Yamato 2199 Group Watch – Episode 17

 

Episode 17 – Out of the Forest of Memories

This is… wow. An episode that reveals some painful truths about the past… The title of the ep (“Out of the Forest of Memories”) is a very apt one.

Hit the jump, and let’s dive on in shall we!

As usual, we’ll take the approach Scott pioneered with his entries and break things down into sides…  but going a bit further because there’s two main tracks on the Yamato side.

Gamilas Side:

Events on this side cover only the first few minutes of the show…  But they’re no less important/interesting…

In quick order we see:

– General Domel being sentenced to death for being suspected of being involved in the death of Leader Dessler.

– Elisa Domel being herded onto a transport headed for a prison planet.

Neither one seems to have had much in the way of a trial…  Mere suspicion seems to be enough in the Gamilas legal “system”.  It’s the easiest way to maintain order.

Both of these are fallout from the events in Episode 15.

– Most interestingly, we see Melda Ditz trying to hide her identity while watching Elisa Domel and other being forced onto the  prison transport.  (And a family being shot for trying to make a break for it.)

– Melda herself was being watched while this was going on…

Yamato Side – Sanada

Xo Sanada has always been presented as something of an odd duck…  Cool and efficient on duty, and not very social off duty other than with Niimi.  In particular he’s always shown with a book off duty, particularly one small book.

– It turns out that he, Niimi, and Mamoru (Kodai’s older brother) were friends in college.  And the book in question?  Poetry.  Borrowed from Mamoru.

– And all that ties into a powerful sense of guilt.  He knew the battle at Pluto (in the first episode) was a sham, that the ships were sacrificial decoys.  And his powerful sense of duty prevented him tellin Mamoru he was likely going to his death.  He’s also aware (and guilty) because he knows the truth about Yuuki…

Yamato Side – Yuuki / Yurisha

More powerful than Sandada backstory… We finally learn the truth about Yuuki, and Yurisha.

– When we first see Yuuki, she has the alien device featured in episodes 8, 14, and 16…  Only now it has a message from Admiral Hijikada referring to the “truth” she might find.

– And what a powerful thing that truth is.  Sanada reveals that Yuuki has no memory older than a year because she and Yurisha Iscandar were in an accident… an accident that gave Yuuki amnesia and left Yurisha in a coma.

– Which leads to a further revelation…  Yurisha had never told them how to reach Iskandar.

– Which then leads to… There is an Iskandarian aboard.  Yurisha herself.  Entombed within the machinery of the Autonomous Navigation System, which is probing her memories to find the path.  (Which Sanada also feels guilty about.)

And while her body is in the machinery…  Her consciousness seems to have leapt into Misaki…

That’s a lot to process, for both our heroes and we the viewers. And as I’m running out of time to write, I haven’t even mentioned them gaining control of a jump gate that will shave days off of their trip. Or that it was built by some unknown ancient civilization….

And that’s where we’ll have to leave it this week…

The bullet point format, in place of exposition, is an experiment-in-progress, drop a comment and let me know what you think!

Yamato 2199 group watch:

Other Participants:

– Mechanical Anime Reviews: Space Battleship Yamato 2199: Episode 17 – Large but Small

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You can see the all the postings in this series by visiting the Uchuu Senkan Yamato 2199 Group Watch category page.  If you want to participate, this post has all the information you need.