Episode 3: Pale Blue Death Struggle

Review by Chris

January 23, 2004

Shin continues to watch as Sara sings naked and causes rocks to float in the air. She stops to watch the rocks float, and she is embarrassed when she sees Shin standing behind her. The rocks suddenly fall back to the ground, and Sara swims over to where here clothes are. Shin asks her why the rocks were floating, and she tells him it's because he and the other outsiders brought a Kadun of battle with them that is weakening the connection between the rocks and the Earth. She tells him that the links between people will also weaken and that the Bird Human will soon awake. Shin says he doesn't need to hear such superstitions, and Sara tells him not to tell anyone else what he saw. He answers that even if he told someone, they wouldn't believe him. Shin hears the sound of singing, and Sara says that it is the voice of Rooy Kanu in the cave. Nearby, Aries and Edgar come across the lake with the ancient ruins. Aries pulls out Hasford's notebook and sees that the drawing in the book matches the ruin. Aries believes that Hasford must have created his Protoculture theory based on what he saw on the island. Sara and Shin appear out of some bushes, and Sara tells them to stay away from the sacred place. She asks Aries if she's related to the old man who stole blood, and Aries sees that she knows Hasford. Sara suddenly has a flashback of being a young girl. Hasford gave her a necklace and took a sample of her blood, which made her angry. Sara then begins to yell at Aries and says that the white people will bring catastrophe. Aries cuts herself on the edge of Sara's staff and asks about the secret of the song passed down in the blood of the priestesses. Shin says he saw Sara lift the rocks and starts jumping around like an idiot. On the Asuka II, scientists determine that the blood coming out of the AFOS matches the blood of the islanders. Shin and Edgar walk back to the village, and Mao pokes him in the butt. He asks her where everyone went, and she tells him they are watching Earth Maiden Arjuna on TV. Mao asks Shin to come along and see her treasure, so they go diving. Shin sees all sorts of amazing things like flying fish. She takes him deep down to her treasure, which is the cyclops head of the AFOS. The eye suddenly opens and looks at them, and Shin panics and loses breath. Mao then kisses him to give him breath. At the sacred lake, Sara senses what happened and the ground shakes, causing Aries' camera to break.

Sara tells Aries to come out because she knows she's hiding. Aries thinks that Sara's power caused the ground to shake, but Sara says it is a Kadun. Shin and Mao come back to the surface, and he's out of breath. He wonders why the cyclops lit up, and Mao thinks it may have to do with them kissing. Elsewhere, D.D. and Nora's SV-51 attack team move in to attack the Asuka II and steal the AFOS. Shin and Mao speed away with her treasure, the AFOS fragment. He wants to get back to the Asuka II, and Edgar suddenly appears out of nowhere awkwardly flying their Phoenix. He lands in the water so Shin can get in, and Mao tells him to protect her treasure from the Kadun. He sees a missile coming towards them from underwater and grabs Mao just before it destroys her boat. Shin sees an OCTOS mecha going after the treasure, so he decides to go underwater to find it. As the the Anti-UN forces begin their attack run on the U.N. Spacy fleet, they come under fire from Destroid Cheyenne units. D.D. and Nora bypass the small destroyers and head directly for the Asuka II. The stationary Destroid Cheyennes break out of their turrets and attack, but they are no match for the SV-51s. Nora covers D.D. as he begins to pry open the ship's hull to get inside the hangar. Underwater, Shin dodges missiles fired by the OCTOS. D.D. breaks into the hangar, but Roy attacks with his armored Phoenix and knocks him out of the hangar. He then fires a large barrage of missiles and forces D.D. and Nora to be on the defensive. A missile explodes on impact with the Phoenix, but Roy ejects his reactive armor and presses the attack. In the ocean, Shin attacks the OCTOS and escapes with the AFOS fragment. The OCTOS pilot informs Nora of what has happened, and D.D. orders her to get the fragment back while he distracts Roy. Nora leaves the battlefield, and D.D. attacks Focker. Shin lands on the coast where Sara, Nutuk and Aries are standing. Sara sees that Mao is sucking her thumb and asks Shin why he involved her in the battle. Aries says that Mao is in shock, and Nutuk says she has a Kadun in her. Katie and the other marines detect an enemy attack and begin firing their bazooka. Shin gets back into the Phoenix and says he will protect Mao's treasure. The Anti-UN forces begin destroying the village, and Sara runs off to stop the awakening of the Bird Human and the singing of the song of destruction. As Shin and Edgar fly over the island, they are attacked by Nora. He breaks free of her, but she sweeps in from underneath and severely damages his Phoenix. He drops the AFOS fragment, and she disengages to go after it. Shin and Edgar then slam their Phoenix into Nora's SV-51 and eject. Nora is forced to make an emergency landing in the jungle. Mao is taken to the Asuka II, and doctors prepare to transplant the AFOS blood into her. Shin evades gunfire in the jungle, and Sara attacks him with a sword. She tells him the world could be destroyed, and he says he was just protecting Mao's treasure. Nora then pulls up in an OCTOS and sees that she has found Shin.

After another long wait, we finally get another episode in this series. Shin has some awkward moments with Sara, mainly due to him seeing her naked. There's also a lot of conflict between Sara and Aries, and we see her past with Dr. Hasford, which explains why she dislikes outsiders. However, she's still very uptight. Also, the classic Macross love triangle is at last formed when Mao kisses Shin underwater. She's obviously too young for him, but at the same time it's clear that she's interested in him. The attack on the U.N. Spacy fleet is brilliantly rendered, and it's perhaps the best CG I've ever seen in an anime series. One thing that threw me off was the brief period that Roy's Phoenix was depicted with cel animation rather than with CG. Shin finally gets to fight with his Phoenix, but not surprisingly he gets it destroyed. That's as bad as Hikaru Ichijyo, but that was more understandable since Hikaru was a civilian, whereas Shin is a military pilot. It's still not exactly clear what the AFOS is and why people want it, but hopefully this will be explained in the last two episodes.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

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