Series rec: Twin Spica
Jan. 2nd, 2004 07:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thistlechaserOn ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
luminata's rec, I downloaded and watched Twin Spica. Somehow, even though I had to play each ep individually, I watched all six eps in one sitting without noticing the passage of time at all. It's hard to compare anime series, they're just too varying and too different -- however, if I were to try putting my favorites into some kind of order, Twin Spica would be in the top two or three.
In a half-hour ep, you really only get about 20 minutes of actual show. Too many commercials, opening song, closing song/credits, recap from last week... it doesn't leave much time for new material. That makes how much story and characterization are packed into Twin Spica especially impressive. They've covered life, death, and (a wonderful) afterlife. Family, love, loss, dreams, coping after a loved one dies... so much story, so much character development in six little eps!
I could sum up the storyline as "a little girl follows her dreams of becoming an astronaut", but that does not do the plot justice. A tragedy happened when the main character was only a year old, and the fallout of that affected her and many people around her in numerous ways. Unexpected ties were formed between characters, including a lion masked ghost. (I love the way Lion is handled. And between the mask and the astronaut gloves and boots, he's really cute in a totally non-sexual way.)
Though it had no plot-progression in it, the flashback/afterlife ep was my favorite by far. The subtitlers said "the Japanese believe this version of the afterlife", and if it's true that the majority of them do, then that's just one more thing that's really got me interested in that culture. The ep explained it as: Death is a journey. There are seven stages of it, each taking seven days, so it takes you a total of forty-nine days to get to the next world. For seven days you walk through a meadow, then for seven through a forest, then for seven in some other place (I forget all seven places and their exact order), but at the end of those forty-nine days you reach a river you need to cross. Once you're across, you're in that next world. People don't get tired or feel pain as they walk, and once you start across that river, any injuries/disfigurements you have will vanish. If there really is such a thing as something after death, I think this would be a great form for it. All that traveling time to think and reflect on your life, walking through all sorts of natural places without getting tired or pains in your feet or anything.
BT folks can find the downloads here. I highly, highly recommend watching this if you can. And thanks for the rec,luminata. :)
ETA: I should have also mentioned that the animation was totally beautiful, but the wonderful storyline overshadowed it in my mind.
luminata's rec, I downloaded and watched Twin Spica. Somehow, even though I had to play each ep individually, I watched all six eps in one sitting without noticing the passage of time at all. It's hard to compare anime series, they're just too varying and too different -- however, if I were to try putting my favorites into some kind of order, Twin Spica would be in the top two or three.In a half-hour ep, you really only get about 20 minutes of actual show. Too many commercials, opening song, closing song/credits, recap from last week... it doesn't leave much time for new material. That makes how much story and characterization are packed into Twin Spica especially impressive. They've covered life, death, and (a wonderful) afterlife. Family, love, loss, dreams, coping after a loved one dies... so much story, so much character development in six little eps!
I could sum up the storyline as "a little girl follows her dreams of becoming an astronaut", but that does not do the plot justice. A tragedy happened when the main character was only a year old, and the fallout of that affected her and many people around her in numerous ways. Unexpected ties were formed between characters, including a lion masked ghost. (I love the way Lion is handled. And between the mask and the astronaut gloves and boots, he's really cute in a totally non-sexual way.)
Though it had no plot-progression in it, the flashback/afterlife ep was my favorite by far. The subtitlers said "the Japanese believe this version of the afterlife", and if it's true that the majority of them do, then that's just one more thing that's really got me interested in that culture. The ep explained it as: Death is a journey. There are seven stages of it, each taking seven days, so it takes you a total of forty-nine days to get to the next world. For seven days you walk through a meadow, then for seven through a forest, then for seven in some other place (I forget all seven places and their exact order), but at the end of those forty-nine days you reach a river you need to cross. Once you're across, you're in that next world. People don't get tired or feel pain as they walk, and once you start across that river, any injuries/disfigurements you have will vanish. If there really is such a thing as something after death, I think this would be a great form for it. All that traveling time to think and reflect on your life, walking through all sorts of natural places without getting tired or pains in your feet or anything.
BT folks can find the downloads here. I highly, highly recommend watching this if you can. And thanks for the rec,
luminata. :)ETA: I should have also mentioned that the animation was totally beautiful, but the wonderful storyline overshadowed it in my mind.
