There are many people who appreciate anime mecha, but it is clear that mecha’s popularity has decreased significantly in modern anime. Unfortunately, in many cases, people who like space anime often have to look to the mecha genre to get the space context they want.
While the stars have fascinated humanity since the beginning of our species, I guess anime creators often think that there needs to be a little more going on there. Although rarer, you can find space cartoons that are not the battlefields of conflicting mobile suits.
If you like space anime but don’t necessarily have a fighting robot in it, give these space anime non-anime mecha recommendations a try.
Space Anime Isn’t Mecha
Legend of the Galactic Heroes
The legend of galactic heroes is unfortunately often confused with Gundam. Both series are long-loved space operas, set in intergalactic battles, ideological conflicts, and character drama, but The Legend of Galactic Heroes really not a cartoon about machines.
They’re not fighting with mobile suits, they’re fighting space fleets like you see commonly used in non-cartoon space series like Star Trek.
As such, if you like a good war epic that focuses heavily on strategy and tells a compelling story where each side fights for reasons they believe are good reasons, there is a reason. making Legend of the Galactic Heroes considered one of those “legendary” anime series.
Astra Lost in Space
Though Astra Lost In Space requires a little pause in skepticism and “just go for it” when it comes to certain things. Intro, this is actually one of those rare space cartoons that shows realistic diversity in the planets the characters visit.
This series is about a group of teenagers who are on a planet camping trip planned by their school. However, a wormhole opened on another safe planet and threw them 1,000 light-years away in the middle of outer space. “Fortunately,” they happen to appear right next to an abandoned spaceship and use it to jump home from the planet, gathering the resources they need to survive. visit.
Along with space travel and using planetary issues as a catalyst to solve character drama, Astra Lost in Space also explores an overall mystery surrounding who tried to kill the children. this child by opening that wormhole in the first place and why they did it.
Planetes
Planetes is a near-future space anime that tackles a real-world problem with humanity’s activities in space – all the junk we create there.
A Screwing up your windshield on a highway on Earth is terrible, but a screw in space cracking the glass between you and the endless void is worse than ever. Scrap metal, loose parts and other junk in space is actually quite dangerous for the structures above it.
As a result, Planetes tracks recruits who are essentially space junkers. They collect space junk and dispose of it to prevent it from causing problems and cascading effects.
While the series started off as a lighter space workplace comedy, it actually adds to the plot and characters as the series goes on to become a pretty gripping drama. .
Cowboy Bebop
Cowboy Bebop never really emphasizes the “spatial context” of it all. The crew, if not entangled in the antics inside their spaceship, are on planets entangled in mischief. So while they often jump over planets, it never focuses on the actual space travel between those planets except for the rare occasion where they need to throw a musty fridge in. in there.
Either way, Cowboy Bebop follows a bunch of bounty hunters who are skilled fighters, but are frequently poor when the job goes south for one reason or another.
It doesn’t accentuate the space as much as some might like, but it certainly accentuates the future settlement space of the installation.
Space Brothers
It’s hard to call Space Brothers a real “space” anime because ninety percent of the series actually takes place on Earth. However, it cannot be ignored as it is the most realistic depiction in the anime of what potential astronauts must go through to eventually make it to space.
Space Brothers follows two brothers who have been infatuated with each other since childhood. by space. While both wanted to grow up and become astronauts, only one truly pursued that dream. The other brother, upon learning that his younger brother had been selected for a mission on the moon, was motivated to try again to fulfill his childhood dream. Furthermore, as an older brother, he vows to surpass his younger brother by becoming the first to go to Mars.
While you do, you’ll eventually see the younger brother in space, the Space Brothers beloved for their lovable, grounded, and realistic characters rather than interstellar time. It’s refreshing to see, in a sea of sci-fi cartoons, that someone trying to get their roots in realism might have actually inspired some young audience by showing them that it’s possible. they can be astronauts too if stupid Rollin’Mutta can. It.
Moonlight Mile
You know Space Brothers is a realistic and detailed description of the steps that potential astronauts have to go through to get into space? Moonlight Mile is like that, but ridiculously unrealistic through its main characters. It’s like America trying to create Space Brothers.
Moonlight Mile is about two friends who, after accidentally climbing Mount Everest, decide to set their sights even higher – Space. By chance a new energy source was discovered on the moon and NASA launched a special project to capture and harness that energy, and the main characters jumped at the opportunity.
The series follows two different paths pairing friends to the moon before the other. The main characters are described as people I can only describe as “extremely masculine men” because everything they do is either reckless or promiscuous.
Outlaw star
Unlike Cowboy Bebop, the Outlaw Star follows outlaws in space. The series is about a guy who fulfills his dream of finally having a spaceship, and starts taking any job, legal or not, to keep it afloat.
This is definitely a series for people who don’t necessarily need real science fiction, but enjoy endless space adventures without being afraid to be a little silly.
Airship operator
I think a lot of people are looking for harder sci-fi anime set in space where battles are on the radar and won by tactics that would have eliminated Starship Operators, if not for its prone name. confused with Starship Troopers, it’s because it has a female protagonist.
Anime has made it possible for us to consider a group of women as protagonists and think that this series is either a harem, ecchi or amorphous moe, The Spaceship Operator is not one of them.
Instead, you’ll have a story about graduating space cadets returning to their home planet on a new spaceship. They soon learn that their home planet has been claimed by a more powerful kingdom and quickly surrender without a struggle.
Instead of accepting this, they decide to launch their own war for their home planet. This is not done through some reckless frontal attack with a powerful airship, but the act of getting out of deadly trouble to find allies, secure finances, and enter into deals. Smaller, purposeful paintings.
Space Pirates Bodacious
While the premise is that a high school girl discovers her long-absent father is a space pirate and she has now inherited the pirate ship and his crew is a bit silly, Bodacious Space Pirates is not really “over the top” science fiction. If so, it’s a space anime that oscillates between the space opera series and the slice of life.
While Bodacious Space Pirates is actually a better “pirate” anime than a “space” anime, it’s still a series for those who prefer a more lawless universe.
Towards The Terra
Towards the Terra takes place in a universe where, after destroying the Earth, humanity flees into space, where they work on terraforming the Earth to make it habitable again. Instead of colonies being driven to war through ideological differences as is often the case in space science fiction, Towards the Terra follows a protagonist who is part of the evolution of the species. person, Mu, who has developed psychic abilities.
In our way, ordinary people oppress and have strict population control over these individuals.
The series follows the protagonist as he grows up to lead a group of people under siege. He travels and rescues Mu, who have awakened to their abilities while trying to find a place where they can live in peace.
Edens Zero
Due to the immediate and very obvious similarities between the characters, Edens Zero is easily described as “Fairy Tail in space.” It’s fair because they share the same creator anyway.
Although Edens Zero is its own with its intergalactic space story, Eden Zero is still a shounen gamer. Like Naruto, My Hero AcadeKaren, or indeed Fairy Tail, it has characters going to a place, fighting a mighty enemy or solving some problem with the power of friendship, and then going to a place. else to start over.
If you enjoy shounen battlers like many others, it’s rare to find a space setting, but Edens Zero makes the most of endless opportunities.
Space Dandy
Space anime is usually extremely serious. It’s all politics and war and the characters always have some sort of tragic past. Space Dandy takes a brave stance as the dumbest space travel cartoon you could ever see.
This series follows Dandy, who is paid to catalog new alien species. To raise money to fund his frequent visits to BooBies, the best eatery in the universe, he travels the galaxy with his robotic vacuum cleaner and his alien cat.
The series, sounds like a chaotic manga all the time. Teen humor and top-notch action are all the rage here and that’s exactly what some people want.
Crest of the Stars
Although never quite as legendary as Legend of the Galactic Heroes, Crest of the Stars is about a similar space opera, but told from the perspective of two teenagers who are the children of space aristocrats.
The series is about a human boy whose father sold their home world in favor of the Abh Empire. Traveling to his new school in the empire, his ship is caught in the middle of a skirmish between the Confederate fleet and the Abh fleet. Suddenly, he is jostled with a princess of the Abh Empire as the two travel across the galaxy to safety, where an all-out war between Abh and humanity has now raged.
Orbital Children
Orbital Children tells the story of several children who were visiting the space station for various reasons when disaster struck. Their evacuation route is blocked, the children must solve many deadly problems to escape to safety.
It’s a short series and has a few issues, but it’s also more youthful than the space adventure where these kids, growing up in a high-tech age, are often dependent on technological solutions. lower for high-tech issues.
Do you know more space cartoons that are set in space but aren’t? Let fans know in the comments section below.