| Banner of the Stars II #2: Prey |
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| Monday, 17 November 2003 | |
 More classic SF fare here, as we approach the end of BotSII. Although I still find myself wishing there was more of Lafiel in this set of episodes...See, the problem is that this story takes place mostly on the surface of Lobnas II, which is pretty much Jinto's domain. Lafiel does get some airtime, but it's fairly limited - especially by the standards of Crest and Banner I. It's a sad state of affairs for Lafiel fanboys... None of which is to say that this disc isn't as good as it could be - it's definitely worth watching. Events on Lobnas II continue to spiral out of control - the inmates from the Eastern & Central areas are openly rebelling, apparently with help from a lot of the prison guards (we find out why they're helping towards the end of the disc). The women from the Western area are well aware what'll happen to them if the men get their way & are desperate to get off the planet as quickly as possible - but events aren't making that easy. When Jinto is evenutally captured by the rebels, Lafiel is left in an awkward position, and eventually ends up having to ask for help from an unexpected quarter - Spoor. Whaddya know - they can do ground-based action in this show, too, although it's not on the same level of detail as the space combat scenes from previous episodes. Jinto's trying his best to be of use to the people on the ground - which gets him a telling-off from the Administrative Director for trying to be a hero. You can't help but think he should've listened when he ends up in the hands of Agnusson. There's a feeling in places of Jinto being in over his head, yet wanting to make sure that as far as he can, he'll make sure events turn out alright. Sadly the room he has for maneuvering gets more and more limited as time goes on. There are 2 scenes on this disc which I have to flag as classics. First, there's the explanation of Abh Hell. I won't spoil it, but yet again we see that you really don't want to mess with the Abh. Secondly, there's the conversation between Lafiel & Spoor, where Spoor eventually agrees to commit her forces to what can only be a losing battle. Both scenes are great examples of what BotS does so well - moving a story & fleshing out characters and background through the dialogue rather than the action of the story. Personally, I love it. Banner II is different in tone than it's predecessors - mainly as it's mostly a land-based story & focusses more on Jinto than the earlier stories. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing I haven't decided yet, but even if this were the poorest of the Crest / Banner stories, it's still head & shoulders above most other SF anime shows out there, and this disc just continues the trend. Well worth it... |
