First off God damn that's a long subtitle, as ridiculously long a title to have to begin with they managed to top even that. Seriously what a fucking mouthful. So this anime is shilled a lot, and yesterday I finally was convinced to try it out. I began with the prequel movie "My conquest is the sea of stars", and I have serious issues with the last ten minutes, and nowhere else more appropriate to air them. There's a giant fleet engagement with about a million vessels taking part, as the democratic "good guys" are getting creamed they come up with a move to win. Three guys take a ship and kick everyone else off (if these ships don't need gunners to fire the guns, engineers to oversee the powerplant, marines for boarding actions, or even crewman to man radar. Then why the hell are these ships manned at all?) Then fly up to the enemy commander, come along side and sit there. The entire warzone goes quiet. Everyone to afraid to fire a single shot, EVEN MILLIONS OF KILOMETRES AWAY, for fear the commanders vessel might be struck. The "good guys" (who were getting crushed) use this confusion to sail away in peace, leaving this single vessel with three crewman alone behind enemy lines. Then that ship leaves too. That was the summary and already I bet many can see the obvious issues with this plot. 1. Coming alongside another vessel does indeed mean you probably won't be targeted by canon fire, sure, BUT that simply means you are commiting a boarding action. Pistols and sabers time. So why doesnt the "imperialistic" "badguy" commander sound repel boarders and? Or when it's clear he isn't being boarded, BOARD THE OTHER SHIP. 2. why the fuck would you let the enemy go? 3. Why would a ship fighting off boarders (which has been a common occurence for so long as naval vessels have existed I.E. all of western history) silence not just his own side, but the other side as well? 4. In a battlespace billions of kilometres wide why would anyone else give a shit? 5. Why let the enemy suicide vessel go? Why would noone take a potshot after it left the side of the commanders ship? 6. Is the entire series this monumentally retarded? Did the author even look into naval tactics from any century? 7. Will it get better? I mean what kinda ship doesn't have marines on board? How is there no procedure for dealing with a close in enemy? Traditionally you board it, kill the crew, and then cut away boarding ropes, wait til you are out of range of it exploding, and then sink the bastard. Or you take control of the enemy vessel, crew it, and keep fighting now with another ship in your flotilla. I just don't understand how that was a conundrum that has never occured in that animes world. Simple fucking shit guys. All that being said I liked it. Good music, good art, cool massive fleet battle. On the negative sides, bad dialogue (or maybe stilted is a better way of phrasing that) stupid understanding of warfare, and silly deus ex machina at the end for all the main characters to live. I'm thinking of making diagrams of the battle, and ones of Lord Nelson's victory at Trafalgar to further demonstrate how ridiculously naive the writer was in terms of tactics, complete with footnotes to the equipment available in the anime and the tactical considerations such weaponry necessitates. I don't know about tonight though. Oddly not feeling nearly autistic and angry enough to commit to what will be a minimum of three hours of work to create something that honestly only 3 people will ever see.