So possibly the best anime released in 2024 (honourable mentions to Yatagarasu and Girls Band Cry) and one of the best anime you’ll see This Decade just got done airing after about five months of nothing but perfection, and you’re wondering whether you wanna give it a try, or maybe you’re only here to find an opinion that’ll put into words what you’ve already felt this entire time. Either way, this review is gonna involve a lot of me gushing about a story I personally never expected to get an awful lot out of when I randomly put its first episode on after idly opening up the Netflix app all the way back in October. The gushing in question will involve: minor spoilers (i.e. references without lots of specific detail), so consider this your first and only warning. You can skip the spoilers and/or just get a tl;dr on the whole review by skipping to the very end.
Orb: On the Movements of the Earth is an anime set in and around the Protestant reformation – which permanently altered how people would perceive and relate to Faith, as well as the Copernican revolution – which permanently altered how people would perceive and relate to the natural world. For a lot of its run I went back and forth on exactly which of those two areas formed the focal point of the story, or at least which of the two I personally felt I could extract the most meaning from. In the end, it turned out I was: an idiot, and the two were always in harmony with each other, coming together to tell the story of human progress and some of the different perspectives that would drive it forward. It was never aiming to present science as an obstacle to faith, or vice versa, but the two augmenting and amplifying one another as different ideas sharpened each other through conflict. But I’m getting ahead of myself,,,, so it’s probably best for me to try and give an actual brief plot summary before I go any further.
The story, set in 15th century Poland, is essentially one without a fixed protagonist, as it follows on from one person to the next, each phase bringing forward a unique and interesting perspective on Orb’s subject matter, ranging from self-avowed heretics or atheists, to those seeking to affirm or otherwise renew their faith in the Christian God. For all the diversity in outlooks, each “main” character is united by a common goal: to prove and spread Heliocentrism – the understanding that the Earth revolves around the Sun, rather than the other way around as was the Church’s favoured doctrine at the time. I am not overly familiar with all of the figures involved in the Copernican revolution as it occurred in our own history, but I don’t have the impression most of them made any direct cameos in this anime. Instead, it delivers through the choice of having a “new” cast of faces for this period, which may well resemble reality to an extent, the idea that human progress is bigger than any one person, and that their ideas and contributions to knowledge will outlive the memory of their own lives as it inspires others to take up their journey. And that is exactly what happens over and over again in this anime’s 25 episode run, a series of seemingly unlikely connections and fleeting sources of inspiration that keep Heliocentrism – perhaps a proxy for human curiosity – alive, no matter how fervent the opposition from our favourite resident inquisitor, Nowak, and his lackeys and successors.
The ironic thing, at least in terms of my own experience with the story, is that I am not even a Christian, of any category, and yet I feel it would be dishonest of me to latch onto the aforementioned: opposition to heliocentrism and use it as a cudgel to claim that Orb shows why religion is: bad actually. I would like to do that! I would, but this show paints a more complex, and I suppose more true to life picture of faith – one that doesn’t shy away from showing the fallibility of organised religion, the self-limiting and even corrosive effect of religious fear, but also showing the sense of both conviction and hope that faith can and does provide, to the extent that it also serves as the spark that drives at least a couple of our main characters forward.
The message then, if anything, is that it’s not constructive to try and impose a particular set of beliefs on anyone, and that the world is enriched and brought forward by a plurality of ideas coexisting, even those that stand opposed to each other. And there are a lot of really engaging conversations between different members of the main cast whose conceptions or objects of faith differ, that demonstrate this. It works to elevate the story beyond the individual struggle that serves as its narrative focus, towards being a broader commentary on what faith actually means, and what progress actually looks like, applicable in every era, with all of the good and bad that those concepts entail. The pain of those left behind by a shifting era whose efforts are rendered meaningless (captured in one character in particular), and the evils justified in the name of faith. Again though, the positive aspects still shine through, it's just that the anime is never dishonest about what that complete picture looks like, and it paints that picture in wonderfully written bits of dialogue at various points. Points where a character put into words something I’d always felt, or that genuinely increased my appreciation for or drew my attention to something I’d never previously considered at any great length, speaking from a range of perspectives I wouldn’t have otherwise come across or considered. I mean, there’s a character here who says religion is inherently rational, and that is the basis of his rejection of it, which at first glance seems kinda ridiculous? But as he goes on his argument becomes equally more interesting and more convincing, even though I don’t wholly identify with it. I could go into descriptive detail in that regard, but I wholeheartedly believe this is the sort of show best experienced directly, on every front.
It’s not just the engaging conversations, it’s not just the religious perspectives, it’s not just the message regarding the nature of human progress, this story is also just amazing from a narrative perspective. From pretty much the first couple of episodes that got released simultaneously, Orb constantly kept me guessing. It’s the kind of show where you can’t take anything for granted, and can’t be entirely at ease when anyone you’ve invested yourself into tries to do practically anything, and I don’t know if that sounds like a bad thing for some people, but that is a godsend in a world where shows like Solo Leveling exist. It doesn’t have the most complex mystery plot in the world or anything, but small details often do matter, and the writers never dumb anyone down to make them easier for their counterparts to outsmart (or to make their world view seem less cohesive, for that matter). There are a lot of characters who are both highly motivated and: competent with respect to acting on their motivations, and we get maybe the best anime “villain” in a while out of it? Someone who, at least for me, stands on the same sort of tier as someone like Askeladd from Vinland Saga, just absolutely perfect for the role and probably the most hardworking villain in a while too.
This is probably where I’d put down a couple of problems that I had with this anime, to break up the monotony of me continuously singing its praises, but uh,,,,, I have not one complaint. This thing is 25 episodes and it only had 1 episode out of that total that I didn’t think was literally flawless, and I’m not so desperate that I’m gonna go nitpicking off of one episode that ultimately Still wasn’t bad anyway. I guess if I had to say anything it’s that, from my own biased perspective, I would’ve liked to see a bit more of a robust atheist perspective presented than what we got, but promoting atheism (or any particular religious or irreligious perspective) obviously isn’t the show’s goal, nor should it be, and I don’t have the impression atheism was especially common in that area during the period being depicted either, so it is what it is. Separate from that, there were moments where the dialogue felt somewhat anachronistic, like someone was taking a twenty-first century perspective and putting it forward through what were supposed to be fifteenth century Europeans. Like, for one thing, the idea that human civilisation is constantly marching forwards through time, rather than regressing or stagnating, while maybe somewhat consistent with and justified by the experiences of the last century or so, was not the experience or perspective of humans in many parts of the world through much of our actual history. So purely in terms of accuracy, I wonder whether the moments where characters put forward that kind of perspective, appealing to the idea of society being brought forward, which the subtext of the show does support anyway, might be seen as somewhat obtrusive. But again, I didn’t mind it all that much, and I have been forced to resort to nitpicking here, right or wrong.
I could go on to talk about the great voice acting, the beautiful visuals, the perfect soundtrack (the op, Kaiju by Sakanaction, is one of my favourite songs right now,,,), but you get it at this point. Orb is incredible, and it’s the level of quality that’s hard to quantify, and that’s kinda rare to come across – at least in the world of Japanese children’s cartoons :’) so, if you’re looking for something to feel superior than everyone else for watching, or genuinely just looking for a story that’s worth putting your time into in a sea of mostly mediocre seasonals, then you absolutely need to give this anime a chance, because you’re probably not going to experience anything else quite like it. Minor disclaimer, to the extent you may care about this (I know I didn’t), but it does have basically no action. Lots and lots of this show consists of people talking, observing the stars, or talking about observing the stars, so if you do not have the attention span for that then uh,,,,,, rest in peace I guess. There are a handful of fights scattered here and there, and they are just as gripping as any other part of the anime by virtue of how high-stakes they tend to be, but they are definitely infrequent and far from being the centre of this anime’s attention.
With all that said, Orb: On the Movements of the Earth is a truly exceptional anime, that I would be dishonest to score at anything less than a perfect 100 out of 100, just in terms of my personal experience with it, and it would barely go much lower even if I wanted to pretend to be “objective” with it. It does feature a moderate amount of blood and gore on the handful of occasions that things get violent, so be aware of that as a possible trigger warning I suppose, but that fact notwithstanding: it is a must-watch.