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well i wouldnt go that far and say its a disappointment. sure the storyline is somewhat inferior to last exile, but its definitely passable, and worth at least a B- in my view. luckily it have a very good english dub ,and in my view kinda superior to the japaneese version. so yea, it may leave those that haven't watched last exile to leave something to be desired, but its definitely good for those that did. kinda similar to AO.

The review brings up a great point: why not go more into the issue of the returners displacing the ones who stayed?

At the very least they could've had spoiler[Millia and Sara in an big, public event recognizing that both sides had made mistakes but needed to work together now].

So it's a Funimation dub? That's a shame since the original dub was so good.

I have a love hate relationship with Last Exile. It seems like such a good show with such a cool setting and premise. Fantastic animation, good character designs, none of the crap you can acuse modern anime of having, ect ect. It's like the perfect anime of that time. Yet the show kind of sucks. It really has boring one note characters. For all his coolness, Alex Rowe is nothing but a dude who looks and sounds cool. Claus is just kind of a generic hero who kind of stays whimpy the entire time.

Plus I really hated what Exile turned out to be. It always seemed like it came out of nowhere and the show didn't need some super big sci fi twist. It was an engaging adventure anime that could have used better characters.

I tried to watch Fam and got through 3 episodes. Didn't really like it. Hated the new characters and the way they looked. Decided it probably wasn't going to be better then the orginal if they couldn't fix the main problem.

We've already had so many Fam review threads, so I'll just sum up my major complaint with this series being not enough episodes to fully flesh out the world-building and the conflicts that come in the second half. Also, there's too much focus paid to Fam when Milia was the real star of the series. When the series really tried, it could come out not only beautiful but also haunting with a undertone of melancholy, like the almost futile battle in the second episode.

Rahxephon91 wrote:

I have a love hate relationship with Last Exile. ... Yet the show kind of sucks. It really has boring one note characters. For all his coolness, Alex Rowe is nothing but a dude who looks and sounds cool. Claus is just kind of a generic hero who kind of stays whimpy the entire time.

I agree. The irrational, sanctimonious, rather-die-than-fight archetypes annoy me greatly. The vanships in Last Exile were 1920s-styled but Lavie Head and Claus were definitely had a lot of 1960s hippie in them. I also didn't care much for the character design in this sequel and I couldn't get into it. For the Funimation dub-for the anime legend that is Carrie Savage-I might, someday, retry it.

Rahxephon91 wrote:

Plus I really hated what Exile turned out to be. It always seemed like it came out of nowhere and the show didn't need some super big sci fi twist. It was an engaging adventure anime that could have used better characters.

I agree, they never should have tried to tie this "roaring 20s + WW1 Europe in space" universe to our own, actual universe in any way, shape or form. Big mistake on Gonzo's part.

The Review wrote:

How many liberties the script takes is hard to tell since one does not have the option to have the subtitles on while the English dub is playing.

Why does ANN by and large believe in this myth that the subtitle track lists the lines that the dub actors should be saying and that anything that they speak differently is a "deviation"? Both the sub-script and the dub audio are adaptations of a translation that are engineered to fit into their own, vastly different methods of presentation.

Last edited by DangerMouse on Tue Jan 21, 2014 8:55 pm; edited 2 times in total

Nice read.

Yeah, it definitely sucks that it didn't get at least all of it's eps to further develop everything given all it tried to do, at the very least it hopefully would have helped the pacing/more things getting more attention.

jr0904 wrote:

well i wouldnt go that far and say its a disappointment. sure the storyline is somewhat inferior to last exile, but its definitely passable, and worth at least a B- in my view. luckily it have a very good english dub ,and in my view kinda superior to the japaneese version. so yea, it may leave those that haven't watched last exile to leave something to be desired, but its definitely good for those that did. kinda similar to AO.

Pretty much agree, it was uneven but still quite enjoyed it even if it couldn't match the original. I thought overall the animation looked beautiful and what the story tried to do was really good even if it was uneven in achieving the parts. I also think the dub cast did a really good job.

Not to get off-topic but I agree similar to AO in both of those ways you mentioned, and I think this was a better sequel than that was, this felt like a part of Last Exile (AO really was too different even if I still enjoyed parts of it).

walw6pK4Alo wrote:

We've already had so many Fam review threads, so I'll just sum up my major complaint with this series being not enough episodes to fully flesh out the world-building and the conflicts that come in the second half. Also, there's too much focus paid to Fam when Milia was the real star of the series. When the series really tried, it could come out not only beautiful but also haunting with a undertone of melancholy, like the almost futile battle in the second episode.

Yeah. It's a shame they didn't get to do at the very least 24-26 real eps (non-recaps) to further flesh the second half. The other thing they could/should have easily done was given Fam herself more of a development arc (or further developed the one she had, rather than try to address her not growing enough later with some of her comments where she says she realizes she hasn't changed or done enough, it was nice to hear but developing her would have been far better) to force her character to grow (like Millia got) would have addressed my complaint since I liked her a lot but wanted more so it was something I wanted to see such as if she had been forced with coming-of-age the rest of the way on the battlefield.

spoiler[I was hoping Tatiana would force her to face the cruelties and realities of the battlefield like they seemed to be grooming/teasing her for with that initial encounter in ep 4 where Tatiana was judging Fam's piloting skills.]

Agreed, I still remember that part, moments like that were incredible, better pacing in between them could have elevated the whole thing. The tone in that battle was really well done (also that music track was so perfect for it).

Echo_City wrote:

Rahxephon91 wrote:

Plus I really hated what Exile turned out to be. It always seemed like it came out of nowhere and the show didn't need some super big sci fi twist. It was an engaging adventure anime that could have used better characters.

I agree, they never should have tried to tie this "roaring 20s + WW1 Europe in space" universe to our own, actual universe in any way, shape or form. Big mistake on Gonzo's part.

I loved this part when I first saw it. I also really liked how it tied into not only what the Exile ship was hidden in the Grand Stream but also how it tied into the Mysterion riddles that had been one of the mysteries of the show and what Alex (and confirmed later Delphine too) had been after on several of the Silvana's missions.

So I was the only one whose reaction to Fam the Silver Wing and its usage of Dio was ""Hold it. He's dead."?

I can't figure out if the bigger question is how he survived the first series or why he survived the first series? At least the second series had enough sense to leave Mullin in a state of dead and alive - if I recall, the writer wanted him dead while the director stuck a scene of him in the end. I guess Dio had the same fate, er, nonfate, only reversed I suppose?

"Take out word for it, he's not dead!"
"He fell out of a moving aircraft into hurricane force winds. The word 'splat' comes to mind."
"He flew, he caught a ride with a bird or two or how many took. It doesn't matter...""

It only matters to me if I consider Fam to be a continuation and I don't. I gave up after a few episodes and choose to just watch the real series again. Which has its own issues...

Quote:

The irrational, sanctimonious, rather-die-than-fight archetypes annoy me greatly. The vanships in Last Exile were 1920s-styled but Lavie Head and Claus were definitely had a lot of 1960s hippie in them.

Just not that.

It didn't go in the direction I expected myself as the "flying ace" Claus had no real cause or need to fight so he didn't. He just wanted to fly, free and unhindered with Lavie as his navigator. I wouldn't consider his decision sanctimonious as we had Shetlin Mullin as his counterpart on the ground, the musketman who went back to being a musketman and died in a meaningless fight saving others, well, he would have if the director has any idea of what an "anti-war" message was.

I'd explain the emotions involved in Claus's decision but it'd be easier to direct you to Porco Rosso.

Quote:

Funimation's English dub is easily one of their best efforts of 2013. All of the cast members whose roles carry over from the first series return

Where exactly did Theron get this idea? All of the old cast got replaced by Funimation regulars, most noticeably Dio since his original voice actor (Joshua Seth) had a rather distinct voice that can't quite be matched by Greg Ayres.

Echo_City wrote:

Why does ANN by and large believe in this myth that the subtitle track lists the lines that the dub actors should be saying and that anything that they speak differently is a "deviation"? Both the sub-script and the dub audio are adaptations of a translation that are engineered to fit into their own, vastly different methods of presentation.

Because in practice ADR scripts are almost always adapted from the subtitle scripts.
An ADR script which is created directly from the Japanese script is extremely rare since the script writers aren't usually translator's themselves.
It's also quite true that generally ADR scripts are more constrained by things like lip-flap that there are almost always more "changes" from a direct translation than the subtitle scripts.
In other words, I think it's perfectly fair in most circumstances to judge the degree to which an ADR script deviates from a direct translation by comparing it to the subtitles.

The Russian in Japanese dub was really atrocious! I had to read English subtitles to understand what they were saying. Of course with exception of Viola who was played by @jenya_jp Smile

Orange Hollow wrote:

The Russian in Japanese dub was really atrocious! I had to read English subtitles to understand what they were saying. Of course with exception of Viola who was played by @jenya_jp Smile

which is why its better off to watch those parts in english dub cause they sound much better. sure they dont speak the language, but its convincing enough that their from that country. and it started cause of how good and convincing the black lagoon english dub was

Sorry to disagree with you on this outcome of this series. You did address both the main aspects and also much of the implications of the content of the story so I appreciate that effort a lot for you have given some real thought to this.

However I am sorry to say that the follow up to Last Exile which remains one of the best feature Anime series in any genre..the follow up was a failure bordering on an epic disaster.

Fam and others as you correctly note are given super powers that totally unbalance the story from the very start. Other fundamental flaws such as the ridiculous ease with which the pirates seize immense sky ships with imunity and the very microscopic size of these new van ships was just beyond bearing and credence. Magical plot devices are ok if there is a strong main story to support them but here, these devices ARE the story. Fam is a silly shallow and careless girl and nothing like all of the characters in Last Exile. In fact almost none of the new characters have any subsetance at all, they fill generic off the shelf roles like "lost princess", evil overlord, evil admiral, gay and carefree youths, pirates with hearts of gold, etc....and one after another these puppets are paraded around a very shallow story.

Frankly it is insulting for them to drag in one character from the original story after another and then make them go thru the ritual expected motions. It is character abuse to the extreme and the entire series is abuse of the original which I repeat is superb.

I am sorry that all of the effort was wasted due to some really basic mistakes about story...and delivery. It is a tragic loss, for it might have been great. Just as Code Geass was GOOD in the follow up, and other series FAIL terribly like season 3 of Genshiken for many of the same reasons, Fam The Silver Wing is a sad flop, and never gets off the ground.

Just to put it bluntly, the where actual Russians in the dub cast. How do I know, Because I'm fluent in Russian and am Russian myself. How the thing about the Russian speaking parts is, the Japanese dub is God awful and just isn't pronounced in the least bit correctly. While the English dub is quite good and as stated "as reasonably can be expected".

Now what I found about the 2 dubs of those parts is that while the Russian in the English Dub sounds more "authentic" it is lacking the "acting" department. The main and biggest role in Russian sound like she is just plain bored, not acting bored but really just bored and uninspired. While the Japanese counter part did have more "life" to the character, the actual performance was so inaccurate it's unbearable. They should have just done what was done in "Satan is a Part Timer" and just make up a language and just give subtitles to the wacky language if the performance would butcher the language so badly.

Her name is seriously Fam Fam Fan?
...okay then.

Truthfully, I wasn't that into the original series. It was good enough that I will probably watch this show eventually. Glad to hear it's not a total disaster.

Animegomaniac wrote:

So I was the only one whose reaction to Fam the Silver Wing and its usage of Dio was ""Hold it. He's dead."?

I can't figure out if the bigger question is how he survived the first series or why he survived the first series? At least the second series had enough sense to leave Mullin in a state of dead and alive - if I recall, the writer wanted him dead while the director stuck a scene of him in the end. I guess Dio had the same fate, er, nonfate, only reversed I suppose?

"Take out word for it, he's not dead!"
"He fell out of a moving aircraft into hurricane force winds. The word 'splat' comes to mind."
"He flew, he caught a ride with a bird or two or how many took. It doesn't matter...""
.

I ended up watching the first series again because seeing Dio convinced me that I must have completely forgotten seeing him afterward, but that wasn't the case. I did some looking into it afterward and apparently this gets addressed in the manga that takes place between the two which hasn't been released here. Though, from what I can tell it seems pretty far fetched that Dio made it.

Raikuro wrote:

Quote:

Funimation's English dub is easily one of their best efforts of 2013. All of the cast members whose roles carry over from the first series return

Where exactly did Theron get this idea? All of the old cast got replaced by Funimation regulars, most noticeably Dio since his original voice actor (Joshua Seth) had a rather distinct voice that can't quite be matched by Greg Ayres.

Good question since not a one of them was the same, and it took some decent effort on my part to get past that. About my only guess is that Lupin and Eureka Seven AO had returning cast members and came out somewhat around the same time, but that seems like a stretch.

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