When hearing the term mecha, one can’t be blamed if the image of gigantic mobile suits launching rocket-propelled fists at each other come to mind. After all, this is how many was first introduced to this bizarre genre. While many mechas still exhibit similar traits nowadays, every once in a while comes a show like Sidonia no Kishi, which downplays the mecha so much that even replacing them with something else entirely wouldn’t change the story by one bit.

The story of Sidonia no Kishi is set in the far future, where mankind has been forced to retreat into “seed ships”, basically gigantic spaceships, to preserve themselves after the planet Earth was destroyed by a mysterious race of aliens known as the ‘gauna’. Nobody knows where the gauna came from or what they want from mankind, but the story mainly focuses on the efforts of a military team (dubbed the “knights”) to prevent the gauna from reaching and thus destroying one of the seed ships, “Sidonia”. They do this through the use of mecha units dubbed the “grades”, which in execution is very akin to a fighter jet.

The premise itself seems very generic. We have the human’s mothership, an attacking alien race, and a team of pilots tasked to protect the mothership (which is where of course our protagonist is). Of course, premises don’t mean that much to an anime – true beauty lies in its execution – in which Sidonia no Kishi did surprisingly well.
The crew did their best to make the setting as believable as possible. Even though most of the anime takes place in the ridiculous setting that is Sidonia, the anime explains everything sufficiently enough that you’ll never find yourself confused or objecting to any of the events that happen in the anime.

You’ll also find that the show doesn’t fell slow nor dragged on. There’s always a new development – whether it’s a new gauna or interpersonal relationship problems – to keep the show going forward. There isn’t much of an overarching plot however, and due to this often times the development feels forced – like how a gauna always manages to appear at the right time.

But by far the biggest flaw of Sidonia no Kishi’s story is its characters. They’re shallow, one-dimensional, and they never seem to do anything new. To make matters worse, our protagonist is too perfect. He never messes up, and even if he did, it was because of another character’s doing. He doesn’t react much to other people’s insult, and he doesn’t react much to their praises either. He’s not a Gary Stu or anything, but a human being must at least have a few flaws.

Other than the story, the first thing you might’ve noticed when watching this anime is its very peculiar animation. Unlike many animes, Sidonia no Kishi is done in full 3D. I’m not talking about Pixar-esque 3D, it’s more similar to 3D JRPGs taken up a notch.

As expected from 3DCG animation, the shadows are very well done. They are updated dynamically according to its light source, which is something very hard to do using traditional hand-drawn methods. In addition, POLYGON PICTURES opted to have the shadows to be very prominent, and this results in some very nice looking scenes. The 3DCG also allows for very impressive looking battle scenes. Whether its a dogfight or a gauna encounter, you’ll never find the animation in Sidonia no Kishi to be lacking in the action department.

It’s not all flowers and sunshine, however. The animation in Sidonia no Kishi suffers from 2 major flaws that holds it back from truly being great.

Firstly, movement, especially those of the human characters, seem very awkward. As many of you are probably aware, making natural-looking 3D animation is not an easy task. Many major 3D animation studios spend a crapload amount of budget just to overcome this one problem – budget, that POLYGON PICTURES certainly doesn’t have. You might think that I’m overexaggerating the magnitude of this problem, but trust me, it’s nothing small. There is a lot of screentime devoted to the characters in Sidonia no Kishi, and having their every little movement feel awkward really gets annoying. Yes, you might feel used to it after a few episodes, but the awkwardness won’t dissapear – it will always be there.

Secondly, it’s the framerate. The framerate of Sidonia no Kishi’s animation is very inconsistent. It might be fine for most of an episode, but it’s not rare for it to have a sudden drop. Some episodes even have most of their duration in low framerate. This is especially true during more complex scenes, such as gauna encounters, where the animation would feel so choppy that you can no longer shrug the issue off.

In the sound department, I don’t really have much to say. Sidonia no Kishi has a lackluster OP and ED, and the background music aren’t really that memorable either. I’m not saying the background music are unpleasant, however – they do add to the mood – but you’ll likely just forget about them by the time the episode ends.
About the voice acting, again, I don’t really have much to say. They get the job done, but they’re not really any better than any other anime, be it mecha or not.

Now with all that said and done, that brings us to our final question: is the anime worth watching?

Despite all its flaws, Sidonia no Kishi does one crucial thing great and that is swaying its audience’s emotions. You’ll likely find yourself thrilled, shocked, happy, or even angry according to the anime’s set rhythm. Many animes set in a similar setting fail at this and end up being 3edgy5me – Sidonia no Kishi masterfully doesn’t – so I say give it a shot. If you’re a sci-fi fan like I am, you’ll probably like it.