Planetes is one of my favorite anime series that is currently being released, and I'm happy to report that the second volume is just as good as the first. Bandai creates another great package too, giving viewers an ample five episodes and a second disc of extras, all for the regular price of most anime releases. A great series released in a classy package.

Series synopsis:

Ai Tanabe has finally achieved her dream of working in space. Though she was at the bottom of her class and has no special skills, she somehow managed to swing an assignment on her companies space station. When she gets there though Tanabe discovers that she's been assigned to Debris Section, know throughout the station as Half Section because they only have half the workers and half the budget they need to get the job done. They are people responsible for collecting space junk that may be dangerous to other space vehicles and satellites.

Though their offices are in the basement in an old storage container, and the manager and second in command are idiots, Tanabe is excited about her new position and filled with youthful enthusiasm. In addition to her two bosses Ai works with several people. Hachimaki is her partner, a young man who desperately wants to own his own space ship, and teaches Tanabe how to work out in space. Fee Carmichael is the tough female pilot of the spaceship they use, the 30 year old 'Toy Box' and Yuri is her first mate. The Debris Section is rounded out by Edelgard a temp worker who doesn't say much and does all of the paper work for the section.

The work they do is hard, very dangerous, they don't have an appropriate budget, and everyone treats them poorly since they are just garbage men. But the job is also important and saves lives, so Tanabe gets a lot of job satisfaction.

This Volume:

The first episode on this disc startled me a little...it was a comic piece that really didn't fit in with the rest of the series. Ai and Hachimaki take a brief vacation on the moon, and it doesn't go as planned. Ai's hotel is inhabited with a group of seven (of course) ninja wannabes. This group of unemployed westerners spend their copious free time watching karate movies and dressing up like ninja. When they hear that a real live Japanese lady will be staying in the (run down) hotel, they go all out to impress her with their ninja moves.

Hachimaki's vacation isn't what he was hoping for either. He gets in an accident and breaks his leg, and spends most of the time in the hospital. While there, he starts talking to a nice attractive girl who is very interested in Earth. She's been on the moon for twelve years, and would really like to see the ocean. There's something odd about the girl, but she and Hachimaki have a great time chatting and playing Bullshit (an irritatingly fun card game I almost forgot about), until he discovers her secret.

Getting back to their space station, there is a fun filler episode where Fee is offered a big promotion. The rest of Half Section decide that they want to prove to her (and themselves) that they can go on a mission without her so they arrange to leave her behind. The only problem is that the debris that they have to recover doesn't show up on radar, and in the sun it melts into a liquid, so the mission has to be done by eye at night. Four other teams have tried to retrieve it, and they've all failed, and now Ai, Hachimaki, and Yuri are trying it with their (incompetent) managers.

The last two shows were some of the best so far. Hachimaki's old boss returns to do a safety inspection. He's now part of the OSA, the space police force, and quite good at his job. Ai grows fond of the gruff old guy and admires his vast experience and knowledge. This feeling grows when a routine mission turns up an illegal dumping operation. The OSA officer isn't just going to sit by and watch, and has the unarmed Toy Box attack the villains.

This volume wraps up with an episode devoted to Yuri. The quite man on the team doesn't do much on his off time except look through some public domain records and tend to his pets. He hasn't taken a day off in five years, and isn't really open with the rest of the crew. There's a reason for that, and the show has a little twist that was quite unexpected.

Aside from the first episode, that was funny but in a silly way that didn't fit with the rest of the series, this was an excellent disc. The stories continue to be entertaining and surprisingly engaging. The characters are becoming more rounded and three dimensional as the show goes on, and the writers give the audience credit for being able to figure out things that are not spelled out.

The main reason that I really appreciate this show is because of the close attention to detail. The show is firmly grounded in reality and all of the things that happen in space and the way the crew collects debris is all scientifically based. There is no sound in the vacuum that these people work, and inertia and center of mass are things that really matter. Even the physiological effects of living in space are touched upon.

Overall, this is a more mature anime. Not because of violence or sexual themes, there isn't much of that, but because it is grounded in reality. There aren't huge mecha to create "oh wow!" situations so the creators had to rely on quality scripts instead.

This two disc set comes in a great looking single width case. The cover to the case itself has a wrap around space scene on it, but the back doesn't have the usual series blurb. That is reserved for the clear slip that goes over the keepcase. It's a nice design and works well.

Audio:

This disc features the original Japanese soundtrack and an English dub, both in stereo surround sound. I alternated soundtracks while watching the show, which I always do, and enjoyed both of them equally. The English dub was very good, with the voice actors giving good performances. They brought their characters to life without overacting or using fake accents.

The audio quality was very good. The dialog was clean and the more subtle sound effects came through fine. The sounds of the astronauts breathing in their suits were clear as were the engine sounds and background noises. Overall a nice sounding disc.

Video:

The anamorphic enhanced widescreen (1.78:1) video looked excellent. The lines were tight and the colors were bright and strong. The show has a lot of fine details that come through well. The clouds of Earth as seen from space and the plates that form Space Station 7 are all reproduced wonderfully. The backgrounds have a lot of shading but banding wasn't a problem at all. Other digital defects were also nonexistent. Aliasing and blocking weren't to be found. A really nice looking disc.

Extras:

Like the previous volume, there is a really nice selection of bonus material included on the second DVD. This time there is part 3 of the audio drama, the second part of the NASA interview that I really enjoyed, and an interview with Jamieson Price who plays Yuri. One item that I found fairly amazing was a CGI model NASA created in 1998 of all of the charted space debris circling the Earth. I was astonished at how much there was. There is also a textless opening and closing and some trailers.

Final Thoughts:

Planetes didn't suffer from the sophomore slump with this volume. If anything, this volume is even better than the first. The stories are tightly written, and this gentle drama can turn suspenseful or bitter-sweet at a second's notice. A good contender for the top ten anime list for 2005, Planetes is Highly Recommended.