Nagate Tanikaze, a teenager, lives on Sidonia a city that travels through space. He has lived his whole life in the underground portion of the city. He was raised by Hiroki Saito, his grandfather. He ventures to the surface for the first time after he runs out of rice. He is injured and apprehended running from guards in the rice factory. He escapes, only to be recaptured. Ochiai, an agent of the Immortal Council, finds him and takes him to Captain Kobayashi.
He is quickly added to the pilot training program, at Captain Kobayashi's request. He is assigned to a dorm where he meets Lala Hiyama, the dorm mother. She looks like a bear that wears clothes and has a mechanical hand. Soon after that he meets Izana Shinatose, who is neither male nor femaile and is one of Nagate's classmates. Izana informs him that usually it is very difficult to get in the pilot training program.
Many of Nagate's classmates refer to him as the underdweller, behind his back. He tries his hand at one of the simulators. He trained on pilot simulators when he lived underground but those were designed for the Mark 17 Garde. The Mark 17 models have been replaced by the Mark 18. Nagate scores poorly on his first attempt at using the newer simulator.
Nagate is sent on his first mission along with several other pilots. They are sent to an asteroid that has water. The pilots are broken up into two squads. One is led by Norio Kunato and the other by Shizuka Hoshijiro. Nagate, Izana, and Yamano (another pilot who was seen briefly in this episode) are assigned to Kunato's squad. It was Kunato who stopped Nagate after he escaped, by knocking him out. Hoshijiro took him to the police after he was knocked out by Kunato. He was in bad shape but healed very quickly despite the fact that he jumped from a window several stories high.
Kunato is irked when he sees that the Tsugumori, the last remaining Mark 17, has been pulled out of retirement and given to Nagate.
The eight pilots take off in their Gardes and head for the asteroid. Each squad has their giant robots join hands after they have taken off from Sidonia. They shoot off to the destination after doing so. They are just beginning their mission on the asteroid when a Gauna emerges from beneath the ice.
There are number of scenes that don't directly involve Nagate that help to fill in some details about the Sidonia. Kunato and Hoshijiro are accosted by protestors who insist that the war is a creation of the Immortal Council. Kunato has no time for them. One of the faces on the signs that the protestors are carrying is that of Captain Kobayashi.
The population of Sidonia has changed in the time that Nagate has been underground. People no longer eat to sustain themselves. They gain the nutrition they need to live through photosynthesis. A number of them are clones including quite a few of the women who look identical.
A little bit of information about the enemy is dropped throughout the episode. The enemy are giant space monsters known as Gauna. The only weapon that humans have that has proved effective against the Gauna are the Kabizashi, giant spears wielded by the Garde. The spears need to penetrate the Gauna, in order to kill them, near what looks like it may be their skull and pierce the Ena.
Thoughts
There's a lot to digest in the first episode and it moves fast. I first watched it a few years ago but I still felt this time around like I needed to pause it multiple times and take notes. I like the challenge but I can see how other people might feel differently.
The show is currently available but I also own the show on DVD. The translations are slightly different on the DVD set. I prefer the way that the DVD places the translated words but the colors on Netflix, at least on my desktop computer, are brighter.
I'm pretty excited to be watching the first season for the second time.
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