Total Eclipse

This is what I originally wrote:
Total Eclipse is an alternate history story beginning in 1967 about the invasion of earth by the extraterrestrials know by humans as the Beta. The first episode covers the years from 1967 to 1998. The story revolves around a young female retainer of the Shogun in the Empire of Japan's capitol Kyoto, studying to become a soldier and mecha pilot. It's obvious in the first episode that most of Japan's male population is already involved the war with the Beta. This promises to be an interesting journey through an alternate history.

Here is what I think now:
I'm not sure which is worse, the fact that they took a promising idea and completely dropped the ball. or the juvenile whiny dialogue they are trying to pass as drama.

Now I realize this is based on an eroge, but at least try to clear the bar for art. Jun Maeda started in the adult game industry and he came up with Clannad and Angel Beats. This show comes nowhere close to that quality.

For those of you who have not seen this and are thinking about watching it. I have one recommendation. Lower the bar for your expectations . I have read they fired the first director after the second episode aired. His stuff was in the can til episode 9. We'll see if it gets better from episode 10 on, but I won't get my hopes up.

This first episode spends a lot of time setting up the shows history. We learn a lot about how very different this world is from ours. In this one, aliens attack Earth and over the course of several decades slow take over the world, bringing humanity to the brink of being an endangered species. Then the school girls who pilot the giant mechs come in. And yes, they where skin tight piloting uniforms. And yes, they mention how ridiculous the uniforms are. This anime has a hard time making up it's mind about being a serious action drama about the possible extinction of humanity and a cliche ridden mecha anime where well endowed girls pilot anime mecha and be girls. It could possibly balance out both, but that isn't evident here. It's saved, however, but good action, a great set up, and the mecha not entirely being cliche anime mecha. Here, everything seems to scale and the danger actually feels dangerous, as humanity feels like it truly is on the brink of extinction. Thankfully, our heroines don't demonstrate super hero abilities that will evidently save Earth. In it's more-realistic-than-the-typical-mecha-anime way, this show is worth a look.

I had very low expectations for this show because the description of the plot and the trailer didn't look very exciting. Boy, was I wrong. I won't spoil the fun for anyone by giving highlights of the plot, but if you like shocking origin stories similar to how Ga Rei Zero started, you will be very pleased with this anime.

In a way the show feels very 90's to me, with tons of fan service and hexagons, but I like the mix between that kind of old school anime approach and all the new CGI and cool design of the mechas.

I recommend it to fans of shows like Macross F, Ga Rei Zero and Evangelion.

(This review was written as of release of the second episode)

If cute girls piloting big mechs is your thing, then maybe you can overlook the lack of pacing and shallow content that so far has been offered up. The first episode was slow and downright boring to the point that it should have been called a prologue. The second, instead of being a snorefest, was a gorefest that while exciting at times lacked any real emotion to it. The lack of emotion was not for lack of trying, but it just never connected with me.

There are so many ways to do what they did better. I am convinced that using the same two aweful episodes someone out there could make two good episodes. The content is there, but the delivery was flawed. If this is what to expect I think this anime will be a dud.

All that said I haven't thrown this one completely out the window just yet, but its sitting on the window sill ready for me to push it off the edge. Get it together Total Eclipse and you might have something decent to offer other than just eyecandy and gore.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: Made shortly after ep 2.

Take Starship troopers, Heinlein's 1959 military sci-fi novel (not the 1997 parody). Replace Johny Rico (directionless upper-middle class kid turned mecha flying killing machine) with a Japanese school girl and the book’s semi-fascist militarism with ill thought out form of chivalry or fighting spirit. This is what you get.
First of all, don’t get me wrong. I’m a fan of Western sci-fi and believe that it transitions well into an anime, if properly thought out. This is probably why ideas from Asimov’s I Robot and Foundation series are even more widespread in sci-fi anime than in the west. I would very much welcome a show based on starship troopers, provided implementation were good.
Total eclipse’s plot is actually very close to Heinlein’s vision. Here, a coalition of human nations fights a losing war against the Arachnid like BETA. The Mecha have very similar characteristics to the Terran Federation’s MI and the beta laser caste is reminiscent of the Arachnid soldier caste. They even have the high casualty rate of the books, which is very unusual for mecha.
Unfortunately, Total Eclipse squanders this potential with several very questionable decisions. First, it attempts to do fan service with generic airhead school girl characters. This completely ruins everything (doesn’t it always) and makes it very difficult to take them seriously. I find Rico, the kid who may have just made a horrible life decision, more compelling. Second, the human coalition is shockingly ineffectual. Despite having these fast flying mecha, they stand around waiting to get overrun because moving would hurt their honor. They make few attempts to break up enemy troop concentrations or attack their infrastructure and seem to be very reluctant to use artillery. In contrast, the semi-fascist Terran Federation (which heavily influenced Halo’s UNSC) is extremely analytical and ruthless. Rather than standing around waiting to get slaughtered, they would ask 2 questions prior to the invasion. 1. What do the aliens do to get such a large biomass? 2. What incredibly evil thing can we do to stop them from doing it?

So, in conclusion, Total Eclipse had potential, but fan service and Starship Troopers don’t mix.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Update ep 6 or so...
Had I known that it would turn into a cliche harem show, I wouldn't have bothered. I don't find the characters compelling: their actions and emotions don't seem appropriate to the situation and I find their reasoning abilities lacking.

It's the end of the world! Time to have a beach party and later sulk while the stupid ant-man things surround your mech.

Makes you wonder why they're almost extinct. Logic defying antmen, I solute you.