Hard science fiction is a sub category of science fiction, and as the name already implies, hard science fiction puts an emphasis on scientific or technical detail as well as the accuracy. And no, that doesn’t mean that it’s dry technical manual. Quite the contrary, some of the best books, and shows that I have seen are hard science fiction.

Planetes, is more or less the only anime that I can name that is hard science fiction. It does stray here and there from time to time, but most hard science fiction does that. Most science fiction anime has things like mecha, huge robots, technology that just seems very silly, or technology that just plain doesn’t make any sense.

Of course there is nothing wrong with that, but at some point, one wants to watch an anime that isn’t filled with fourteen year olds piloting twenty meter tall robots. And this is where Planetes comes in. Planetes takes place in the near future, and follows the story of “Space Debris Collection Section”, a unit of a large corporation.

Yes, that’s right, it’s a hard science fiction anime about space garbage men (and women). And no, it’s not boring, far from it actually. One could say that it’s a hard science fiction comedy, but that wouldn’t be quite true, as with a lot of other animes, it’s light-hearted and easy going, but it confronts many serious issues that people still have to deal with in the future. Death, terrorism, love, hate, camaraderie, betrayal, and much more.

As with all fiction, it’s the characters that make or break it. In Planetes case, the characters are one of the major things that contribute to making this anime a great anime. It’s a very interesting bunch, each with their own personalities. Their own strengths, weaknesses and history.

Another place where I think that Planetes really shines is the quality of artwork and animation. Being true to its hard science fiction setting, the technical details, like small valves, tubes, circuitry and other such things are very detailed. By far surpassing other science fiction animes that I have seen so far, even ones that are newer than Planetes.

As for the soundtrack, well, I’ll say this much, there has been better. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still very good and solid, but it could be even better. Just to name a show where I think that the sound and music was handled better in a similar setting, Firefly. And just as with Firefly, Planetes deserves praise for not adding sound to space. Instead they use character dialogue (via suit speakers), and sometimes music.

Overall a very good anime, well worth watching it. If you like science fiction and animes, then Planetes is one of those must watch animes.

(4 votes, average: 3.5 out of 5)

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