Mighty Space Miners

Original Title: おいら宇宙の探鉱夫
Romanized: Oira Uchuu no Tankoufu
Literal: We Space Miners

Plot Synopsis

In the year 2060, a small group of daring individuals lives on an asteroid colony orbiting near Earth, extracting the raw materials Earth needs. Their latest project is an ambitious one: to capture Haley's comet. Among the colony's inhabitants is Nanbu Ushiwaka, a young man determined to pass the company flight exam and follow in his parents' footsteps. But during his test run, things get a little rough back home when the capture operation goes wrong and a stray military satellite severely damages the colony.

Now the colony is on a collision course with Earth, once the government there realizes what's going on things are going to go from bad to worse, and the surviving colonists are having a hard enough time just staying alive. Then there's Ushiwaka, dead set on finishing his exam...

Review

Rating: 3.5 / 5
Reviewer: Marc
Review Date: 2005-01-23

Mighty Space Miners is a good show for several reasons, and a bad show for a couple of big ones. At its heart the series is a classic sci-fi thriller, though it adds a good shot of light anime adventure to the creative and accurate scientific detail for balance. Sadly, though all the parts necessary for a good yarn are in place, the series has so little time to work with it has trouble finding its footing, and it sets up a doozy of an unresolved cliffhanger thanks to being cut short after only two episodes. On balance, it's so frustrating that it's hard to recommend the series, but it's still quite a ride while it lasts.

The characters here are pretty much anime-archetypes: the determined, spunky, headstrong kid; the wise, brave space captain father; the stern but kind, get-things-done mother; and so on. (Also be prepared for a cute little talking robot-helmet, but it's handled more realistically than you'd expect.) Despite their well-traveled nature, the unusual setting and some good storytelling (not to mention fine acting in Japanese) make the characters seem relatively fresh and certainly interesting enough to watch.

Likewise, the story doesn't sound wildly original at first (I think most sci-fi fans have seen brave colonists struggling to survive some disaster at least once), but it turned out to be quite interesting as well. Most of the credit goes to the attention to scientific detail and realism; the setting is believable and imaginative, and the ample supply of action centered around surviving the harsh environment and classic sci-fi schemes to get things working again serve up more excitement than most stories of this ilk.

A large part of what makes the action (and, as a result, the whole thing) work is not just the attention to scientific accuracy but the creative use of it. For example, the only part of the colony that has gravity is a spinning habitat section, and the rest is in freefall. But instead of 2001-style slow motion spacewalks, the freedom of a gravity-free environment is fully capitalized on--just watching the characters (mostly Ushiwaka) jump and swim around is very cool.

Likewise, the attention to detail turns minor events into exciting drama; just stopping a space pod that's run out of fuel is a tense effort, and a crack in the windshield is a serious problem. It's similar to Apollo 13; if you tell the story right, a broken oxygen tank can make gripping cinema, and here the scale is expanded to an entire space colony.

It's impressive to see an action-oriented sci-fi series without a single battle scene of the sort most space dramas rely on. Indeed, Mighty Space Miners differs from most sci-oriented sci-fi stories in its fast pace and dynamic feel, while still staying adventurous and fun. Heck, there wasn't enough spare time in the story to slow down even if they'd wanted to.

But therein lies this series' sole flaw: It's length. First, the relatively complicated story is crammed in a little too tightly--I felt like I needed to watch it a second time just to get a firm grasp on what had gone wrong, and what the cause of impending doom was supposed to be. You can kind of get away with blowing past the setup in an action movie, and in truth the urgency and lack of "info dump" scenes was refreshing, but a few more minutes of backstory and/or time spent explaining the drama would have made it a lot less confusing early on.

In any case, that's not the real length problem this series has. A few more minutes of story at the beginning would have been nice, but a lot more minutes at the end was essential--although AD Vision bills this as a "movie", it's really an OAV series, and a conspicuously incomplete one. Things are moving along just fine, the story's heading toward its climax, and just when you're ready for the final episode, it stops. And that's it. The colony is heading for earth, there's a nuclear bomb about to go off, the hero is about to be forcibly evacuated, and it ends.

I don't know who made the rule requiring all really interesting OAV series to get cut short after two episodes, but as good as what's here is, I'd highly recommend staying away from it if you can't stomach the lack of a conclusion. It's still a good book if the end is missing, but it's darned frustrating to read.

Visually, Mighty Space Miners is impressive. The art is great; clean, nice-looking, colorful enough, and very detailed. The animation is also very well executed; smooth and with impressive attention to detail. If you look closely, you'll see not just a lot of cool zero-G jumping around, but little touches like when a fuel line breaks and the splashing (and weightless) liquid freezes almost immediately in the cold of space. The character animation is impressive, too, especially when it comes to weightless action, or even just getting around. The character designs are toward the cute side, but appealing and distinctive, with lots of variety. (The look is notably similar to Green Legend Ran, for those familiar with that series.)

I've only seen the subtitled version, but the Japanese acting is quite good. Lots of distinct casting (Ushiwaka's mother in particular has a neat matronly-yet-gritty edge to her voice) and plenty of personality. The real standout performance is behind Ushiwaka, though--the character is an anime archetype, but he is cast believably and voiced with so much gusto that the character partially escapes the stereotype. The music isn't as noteworthy, but isn't bad, either, with a classic but not-so-bad end theme. The opening and endings are more remarkable visually--a series of "photographs" from the past few decades of space development, showing the good and the bad.

In all, Mighty Space Miners is two thirds of a cool, traditional-yet-exciting sci-fi story. It has scientifically accurate action, great visuals, an interesting if rushed story, and some creative situations and settings, but the tragic lack of a final episode to wrap up the cliffhanger is maddening, and depending on your tolerance for that kind of thing might be enough to make the rest of the experience something to avoid. If, on the other hand, you can stand the inconclusive end and enjoy either a fun but serious sci-fi thriller or Star Trek-style action, Mighty Space Miners should be well worth your time.

Related Recommendations

Sort of in a class by itself, although it draws heavily on decades of sci-fi stories. They Were 11 and Odin: Starlight Mutiny are both similar classic sci-fi thrillers with somewhat less of a dynamic feel, and it reminded me a lot of Green Legend Ran and Now and Then, Here and There both mostly due to the visual style. Also shares a few elements with the action in Battle Athletes.

US DVD Review

None currently exists in the US.

Content Guide

Not much to find objectionable, but some realistic (though not overly graphic) carnage, and a few ideas that might upset very young viewers (children born in space dying from the side-effects) probably put this in the 10-up range.

Violence: 3 - It's really not that gory or graphic, but there are a few floating bodies and zero-G blood.

Nudity: 2 - A brief, long-distance scene at the beginning involving the main character (a 12 year old boy) swimming.

Sex/Mature Themes: 1 - Nothing significant.

Language: 1 - Nothing serious.

Notes and Trivia

Apparently a pet project that the director, Umanosuke Iida, had been waiting to do. The credits apparently show it as being based on a novel by an English-sounding author (something along the line of "Horesman Lunchfeld"), but this is a made-up pseudonym of the director (possibly a reference to the fact that "Umanosuke" could literally mean something like "Boy of the Horse").

Speaking as a physics major, I can attest that while the science isn't all perfect, it is some of the most accurate I've seen, and there is an amazing amount of attention paid to detail.

Availability

Available on a single subtitled or dubbed VHS volume from ADV, both now out of print.

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