javonte.leffler - 2015-04-02 01:36:48

In the beginning its is a bit slow and it takes a few episodes for the actuall villians to get in the picuture and real plot to develop  but if you stick it out to at least episode 12 onward it is a good Mecha anime worth checking out.

rsmitham - 2015-01-07 09:24:01

As a very shounen style mecha, captain earth was a very enjoyable series. i'd say that if you are coming of something like Evangelion and want a very chilled out Mecha than Captain earth may be the series for you.

rhett.strosin - 2014-12-05 18:08:48

It wasn't great but I liked it anyway. But the last episode ruined everything.

tkris - 2014-12-01 00:47:40

The very beginning throws you into a story that which you have no idea what the hell is going on. However, the main character is right there with you on that. This anime never explains a lot of why things happened or where the enemies truly came from, however, I think that is part of the greatness of this anime.

Story 7/10: 
Many people will agree on this (under the assumption they watched to the very end) in that the beginning is slow and chaotic, and almost random. But with the second arc comes the true story and the reveal of the purpose of the first arc: to create the launch pad needed to send this anime flying high above many others. However, it is noted that the beginning does hit this anime hard story wise, and in a bad way.

Characters 9/10:
You never truly understand Teppei, and you never truly understand Hana. But, one thing is for sure, they will not let Earth be lost. The development of Daichi is absolutely amazing and breath taking, watching this boy take a door out of his childhood, and into a summer he could never forget. Akari is sometimes seen as a background character, but she's not, and in her own right, she is a badass character. The development of the enemy in the latter part of the anime is largely due to their time during the first arc, and is something few anime actually have: enemies who are not truly evil.

Music 7/10:
My blood boils as the fight scenes happen, and this is not just because of the scenes, it's the music (and SFX) that makes the "epicness" truly polished. I loved the soundtrack, truly outstanding. The OPs were... okay. And the EDs..... were okay. They weren't terrible, but definitely not the best.

Animation 10/10:
Utter eye candy, and I loved it all. The explosions were colorful, so were the characters (in all meaning of the word), and the mechs were so well designed. Beautifully made!

Voice 10/10:
Part of the reason why this anime became one of my top favorite ones was mainly because of the credibility of the characters. And this was done by two things: The development of them, and the voices. Nothing I could say about those who played their parts, except that they did them excellently.

Overall 8/10:
Really, this is a good anime. Nothing was accidental and nothing was unintended. The comedy and drama were mixed and well paced with each other, as well as the blend of action. The romance was never in the way of the story, and in fact, enhanced it. I would only recommend this anime to those who don't require everything to be explained or laid out. This anime is the epitome of either you "love it or hate it". However, give it until at least the second arc, which is where the story stops being slow. This anime can tell you if you're the kind of person who wishes to know what's going on, or will put his faith into the Captain.

haskell84 - 2014-11-02 02:07:03

"When I opened the door called Captain Earth, my ride on the hype train ended. It was an anime I could forget."

From Studio Bones and the same creative team that made Star Driver, comes a mecha anime that promises amazing action backed up by Shakespearean lore but instead, delivers a train wreck that is only worthy for the scrap yard.

The story starts off well enough, having a 17 year old high schooler named Daichi, through a set of extraordinary circumstances, coming to be the sole pilot of the Earth Engine, which was built to defend humanity from the invading Planetary Gears. However, it quickly becomes very apparent that Captain Earth has no intention of delivering a coherent plot and soon meanders off into slice of life territory with visits to the dessert cafe, idol concerts and chilling off by the poolside topped off with copious amounts of fanservice. There is even an episode where an idol gets to be a commander for a day onboard a space station, right before a major military operation is about to go underway. When it does get back to moving the story forward, it does so in the most convoluted manner possible and is nothing short of glacial in terms of progress. Among the worst offenders of this crime is the Planetary Gear's recruitment arc in which the bad guys are awakened and gathered for several episodes like some demented version of Pokémon.

Events happen or things are done in a certain way that has no bearing to proper protocol in a similar situation in reality. For example, when it comes to identifying and apprehending potential Earth-ending individuals, Captain Earth has teenagers taking the place of what should have been the jurisdiction of entire government agencies or armed special forces. I could understand having a bunch of high schoolers be the pilots of giant robots and saviors of humanity but not when it comes to scouring an entire urban center with only four people that get sidetracked by dessert cafe. Plot points are even worst, often appearing from a random direction and resolved in an equally hazard manner. In one instance, there was a scientist lady who was in charge of observing special children connected to the planetary gears. Said scientist kisses one of them and transfers her desire to obtain immorality using the child which results in a falling out between the two. Very quickly, the assistant to said scientist shoots her in the head with a pistol and the last time we see of her, she is riding in a back of a truck, wrapped up in a body bag. I swear to God, I'm not making this shit up. Explanations frequently comes down because the writers say so and that is nothing short of an insult to the audience struggle to understand the bigger picture because of inept writing.

When it comes to the four main characters of Daichi, Hana, Akari, and Teppei, their attributes make them seem anti-Evangelion to a fault. Daichi Manats is the overly confident and energetic teenage boy to distant Shinji Ikari, who only pilots only for the sake of his father. Hana Mutou is the curious and very voluptuous alien girl to the emotionless doll of Rei Ayanami. Akari Yomatsuri is the hacking/self-proclaimed magical girl to the emotionally broken tsundere of Asuka Langley Soryu. Finally, Teppei Arashi is the uncertain and withdrawn extraterrestrial to the transcendent angelic being of Kaworu Nagisa. The trouble doesn't lie in how the characters start off as but it's that they remain stagnant for the majority of their development. Yes, they have their own trials and personal issues to overcome but it's so ham-fisted and forcefully written that it almost becomes a parody unto itself. The obvious pairings happen but everything about their relationships are so bland and uninspired that it just bored me seeing Captain Earth clumsily go through the motions. There is simply nowhere else to go when all the characters become happy-go-lucky teammates that believe in the power of friendship and love to win the day. Unless Captain Earth had the balls to go a darker route from there, which it doesn't, it makes for a boring watch as our young heroes simply brute force their way onto victory, complete with sparkles and rainbows.

Outside other main four leads, which get plenty of screen time to dally about, there are just too many characters and factions in Captain Earth. Ranging from those who work at GLOBE, Tenkaido Space Station, Intercept and Ark faction, Salty Dog, Kill-T-Gang, Puck, and the Macbeth Enterprises, none of them are explored in any meaningful depth. Sure, members of the Planetary Gears get their own episode to shine but as quickly as they are introduced, they are soon forgotten in favor of the next shiny plot point.

One aspect that initially drew my attention to Captain Earth was the high production values in its animation. Having a wide assortment of bright vivid colors and highly detailed backgrounds, it is clear that a substantial amount of money was invested in the visual department. While other series like Knights of Sidonia and Aldnoah.Zero have embraced CGI robots into their animation, Captain Earth steadfastly sticks to the dying art of drawing 2D mecha. The 3D elements are subtly incorporated into the background of display screens and popup HUDs which demonstrates how CGI should be used to enhance the viewing experience. In particular, the Earth Engine's transformation scene was quite a novelty when it was first shown by featuring no less than three space station lined up together while the Daichi's machine speeds through the center as it becomes fully formed.

Also matching the high standards set by the visual department, is the music composition by Satoru Kosaki. His previous works is nothing to sneeze which include the entire Monogatari franchise, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, and OreImo. In Captain Earth's case, he choose to go with a more traditional orchestral sound with booming trumpets and soaring string instruments doing much of the heavy lifting. It really is a shame that the stellar soundtrack is just another sad reminder how great this show could have been if it even had a half-competent writing team backing it up.

The mechs themselves are quite creative in their design and functionality. Earth's own engines look like a updated white version of the Gainax's Gunbuster with its massive shoulder pylons and fairly conventional weaponry. On the opposing side, Planetary Gears in their true mecha forms have more of an aesthetic that resembles doll figurines with umbrella dresses for the ladies and tailcoats for the men. As such, their respective fighting styles are more akin to dancing around their opponents before slicing or blasting them to pieces.

Being a huge fan of the mecha genre, much of Captain Earth's tremendous shortcomings could be forgiven if the giant robots fights were exciting, loud and filled with awesomeness, but sadly, this is not the case. Mech battles in Captain Earth often dissolve in shounon-like brawls that involve little to no tactics and obscene amount of deus ex machina bullshit in favor of the protagonists. The plot armor that every major character, both alien and human, is as thick as the front of a main battle tank and saps much of the tension from said battles. Indeed, the show even incorporates immorality into the invading Planetary Gears with their Ego Blocks, and has them blasting off like Team Rocket every time they get their asses kicked.

With names like Midsummer Knights, Puck, and Oberon, I would have expected a mixture of Shakespearean elements from his various plays like humor from A Comedy of Errors with a dash of the tragedy from Macbeth and the mystical atmosphere of The Tempest. Instead, Captain Earth simply reaches for the lowest common denominator of dumping a metric ton of fanservicey ingredients into its concepts and calls it a day. I suppose it could have be related to the sexuality that is prominent in Shakespeare's work in some sort twisted way, but I can't really be bothered to dig that deep when cleavage takes up half the screen and everyone is trying to kiss each other.

The first opening, titled "Runner's High" by flumpool, is a lot like my anticipation and first impression of Captain Earth. It was epic, energetic and pointed to something far more ambitious than your typical anime show. By the time, the second opening " TOKYO Dreamer ", by Nico Touches the Walls, rolls around, I had long stop caring about Captain Earth and abandoned any hope of the show redeeming itself. The show had wasted too much time on pointless exposition, fetch quests and scandalous shots of female anatomy. Studio Bones held a promising concept in its hands before weighing down with mediocrity and Otaku philandering that plagues the anime industry today.

hudson.gennaro - 2014-09-22 05:31:41

The biggest problem with Captain Earth is that BONES doesn't know how to write anymore.

There is so much esoteric terminology in this show that is simply never elaborated to the audience. And when it is, it is done in the most obtuse and vague ways possible. At some point you just give up and run with whatever nonsense they pull out of their asses.

This problem could easily be fixed by creating a fish out of water character that the other, more informed characters have to explain things to, so that we, the audience can learn as well. THE ONLY PROBLEM IS THAT THEY DID EXACTLY THAT AND THEY STILL FAILED.

Daichi is about as ordinary a protagonist you can get. There's nothing special about him other than having slightly larger cajones than average. At the beginning of the show, he is a seemingly regular joe who needs this complex mecha crap explained to him.

But the explanations are just horrendous at conveying information to the audience and he seems to just naturally pick it up off-screen. I cannot take the logistics of a show serious when it doesn't even cover it's basis. It's like trying to play a game you don't know the rules to.

The story has all the right elements for a classic mecha series, but it butchers them in both execution and pacing. Most of the show is standard enemy of week fair, wherein the bad guys are trying to recruit a new member and the good guys try to stop them from doing that. There's very little tension because even if damage to the planet is prevented, the bad guys always end up with more minions anyway. 

Many episodes feel almost inconsequential, because we as an audience are not informed of their significance. "Why?" and "How?" are the keywords here. Every scenario has some new weapon or power or whatever that comes into play, but I never understood any of it. 

Remember how in Eureka Seven, they didn't explain a lot either? But it still managed to work because it was all planned out and intuitively showcased so that the audience could gradually begin to understand. It wasn't perfect, but it was far far better than the lazy writing of Captain Earth.

There are moments of genuine excitement, but those are just the result of high production values and other artificial factors.

The one high point that I can stress is that the four main leads have great chemistry. For as bland and simple as they are individually as characters, they do have a genuine camaraderie and friendship. And I actually found myself caring a little more than I normally would have because of it.

It's like if you had mozzarella cheese, tomato sauce, dough and pepperoni. Individually, these are very simple foods that have simple tastes and feel very incomplete and unsubstantial. BUT, when you put them together just right, you get motherfucking PIZZA.

...I apologize for the metaphor... I'm hungry.

The production values are very high. This is BONES at their best, which actually angers me because it seems to have sucked money away from other, better projects. The animation is bold, colorful, crisp and expressive. The mechs are also thankfully still animated traditionally. Let's take a moment to appreciate the fact that BONES and Sunrise are keeping 2D mecha animation alive.

The music is also appropriately epic, though it can get a bit cheesy sometimes because there isn't a strong enough story to back it up. Epic music can easily feel like overcompensating when you aren't invested enough in what's happening on-screen.

So there are a few high points, but mostly this is a poorly-written and badly paced slog of a mecha show. I know there's an audience for this kind of thing, but I am not a part of it.

Alternative Recommendations: Eureka Seven | Robotics;Notes

Rewatch Value: No (Based on a Yes/Maybe/No scale)  

georgianna57 - 2014-09-21 21:23:33

It’s been a day since I watched the last episode. Ire-watched in burst mode to remember the memorable moments throughout theseries and to my surprise none of the scenes were filled with AWE or wonder.

The Experience

            I followed the same pattern for most anime I watch.I try not to listening to negative or positive comments as the can cause a biasin my opinion. I went into the series the series as blindly as I possiblycould.

            For now I could say that Captain Earth was one of thethree series I was watching last season (Started Last Season) and the secondmost enjoyable behind Mahouka Koukou noRettousei. This wasn’t true at the beginning since Daichi to a certainextent was a likeable character.

The Characters

·        Daichi: Likeable at first, slowly deterioratesinto nothingness. He was a bland character. Out of the four Midsummer’s Knightshe rank three in my list.

·        Hana: She is the plot of the story(no pun intended), from what the openings showed, one could get the picturethat the ending was going to involve her

o  A:Being taken over by her instinct of destroying the planet or

o  B:Being kidnapped by Puck.

§ FunFact: One of my favorite voice actors plays Hana. Ai Kayano, she has playedMenma from Anohana, Inori from Guilty Crown, Mayaka Ibara from Hyouka, Lindaand Nana from Golden Time, Shiro from No Game No Life, and many others. Checkher out.

Inthe end it was a mix of the A & B. What I am trying to say it was somewhatpredictable throughout the entire length of the Captain Earth.

·        The Blandest: This particular purple hairedcharacter left so little, that I can’t really say much about him. He stays thesame with no development whatsoever. And to be somewhat truthful, I hated mostof his scenes.

·        Mahou Shoujo Akari: Akari was probably my favorite,she was fun and left the little spark needed for the viewer to be obsessed overher scenes. But then again she suffers from being somewhat bland. Like thewriters just copied an archetype and changed it around and pasted it back.

The Soundtrack

            The opening did what it should,it shook you up the episode to come. To say it’s rare for me to actually watchthe entire opening after the first episode but I did with this one.

The Story

          The main complaint I have in CaptainEarth is the predictability of the storyline and the lack of imagination as forseveral weeks’ worth of episodes were just a set villain that the Midsummer’sKnights must defeat. We had a bit of small plot twists and references to NeonGenesis Evangelion and Eureka Seven but like those two series by the end you aren’tso sure what the hell is going on.

Animation

            Basic Bones animation. Carriedout the transformation sequences way to long for my liking.

Enjoyment

Okay if you need something to watch or have a voidleft by another mecha anime.

pearline71 - 2014-09-20 20:32:02

Summary:One night, right before summer vacation, ManatsuDaichi, a second-year in high school, sees a weird round rainbow floating inthe sky above Tanegashima and ventures there alone. He has seen this rainbowbefore. With the memories of his father's mysterious death and an encounter ofa strange boy and girl, Daiji arrives on the island while the alarm of abuilding labelled Earth Engine is going off. Someone asks him if he is acaptain, just as robotic intruders from Uranus called Kill-T-Gang arrive. Thebattle around the shining stars is about to begin.

Story: The story of Captain Earth really is pretty simple overall. The firsthalf of the show was a enemy of the week and the story really doesn't start todevelop until episode 12. This is when all of the planetary gears are shown.After episode 12 The story gets a little better since the characters have tolearn how to better use their  mecha's and find a way to defeat the enemy. I also felt the story was very similar to Eureka Seven in concept butunlike Eureka it wasn't executed as well.

Animation:The animation is one of the best points of the show. The animation was done bystudio  bone which is known for theirgreat animation. The only problem I had was with the mecha transformationscenes that were used multiple times throughout the show. Each one isaround 30 seconds so you see the same animation over and over.

Sound:The sound wasn't bad either. the soundtrack really sets the mood of the showand the voice actors do a good job at displaying the emotion of the characters.The opening was also very good.

Characters:They weren't bad but they weren't great either. I feel like the charactersdidn't develop much over the series. There was some development but I feel likethey could have done more with the mains. I feel that Teppai and Hana were theonly ones that got a lot of development. But Daichi didn't change muchthroughout the course of the series. It was nice though to have a maincharacter that wasn't a shinji archetype. 

EnjoymentI can't say I enjoyed the series. I found it to be very boring and overly drawnout. I think that this series would have been much better if it was a 13episode series. Many of the villain of the week episodes were very predictableand followed the same script for each one. 

cade76 - 2014-08-25 19:27:05

When it comes to viewing a seasonal chart for the first time, I try not to get too excited for shows otherwise I'm left wide open for disappoint. Though I always seem to fail as shows such as Tokyo Ghoul or Akame ga Kill just left me with my face in my palm. So what of Captain Earth? Yes, I was excited for it as were many other people; with what Bones done with Noragami and the promotional videos coming out we had every right to be excited. The show had lots of hype going into it but did it live up to the hype? God no.

Story:...... What story? There is a reason I dripped this show at with 7 episodes to go and that's because I couldn't see where the plot was going. It's as if the writer was just piling conspiracy after conspiracy and trying to add too many plot twists and that just left me completely confused. Seriously, for those who've seen the show just try describing what it is about to people who haven't seen it because I cannot. There is just so much dicking around when it comes to the story of Captain Earth; they just play with the plot too much and try and make it a mysterious show about an oncoming Alien Invasion.

Characters:Ugh, they're all atrocious. I hate every single one of them; in my honest opinion there is not one well written character in Captain Earth, they're all just one dimensional pricks. The 4 main characters can literally be summed up in one word.
Daichi- Bland
Teppei- Emo
Hana- Boobies
Akari- Peppy
And there we have or main cast. -claps-

Animation and SoundI'll lump these two together because there really isn't much to talk about. The sound is completely average, only one stand out track and that is Mugen no Hana (the song Boobies sings) other than that the rest of the track is not good, nor is it bad, it does its job. The same can be said about the animation, it is really not all that spectacular nor is it horrible. I like the transformation sequences for the mechs (though they're too fucking long and reused as much as the opening) and the fight scenes are pretty cool. That's about it.

So after all that, did I like Captain Earth? No, I fucking hated it, if people asked me for a relaxed mech show that they can switch their brains off to, I wouldn't recommend this, I would recommend Guilty Crown. I didn't even plan to review it, I just wanted to spare everyone from what I had to watch.

2/5 (3.8/10)

klocko.elton - 2014-05-06 06:15:56

"When I opened the door called Truth, my childhood ended, it was a summer I could never forget." This quote alone completely describes how Captain Earth will impact mech anime lovers for this spring/summer of 2014 and for the future, by doing exactly as this quote states, making it a summer "I could never forget." Captain Earth's poster and thumbnail alone is what drove me to watch this anime for the first time, and I'm thrilled to finally see a highly potential anime that favors in the 2-D mech style of animation. The anime studio of the series, Bones, has a pretty decent resume when it comes down to it's past projects/shows (i.e. Eureka Seven, Darker than Black, etc.), but this anime just seems extremely distinctive and invigorating from the rest. From the mech's sci-fi design to the OST, everything just seems cutting edge, refreshing, and tensioned, even the representation of the main protagonist introduced as Daichi Manatsu.

Daichi seems like a character that you as a viewer can definitely commend to, especially when he explains his reason's for believing that the school's education system is pointless and uninteresting by simply saying, "Sure, I was playing video games and stuff. But I spent more time reading books, or on the internet, studying things that INTERESTED ME. But that isn't what they call studying, it's just "playing around" to them, and I realize that." This is part of what connects him to most young audiences viewing Captain Earth. Another reason is his flashbacks featuring a supposed old friend of his named, Teppei Arashi, right after his mesmerization of the strange rainbow circle, a.k.a the "Albion Rainbow."Daichi seemed like the type of kid who was always playful, fun to be around, and in a way competitive. This is just a simply evaluation of how Daichi and Teppei first acted towards each other by playing a children's game of impressing one another to obtain the "Bluestar Pendant", which was given to Daichi by his father, Taiyou Manatsu, who was a "Captain" as well and last words were, "Look after Earth for me."

As for the Mech Design...OUTSTANDING! 2-D Mech Animation will always look superb, especially with a glorious 1080p resolution at your disposal. The concept art of these machines, or AEO's (Approaching Earth Object's) reminds me a bit of Konami's "Zone the Enders", and Bandai's "Mobile Suit Gundam Wing" combined, which is a good thing. From the Expansion Sequence of the Earth Engine Impacter, (the Pegasus Rocket to the final expansion), and from the transportation of the Kiltgang's AEO through a portal called the Entangle Gate to the actual battlefield, everything seems innovative, exhilarating, and revitalized for a brand new entry to the mech anime universe.

Overall, Captain Earth seems very promising for us anime lovers. Still to soon to actually have a final verdict of the show, but it's definitely something to stick around for so far. This show can change for the better, or for the worse, but hopefully we don't have to go with the latter. And sure, there are still mysteries that need to be resolved such as an insight to the Earth Engine Project. Who exactly is the Kiltgang?
What connection does Daichi have with Teppei, the Livlaster, and the mysterious girl, who was cocooned within some sort of energy bubble? And a detailed elaboration on Daichi's father, Taiyou, who was also a Captain as well. Only time will tell, and as the show clearly states mid-way, "Everything will be obvious soon..."