Armored Trooper Votoms 4: God Planet Quent
How many anime series do you know which feature such extended storylines that they need "refresher" episodes now and then to bring everybody up to date? God Planet Quent opens with an appropriate review of stage three, and the fact that it's narrated by Chirico himself is helpful as he makes clear his thoughts. Still, too much time seemed to be wasted replaying action scenes from early in the previous stage, rather than producing a good summary of Deadworld Sunsa as a whole. Perhaps the original TV viewers would not have tolerated having an entire episode go by without at least some exciting action being replayed.
I got the feeling that God Planet Quent was reminding me of a movie I'd seen somewhere, and I finally figured out it was the 1956 US release "Forbidden Planet". In both cases, the remains of a fantastic ancient civilization, which abruptly perished for mysterious reasons, is discovered and the mystery of it's fate is unravelled. As the story progressed, it was suggested that Chirico is not just a Perfect Soldier, but may have been selected by some godlike entity as it's successor. This was getting weird--I bet you don't see stuff like this in Gundam or Macross! Chirico, who never had much of a personality to begin with, appeared to have gone insane as he spoke of taking revenge upon the entire Astragius galaxy. Everything seemed to be falling apart--how could he have become a so-called "Overman"? Why had the Gilgamesh and Balarant empires, which had just been at war for a century, suddenly made friends with each other? A series as long as this one really needed a good ending to justify all the time and money I'd dedicated to it, and the plot didn't seem to be making a whole lot of sense. Had the intiguing first stage of the Votoms saga been a fluke, and would I never get a satisfying set of answers to the questions it had raised? Would I ever commit myself to rewatching it all again? I was starting to think I'd have to demote my reviews of all the previous stages to the "watch" category. Feeling quite nervous, I went into the final episode with my fingers crossed.
And, when it was all over, I said to myself "that was good!". Seldom has one episode--really the final half episode--of a series swung me from feeling so frustrated and pessimistic to just plain feeling good. I'm glad I stayed with Votoms to the end. I guess if I had recalled the way the other stages had ended, I might have realised there was nothing to worry about. They always waste a lot of time early on, then accelerate to an exciting climax at the end. In this case, a surprise ending did the trick--Ryosuke Takahashi knew what he was doing after all. Not every question was answered, but this time the right answers were provided to finally make sense of Votoms as a whole. Also pleasing was the post-climactic scene which explained what became of certain favorite charachters in the end. An unexpected bonus was a series of original trailers for the 1983 run of Votoms (it's airtime was 5:55PM!).
I can't emphasise enough that Votoms is an acquired taste. Watching it demands a lot of time and money, and after a mere three episodes it would be easy to assume that it is just a "boring" series that is not worth the effort. But for those of you who liked the way it tasted, and stayed with it to the end, congratulations! I think you know just what you have accomplished. Though far from perfect, (and far too expensive to purchase the entire series) Armored Trooper Votoms really does deserve it's description as one of the most "ambitious" anime series ever.
My favorite line: "In absolute power you will find absolution!" --Wiseman
4/04
Last updated Monday, February 04 2008.
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