FBH Watches: ESA
Falling Blossom Harmony Watches ESA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tE5hyUjcd4
When I was younger, before the war, there were a spate of books and TV shows produced, often by amateurs which kicked off the alternate history movement on Haraway. Most of them had the same plot: Haraway is contacted later or earlier by the Stargazer Program and is either completely conquered and has to rebel or becomes a super strong independent state (with the first usually starting off the second).
They had something else in common too: they all sucked! Every one of them was written by the worst sort of Preservationist party hack, without any but the most vague understanding of history or external context, and usually with extremely fanciful technology (Like for instance, the one where we managed to invent the mega-particle beam a decade early)
So when I watched ESA I felt a creeping, horrific touch of dread Nostalgia: ESA is bad 2170s alternate history taken mainstream.
Chances are if you're a science fiction fan with any interest what so ever in ZOCU Visual media you've already seen, and already have a view on ESA. Terrifyingly, ESA is becoming one of those shows where after it's cancelled it becomes better thought of than when it was showing regularly. It's spawned fanfiction, letter writing campaigns, and megabytes of people whining about how brilliant it was.
It was not brilliant! High production values and good acting do not make a show brilliant anymore than makeup would turn me into a Green.
The show's premise (in case you've been hiding under a rock for the last few years or just migrated in from the core) In a universe without a breakdown, rather than ending with a negotiated cease fire, the ZOCU war ended with the EU dropping a bunch of antimatter bombs on Haraway and vaporising Landing Island, killing half of the planet's population (which is quite impressive given that only 2 million people live on Landing Island) at the instigation of the evil admiral Zweiker (obviously time travelling Saffron Kimmel is falling down on the job). Zweiker is then hung for this; only he's actually grabbed by a secret cabal which secretly controls the EU (In secret) and goes on to help build a series of super orbital frames to destroy all resistance in the Expanse or something.
The EU then invades and occupies the remains and fits everyone with bondage collars which inject drugs into people to suppress their transgenicness, and then a super secret organisation rebels against this, forms an alliance with a strange group which includes Americans, Rebellious Albionites, Nidorans, 14th century Crusaders with giant battleships from the Chinese arm, Ridiculously fruity posthuman worshippers, Extremely Indian Indians and Valera, and sets out on a quixotic quest to destroy the galaxy in order to save it.
I'm as patriotic as the next Harawayan, and after spending months in 2188 digging unexploded EU ordinance out of kids playgrounds and people's gardens I've got no illusions about how evil the EU is... but antimatter bombing Haraway? Seriously? Did Admiral Zweiker wear a big top hat and twirl his moustache while doing it?
I guess I could kind of accept the idea if the war got much nastier (the excuse the show gives) but without the breakdown it seems like the EU would have had an easier time, not harder, heck, without the breakdown their might not be a ZOCU, and the EU would be much better established in the Expanse (and inflict upon us their horrible philosophy and no doubt super bland cooking as well).
This is where the plot takes a hard left into crazy though. Let's talk about slave collars: how the hell are those supposed to work? I mean, I guess if you're a Red maybe you could be drugged to weaken you... though I'm not aware of any drug that'll do that and not be fatal at least over the medium term but what if you're a blue like me? What kind of drug are you going to inject into a normal human? Are these actually magical collars found in some ancient tomb in Egypt or something?
Also: why is it that Preservationists are all obsessed with bondage anyway? Don't say they aren't either: an implant or a bracelet would be far more practical ways to administer drugs regularly but for some reason we get ridiculously kinky looking collars.
It's generally said the only sympathetic characters in ESA are Harawayans, personally I don't find even the Harawayans all that sympathetic. Through the series they ally with clearly wacked out 14th century knights (from the Chinese arm) and cause the ZOCU alliance to basically break up.
The show is obviously trying to make them sympathetic though, by having them recruit baseline girls directly from school and put them into mecha because she passed a psychological test. I wish I was joking.
There's also some just bizarre stuff that makes me think that the authors just didn't know geography at all, like how New Mercia is 1: on a separate planet from Albion 2: bordering PACT and 3: Next to Egyptians. Yes, I'm serious, there's planet ancient Egypt in this, and they're even in ZOCU. I guess the EU dug them up along with their slave collars.
The rest of ZOCU of course (this being Preservationist paranoia) both doesn't seem to care about the fact that Haraway has been set on fire, half its population killed (somehow) occupied, and fitted with bondage devices and generally act like assholes to them and their attempts to gain new allies.
In S2, an effort seems to have been made to get the protagonists to be a bit less sympathetic, or I assume so at least, as Haraway is forced into a devil's bargain with the 14th century knights (from China) to invade some pirate port that was selling them drugs in order to prevent said knights slaughtering everyone. This while war against the EU is just warming up, which makes total sense of course.
Meantime, EU planets are broiling their own citizens alive and the Albions are involved in things with posthumans we never really get to find out about. The show was then cancelled, ending with a whimper rather than a bang.
Of course, all of these aren't really the main flaws of ESA. Despite its daft premise there's a single far more pressing problem: Nothing happens. Stuff is always about to happen or small scale stuff is happening or people are plotting stuff but nobody really seems to do anything meaningful. It's certainly not the exciting alternate history drama you'd want and all the meaningless mechafights, posthuman hijinx and shot up conferences in the world aren't gonna change that.
To add insult to injure, the second season's plot, which could have been rather interesting ends up dominated by the Mecha Olympics, which serves to introduce a whole bunch of characters... who don't go anywhere because the show got cancelled and it took so much time. This dominates the second season's plot to the exclusion of all else and is then won by some weirdly designed robot frame from a place that up until then nobody had heard of.
To sum up: ESA is a mess written by hicks. If you want to watch good Harawayan military fiction then watch Fire-Knives. ESA: we're better off without.