... Bimbos of the Death Sun is REAL! Again!
For those not familiar with the book, the title of Bimbos of the Death Sun refers to an real-in-the-novel's-universe hard science fiction novel that an engineering professor character wrote, only to have the book published with an explicit cover and an eyebrow raising title. While the example of the book is a little extreme, it's funny when you find similar examples come up in the real world.
I was looking for a show to watch from the winter anime season line up (I'm making it a point to watch at least one show a season) and at first over looked a series called Bodacious Space Pirates because... the title sounded terrible. I heard a couple of decent reviews for it and I decided to finally give it a watch...
And it turns out that despite the sketchy title, it's actually pretty fantastic. It's a slow paced, somewhat hard science fiction series. The "hard" is in the loose sense of the concept, as most reviews I've seen point out that the science presented is fairly solid and the technological advances are well-thought out. For example, there's a fun little bit in the first episode where the main character finds out about her mother's secret past via a futuristic Google Image search. The science and tech are contrasted against an extremely broad colour palette, a storyline that involves pirates that are technically privateers (I think that this might be a language barrier issue, since the term the show uses is "legal pirates") and high school girls.
The flavour of the story is quite, quite odd, but I think I like it. I like the idea of mixing hardish science fiction and traditional high adventure stories. At least, I think that's the path the show is going to take. Right now the focus seems to be on the main character's privateer training, with very thoughtful discussions on topics like cyberwarfare and the nature of firearms in ship-to-ship combat.
As for the Bimbos of the Death Sun connection? Some further research reveals that the anime is based on a pulp novel/light novel series written by a Japanese author who was otherwise known for his non-fiction science writing. The books were called "Miniskirt Space Pirates" and featured teenaged girls as a marketing ploy, since the general opinion was that a straight, hardish sci-fi, privateer-themed series wouldn't sell.
The show is being simulcast over here with a week delay on the episodes for free users. I deeply suspect that the novel series won't be released over here, given that market for that sort of thing is very soft.
I was looking for a show to watch from the winter anime season line up (I'm making it a point to watch at least one show a season) and at first over looked a series called Bodacious Space Pirates because... the title sounded terrible. I heard a couple of decent reviews for it and I decided to finally give it a watch...
And it turns out that despite the sketchy title, it's actually pretty fantastic. It's a slow paced, somewhat hard science fiction series. The "hard" is in the loose sense of the concept, as most reviews I've seen point out that the science presented is fairly solid and the technological advances are well-thought out. For example, there's a fun little bit in the first episode where the main character finds out about her mother's secret past via a futuristic Google Image search. The science and tech are contrasted against an extremely broad colour palette, a storyline that involves pirates that are technically privateers (I think that this might be a language barrier issue, since the term the show uses is "legal pirates") and high school girls.
The flavour of the story is quite, quite odd, but I think I like it. I like the idea of mixing hardish science fiction and traditional high adventure stories. At least, I think that's the path the show is going to take. Right now the focus seems to be on the main character's privateer training, with very thoughtful discussions on topics like cyberwarfare and the nature of firearms in ship-to-ship combat.
As for the Bimbos of the Death Sun connection? Some further research reveals that the anime is based on a pulp novel/light novel series written by a Japanese author who was otherwise known for his non-fiction science writing. The books were called "Miniskirt Space Pirates" and featured teenaged girls as a marketing ploy, since the general opinion was that a straight, hardish sci-fi, privateer-themed series wouldn't sell.
The show is being simulcast over here with a week delay on the episodes for free users. I deeply suspect that the novel series won't be released over here, given that market for that sort of thing is very soft.