THAT Animeblog

The Snow Princess is resting peacefully after an avalanche. Who is she, and is there something special about this girl? This show is clearly GAR-infused, and also very importantly not for kids due to the opening sex scene in the fifth minute of the show. If you are someone who enjoys a bit of drama and serious sci-fi, I think this might be a good choice.

Maybe.

Episode gist

We started the show with an astronaut that was running toward a base on the moon after their “Spider Life”, their pod to get onto the surface crashed and exploded. As she traveled with frost bites on her feet due to the extreme -150 degree celsius temperature and the heavy load of the space suit, she suddenly encountered space troops. They first fired at her, as she did not want to die after having a good chance to survive. Eventually, a laser light came from the ship that targetted right at her head.

The story then shifts to a hotel, where Gurou and Lostman were having a gangbang with local girls. They were two adventurous mountain climbers that were daredevils that was attempting the highest peak of Everest. In the white house, they were discussing about shifting the budget toward military means, as well as a research project by a professor. Scenes of them climbing up the Everest were shown, as an avalanche struck the French team who was caught in the bad hail.

All the members in the French team was dead when Gurou and Lostman found them except a French girl who they called “the snow princess”. As they had a bet to see who carried the girl and the bodies, Gurou won it as they carried the body back to the fourth base of the French team. However, the base was also buried as the blizzard was getting worse. As they required to take shelter from the blizzard, the two of them threw the dead bodies down a cliff in order to reduce encumbrance. A shot from a satellite shows the scene of the blizzard from space, as the astronauts talked about Gurou and Lostman.

In the cave, the Snow Princess woke up but immediately spit out blood as her internal organs were hurt in the avalanche. It seemed that her boyfriend had died in the avalanche, as she said that she would have done the same as Gurou and Lostman. She might not even help the living ones unlike them as she rested. She also added how her boyfriend and her wanted to see the satellite at the peak of the mountain. Changing to a space shuttle, the two astronauts talking about the two climbers were having a bet in which the loser would have to listen to a music piece strung by Paul, one of the astronauts in the bet. They also asked the other working mate to bet, but he passed.

It looked like the snow princess was losing her sanity and will, and she was definitely not going to survive. As Gurou allowed her to sleep on his lap, she slept peacefully and eternally. They left her body after burying her and reached the top. With the snow princess’s hint, they also saw the satellite and decided to aim for that as their next peak to climb. In the aftermath, Gurou became a crane operator in a construction site, as he saved a workmate from falling into the depths when the wind blew too hard with his life. Gurou’s family seemed to be glad that he was finally on firm career grounds while Lostman went into the air force and was clearly a very superior fighter pilot on his goal to be an astronaut. He destroyed two planes on a simulation as a decoy plane.

A news report came on the International Space Association, an union of 16 major world powers, that they were going to cooperate in order to harvest the massive Helium 3 that could be a power source for Earth. The energy would be sent through microwaves and it would be the next frontier for the future. Gurou was now at the public pub with his workmates as they had a good drink. They said that it was a pity that he rejected the deal to go to the main office but they were glad that he stayed with them. Gurou said it felt uncomfortable to be wearing suits and ties. They teased him that he was a beast with women, and he laughed heartily as he went totally naked and started jumping around.

Lastly, Gurou carried one of the old men as the old man told him that it was good to have a dream and a goal to move forth. The next day, the word was spreading that one of the candidates for the astronaut mission was going to come from the company Gurou was in and the hot favorite was Kuramochi-san, one of the key people that worked during the early phase of this astronaut mission. Kuramochi then asked his secretary to find out about the other candidates and Gurou was also on the shortlist of people as she was surprised that someone from the construction site was given this job. At the site, it seemed that Gurou is still a bit tipsy after the drinks yesterday as the day moved on.

Thoughts

I really like how they started it off with this rather disturbing and dark plot of an unknown astronaut that was straddling about the moon. The portrayal of her being unable to find help due to the fact that there was only five hours of oxygen, the frostbites from the chilling temperature, the weight of the spacesuit, as well as the fact that she had to travel 21 km/h every hour (even if 6 times the traveling speed) helped to paint a very realistic portrayal right at the start.

The red spot at the end, the laser point, really showed how the unlucky astronaut opened Pandora’s box. I wonder if this will be a foreboding of the future or something totally unrelated with the story. However, whatever this scene is about, I really felt that it captured my attention almost immediately. Still, I am surprised how a huge fleet of soldiers and an extremely big spaceship can be totally unseen considering that the setting is based on the conquest of Helium 3 as the alternative source of energy resources. How can they escape so easily but I presumed that it can be assumed simply as a form of scavenger act by the other nations. I seriously have no clue.

Unlike Rocket Girls who is more of a joke (in a good way, of course), Moonlight Mile steps into the more serious part of sci-fi. I am pleasantly surprised at the character design that is more serious in tone (no cute loli or chibi here). Gurou and Lostman are clearly very manly people and not wusses that will think about which gal to date. I mean, they even added an explicit fricking sex scene at the fifth minute, which really shows that the two are definitely ermm more than potently straight.

I also like the way that they deal with human lives in the Everest scenes. I mean, I like how they dump the bodies and acted ethnically toward the snow queen, even though they could happily fulfill her wish of sorts. I also like how the degradation of the snow queen went about, as she slowly turned from a rather injured person with internal damage to a girl who has completely lost her will to live.

The two of the main protaganists, even though they seemed to be rather rough people, are compassionate as well to do everything that they could to save others, even if it’s risking themselves in the mix. Honestly, what the snow queen said was right, to keep anyone and protect them would only add to encumbrance when they can escape alone. Hence, I respect the two for doing almost everything that they could to save people. I do not know if I will have the strength to do what they did.

On a side note, they really have great graphics on the Everest climb and graphical quality is definitely above average. Let’s hope that it will maintain the same standard because the first episode of a series often lies and you will have to wait till at least the middle stages of the series before realizing whether the animation company has any budget for such a huge series that encompasses themes of energy resources, space travel and grand scale war or espionage (possibly).

I also wonder why Gurou chose the crane job until I realize that it might be practice for him to start operating similar machinery that will be required in space. If you know about Planetes, there are many scenes where the astronauts and operators were required to operate crane-like operations. I believe that it was his goal, to do anything possible to gain experience and enter the astronaut field. I do wonder how he gets the information about the company having selections for astronauts. I did not get the information out from this episode and I hope someone can help me on this.

The next episode seems to be the training of the astronauts and Gurou passed most of the tests only to be sabotaged at the most critical stage…Who did it and will it hinder his dreams and delay him?