I truly loved this story. While it did not strike an emotional note with me as other stories did, it felt refreshingly familiar: owing to my appreciation of Mecha-Anime (Gundam, Evangelion, etc). A recurring theme in these works as well as the story itself is that the best pilots (or in some cases all the pilots) are children/teenagers. This is can specifically be seen in Gundam Wing where the 5 primary protagonists are 14-15 years old. Although I did not hold it against this story, I've grown a bit tired of the troupe. I have a hard time believing that the demographics for giant robot pilots would be nearly exclusively teenagers. I would make more sense to me that the prime ages would mirror those of professional athletes. What does everyone else think about this theme? Did it seem strange to people not familiar with the genre?
Side note: Loved the Blue Submarine 6 shout out.
I always figured it had to do with size: the space inside the mecha is too cramped for an adult (kind of like how being tall on a submarine is unpleasant). I also figured it had a lot to do with the target audience of those stories. Either way, the genre trope is probably self-perpetuating by now.
ReplyDeleteI am not terribly familiar with this genre, and perhaps, as a result, I didn't really enjoy this story all that much. Maybe I'm just lacking the background? I do agree with Maureen, though, that the pilots were primarily teenagers for the same reason that many heroes and protagonists of YA fiction are teenagers: the target audience.
ReplyDelete