Search - Area 88 - Blue Skies of Betrayal (Vol. 1) on DVD

How Far to Paradise?

Strategos | In Space above Planet Earth | 07/17/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The 80's sure was a great decade for anime. Indeed, all things considered, it might have been the best decade for OVA (direct-to-video anime) ever. You had romance like Ah My Goddess, comedy like All Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku, and then of course you've got this classic. Anime is largely by nature very anti-war, even when it's an action title, and this is perhaps best personified by this classic.

The story is an unusual one. A promising young airline pilot is set to marry daughter of Japan's biggest airline and start a magnificent career in the airline industry, when on the night of his graduation, his best friend gets him drunk and makes him sign a contract to become a mercenary jet fighter pilot in deep in the savage desert in Area 88. A pacifist and gentle soul, our hero finds this is a terrible nightmare come true, as he is forced again and again to kill people he doesn't know for a cause he cares nothing about, just to stay alive.

The story segments are solid, if a little slow moving. His "friend" tries to take over both the airline and the love that Shin should have had, and his girlfriend desperately tries to find him and bring him back. Meanwhile, on the base, and in the air, is where the real drama lies.

The opening moments of the OVA have Shin's plane shooting up tanks in the desert, and you can actually see the shells from his bullets fall through the air as he fires. Planes in this show are destroyed in seconds from bullets and missiles, and if they manage to survive a few hits, they are likely so crippled as to make survival almost impossible. This ain't no video game, the planes actually run out of bullets. There is a constant sense of danger throughout the entire series, because you have absolutely no idea who is going to survive from one mission to the next. A character may be introduced and then get killed the first time they go up in a plane in this show.

In the first half of the series there's a this double-edge sword of desperation to escape combined with resistance against what a life like this does to a person. Shin is trying desperately to hold onto his humanity, not to become a cold-blooded killer who feels nothing when someone dies. And he is desperately trying to get away. So as he closes in on his goal of paying off his contract and getting out, you can feel his incredible frustration when things don't go as he plans. The opening song "How far to Paradise" is the theme of the first episode in this AVI, and it's a fitting description of Shin's mindset. He's trying to escape from hell on Earth to go back to a peaceful life, a beautiful woman, and wonderful career that's waiting for him.

The second half of the show is partly just closing things up resolving plotlines, as Shin's nemesis finds his evil plot unraveling, Shin's girlfriend gets closer to setting him free, and the the war draws to a close as the loyalist forces Shin works for are outgunned, outmanned, and (eventually) forced to surrender. The real story though, is the subtle change that has happened to Shin. He talks like a wimpy pacifist, but somewhere along the line he stopped being afraid and stopped caring about the people he killed. The ultimate example of this is when he shoots down one of his comrades who has gone blind and is shooting everwhere in a random pattern in violent desperation. And yet Shin still refuses to accept what he has become, or rather, to embrace it. When a wingman shoots down the parachute of an ememy, he is appalled.

Some time is spent on describing the why of what has happened to the men of Area 88 to make them want to do what they do, and what it amounts to is that once these people live in an environment where their lives are in constant danger, they just can't be at home anywhere where their death isn't close at hand. And in the end Shin himself has succumb to it as well. Finally free and able to return to the life is longed for so desperately, the dramatic end of the show has him instead getting back into his aircraft to join his comrades in one last heroic and foolish battle where survival is almost impossible. But when a life of danger and death is all you have known, would it really be a mercy to let you live through it and return to the world shattered. Heavy stuff indeed.

Throughout the entire series there is some wonderful high-quality animation, music, and voice-acting. The sheer quality of the entire series is what makes it a must have for me, because I have never seen a better animation about a fighter pilot's life. The air battles are incredibly exciting, and friend and foe alike are always just a hair-breath away from destruction (no invincible heroes here!). Everything moves are high speed with style, and the large variety of aircraft are all meticulously detailed, not just exploding, but breaking up, falling apart, smoking, catching on fire, ect ect. Pilots are killed by bullets going through their cockpits, entire instrument panels are recreated in loving detail, and airplane parts move and adjust in realistic manner. Very impressive indeed. It's this level of detail that sets this show apart. And the two best (and craziest) action scenes, one in each episode, are better for the fact that the danger feels all-too-real. One involves an airbase attack where a giant steel wall lifts up right in front of the planes (and they have to fly through the holes in it), and the second navigating an incredibly narrow canyon wall at high speed in the middle of the night. But the all the flight scenes are great, the other standouts being the time Shin and his wingman have to shoot bombs off a jumbo jet without damaging it, and the final battle against the rebel Air Force.

If you love classic anime (and particularly classic OVA), or just want to watch a great show about a stoic fighter pilot's struggle to survive on the far side of the desert wasteland, this show is a must own.
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