directly addressing the matter they only explained that these two corridors exist and only one can be used due to Fezzan holding dominion over one of them with a no military policy. But as to why unnavigable space is well…unnavigable there isn’t really an explanation given. I understand it’s more the writer limiting the nature of space in order to make various plot points regarding the corridors and give them massive strategic importance. For iserlohn essentially is the border between nations and he who would rule that death star at its center essentially pushes the other to stalemate while holding the advantage of invasion. Fezzan on the other hand is the economic powerhouse which controls the bank books of both nations and the episode in this lineup clearly explains their core importance while revealing the agenda of the nations leader. In a way it’s a very clever compartmentalisation of two core aspects of war with these corridors with one dedicated to military might and the other economical might, essentially illustrating the cost and funding of war by having them be two tunnels dividing warring nations.

I had a debate with myself in regards to following my usual episode posts for this series and doing n on the first three episodes of this season but due to a late start I relegated to covering the first six episodes instead. But part of this also happens to deal with the rather simple story of episodes 26 and 27 as there really isn’t much to elaborate in regards to the plot of these two. I think I have said in old reviews around the end of the last season, or if not I am saying it now, that the nobles of LOTGH have become a bit tiresome. They are an undeniably useful plot device for the author indeed as childish man babies constantly messing things up and whining about status makes for an easy conflict to throw into the story. Which may be why the earth clut somewhat fills their absence but it can get tiring to see the same general response of “But I am noble and should get to do what I want!” and while it can be satisfying to see them get well earned comeuppance, it’s hard to care for it at this point where they no longer hold relevance. So a plotline of Mittanmeyer shooting a noble for being a horrible human being and proceeding to get screwed by the system is just something where we know what the final result will be before we even start the story. In many ways this would have served better to have before the big noble rebellion and while it’s nice to get the backstory of how these two became the right hand men of Reinhard In these two episodes the main thing to interest me was the backstory of Reuenthal in that he gained a ingrained distrust of women due to his mother attempting to gouge out his heterochromatic eye when he was a baby as it was evidence to her infidelity. Personally I think she could have written it off convincingly as being a family trait that skips generations but well maybe her son being a constant reminder of her transgressions was too much. Now I think Reuenthal is smart enough to know that his statement of “All women being untrustworthy” doesn’t really hold water and his friendly banter with Mittanmeyers wife certainly shows he doesn’t really think she’s going to backstab his best friend. No I think it’s more that this idea has been so massively etched into Reuenthal that he could never bring himself to trust any woman, no matter how true and faithful they may be. Essentially no amount of reason could ever cause him to get rid of this notion from his head as it’s so much a part of his identity as to ask him to abandon it is to ask to cut off his arm.

With Reinhard making reforms in the Goldenbaum dynasty the people rejoice as former liberties are returned and civil rights are finally respected. It is nice to see in such fanfare that there are still people against him as the former nobles curse his name over having sullied the nature of their overblown privilege much to the sympathy of no one. While the free planets alliance nervously adjust their collars hoping that the people don’t notice how much better and free the autocratic society is over their democratic one. But even Reinhard’s own selected personnel sit wondering if he’s one step away from becoming a ruthless dictator as certainly in this “democratic imperialism” things are improving at a fast rate while Reinhard pushes for the best of the nation. But that only applies as long as Reinhard has the good of the nation at heart and isn’t assassinated. It’s funny that out of these people it’s only those closest that see the true problem in that Reinhard just is dead inside. The man is more or less adhering to the last wish of his best friend and working for the will of the people in almost robotic fashion which makes it all the more fascinating in that he’s so incredibly good at it. As if the positions of leadership are better suited not for those who want leadership but rather those that are dispassionate about it. Oberstein seems determined to keep Reinhard in this state as he wishes to stop anyone from rivaling Reinhard’s status while maintaining this mechanically disposition towards government. But I find it interesting that even Oberstein seems almost worried about how Reinhard refuses to kill the current infant emperor not because it’s morally reprehensible but rather he just thinks the child could prove useful in the future. Essentially if the child wasn’t useful he could have ordered him smothered in bed without much consideration. Having this followed up by Oberstein giving a extremely rare show of compassion by taking in a starving dog feels not so much a coincidence.

So we have the plan of fighting death star with death star as an outlandish plan of using teleportation tech to somehow warp in a fortress in front of Iserlohn. I have a feeling if the one proposing the plan didn’t butter up Reinhard by praising Kircheis that he might not have been as receptive to the plan, but It does show just how this guy managed to stay in the upper ranks despite not having much to show for it. Personally in the episode about it I was more engaged with the part regarding Yang and his friend’s advice to Julian about how Yang may undervalue just how important he truly is. Considering how little security he has and generally relaxed demeanor, there may be quite a bit of truth to that. Yang may be able to plan for the future and learn from the past but his evaluation of the present moment seems foolhardy. As for Fezzan it’s nice to see they have the tolerance for the earth cult that I do and I can say that if anyone is winning in this war, it seems to be them. After all, even if a victor comes out between these two nations, the bank books of the winner will be under Fezzans control. So Rubinskys plan to rule the galaxy economically really isn’t as foolhardy as it might appear. So we are at novel three of ten adaption wise and about episode 30 of the original OVA. If we are assuming this will have the same episode count of the OVA that means we got 80 episodes till the ending. On the basis of 12 episodes a year we can look to finish the series in seven years. That’s the optimistic estimate as well considering that we had a two year gap between season 2 and 3. That really is the kicker about this show in that it’s undeniably good but nowhere near a conclusion which could have it falling into the same white whale status of it’s previous incaration.