Moonrise Episode 18 Discussion

what a waste of time lol

Wow, this show was pretty bad,, Animation was nice, even thought that staff lists had the 2nd key animator thing going on in some episodes. My expectations for this show was pretty low just because it's a wit original and the guy that wrote Bye Bye Earth was working on it, That guy ain't good at writing a script

Binged it all yesterday. 7/10. It was interesting in the sense that it had compelling concepts (AI running Earth with no one questioning/reprimanding it outside of "undesirable" people, moon colonization, war for independence and the protag discovering the truth after decades of Sapientia propaganda) but didn't hit as hard as I thought it would. For starters, many relationships were underdeveloped, such as:

• Eric and Jack's. I did feel kinda bad that he died, at least, since it came out of nowhere and highlights how fleeting morality can be. Jack continuing to play Totally-Not-Pokemon-Go as that was the game that bonded them felt bittersweet, but I believe more intimate moments would've made the payoff more emotional. Surprised with all the shit they went through, plus only having 1 year of military training when they were just nepo babies, I'm surprised he was the only one on their side who died.
  
  
• Rhys and Jack. Despite the ending theme slideshow showing them going on a date, and a few people (Mary, Phil, Salamandra) calling Rhys his girlfriend and he doesn't refute it, I had a VERY hard time believing he had romantic feelings for her throughout the show with the way he treated her. Constant miscommunication (which stemmed from little to no communication at all), flirted with other women in the very first episode, while checking out another woman's ass right next to Rhys a few eps later, never gave her reassurance regarding her insecurity surrounding Mary (tbh, she never made it clear to him anyway...), "choosing" Mary and Phil over her/the VGC multiple times (Jack protecting and running away with Mary near the end definitely jump started her villain arc. Couldn't help but laugh when he stayed on the moon with her while Rhys is the only one from the friend group on Earth). She's always been chasing after him and he just...didn't reciprocate. He had way more chemistry with Mary despite their relationship not being romantic, either. Rhys lost in a love triangle that never existed outside her own head, and I can't help but get extreme secondhand embarrassment every time I remember. Also, Jack telling Rhys in ep 18 that he'll "be right back" after saving Mary, then never returns as he's working alongside Mary to rebuild the Moon while Rhys is the only one from the VGC to return to/stay on Earth, with no signs they're at least still calling/texting with each other is...lol. One last promise to not fulfill. Her mid-season crashout was kinda understandable in hindsight.
  
  
• Phil(ioso) and Jack (at this point, the problem might be Jack?). This is on me, but from the trailer, I thought their relationship would've been more intimate (I don't mean in the romantic sense), especially as the opening portrays them mirroring each other, reaching towards each other but Phil is out of reach, and two the AI magic butterflies flying over the ship/orphanage they grew up in. Personally, more flashbacks could've expanded on their relationship before the ep where they come to the horrifying realization that they're enemies in a war. I still felt some dread when they discovered each other in the church but I think if there were more scenes showcasing their closeness before the orphanage burned down, the plot twist impact would've been stronger. And again, while I get it's war, Mary stating he and Phil haven't really talked since they joined the rebel army was a head scratcher. Your childhood best friend is alive and within grasp for the first time in 10-20 years but neither of y'all could spare a moment to rekindle? Jack had multiple one-on-one scenes with Rhys, a couple of slice-of-life moments reminiscing and catching up, leading to them steeling their resolve towards ending the war and fulfilling the promise between them would've been better. The ending suggests Phil is alive so, eh, guess I'll just decide they can actually continue their relationship in the future off-screen. Saw a funny tweet that compared Phil to Knives Millions (Trigun) because he wanted to save Jack when they first reunited by attacking all his friends lol.
  
  
• Georg and Michaela. Small gripe, but this guy's girlfriend died in the terrorist attack in ep 1 (he was going to run back to the cruise ship to save her, but got hit by debris and was knocked out). But he didn't seem phased at all?????? Jack got multiple war flashbacks, I don't think I've even seen Georg shed a single tear regarding his dead girlfriend before he's back to his womanizing ways.
  

I think the only relationships I enjoyed with little to no issues were Jack/Mary, Jack/Whiz-B and Inanna/Zowan, but I wish they explained why they latter was on the team outside of Sapientia making the groups?? Outside of the underdeveloped relationships my other issue, like others have posted, is the pacing. Frequent flash backs and flash forwards while you're left in the dark as they explain how they got there in the next 2 episodes was a bit annoying yet tolerable, but the final fight finishing within 10m of the last episode (seriously, Jack just had to touch Mary and that was it) and the fallout from the destruction of Sapientia being waved away dismissively with white text on a black screen then having a 3 month time skip did me in. Did they just run out of time?? And while the Earthlings were juSt fOlLoWiNg OrDeRs from the AI, literally nobody got punished outside of Phil being arrested(he promised Jack he'd turn himself in and he had an ulterior goal, but still)? What about the Earth mercenary army (or whatever they were) who were straight up killing dissidents on the Moon(that ep w/the little girl)?

It could've been worse, I suppose. For what it's worth, Phil's hot. Most beautiful man in the series. And such a gentleman, too, visiting orphaned children, providing prosthetics, and giving up his own mechanical arm so that Whiz-B can help control Mary's powers and protect her as well. Thank you, Hiromu Arakawa. Mary's Japanese voice is so adorable. I hope her VA continues to get roles, her voice is very fresh and unique, and I loved listening to her whenever Mary was on screen. The raspiness and voice cracks gives an air of youth and innocence to Mary, a funny contradiction to her power that's practically a giant all-encompassing apocalyptic wave. She deserved that headpat from Jack. I might've missed it, but was it even explained how she got that power? She's simply an AI human (SEED) like Phil and Jack, correct?

Show had its issues but as I said in the beginning of this post, I was invested enough to watch it all in one day. I wouldn't recommend it right away if someone asked me for sci-fi anime, though. Wish it had more episodes(22-24) to iron out its story and characters more.

@YoseiEgg

So I’m curious because he decided to stay behind to help rebuild the moon …… that means he chose her over Rhys ??

That in no way means he chose her over Rhys

Moonrise is a big junk of cool ideas that didn’t work together because of pacing and the fact that WiT wanted it to be another AoT-like, when it should’ve been Gundam-like.

Funnily enough a lot people hated it from the start and for the wrong things. This felt forced and stupid (kinda reminded me of AICO situation that was great sci-fi, but got over-hated). Also a known fact: most people aren’t capable to watch non-linear stories for some reason (probably not clever enough) and Moonrise had a lot of those future-past-present jumps even when it was pointless.

Still, the start was fine. Actually had a lot of potential. It got really sloppy during eps 3,4,5, but then we got episodes 6,7,8 that were really great. The show was only half way through so I expected even more greatness (it felt like a legit 7-8 rated series), but…. Not sure what happened, but ep9 was awful. After that there were some good eps, average and boring ones but they were just not good enough. Last eps had so many interesting ideas, but sadly they didn’t work well together. And pacing didn’t help. It was bad. Out of 18 episodes they couldn’t even develop any character besides their basic characteristics (may be aside from MC, but he was like that from the start).

In the end, a disappointing result for WiT and Moonrise. That doesn’t mean the show is bad, it’s an ok and fun watch, but nothing more. 6/10.