Queen Emeraldas

I was pretty hyped up to see ‘Queen Emeraldas’ after discovering it had been formed in the brilliant mind of Leiji Matsumoto; a renowned anime director behind original projects like ‘Interstella 5555’ (the awesome music video collaboration with French band Daft Punk).
Taking a glance at the stylish cover-art featuring our hero Emeraldas immediately furthered my interest; the character designs are just so damn cool.

But outside of these first impressions, I didn’t have a clue about what to expect from this. Especially troubling was the limited running time of 60 minutes; would it just abandon any attempts to tell a coherent story and flood us with stylized (yet brainless) action?

And indeed, this torn feeling has prevailed even after watching Queen Emeraldas. On the one hand; you have a fun and exciting action story, propelled by cool character designs and some inventive villains. And then on the other hand; you have the mysterious Emeraldas herself – serene, deadly and honourable; yet frustratingly, we never really discover the reasons behind her introverted nature. Hints and references to her past are scattered across this feature, but I’m sure only the most enthusiastic of Matsumoto fans will be able to piece these together and derive some meaning from them.

You see, only after finishing this disc did I discover that Queen Emeraldas is intended simply as a side story in the Matsumoto universe. And hence, all of the pointers to characters outside of this specific story were pretty much lost on me (excluding the fact that Emeraldas seemed pretty pissed off about what had happened to them).

That’s not to say that Queen Emeraldas doesn’t work as a stand-alone story, it’s just that I would have preferred to join this story understanding a bit more about Emeraldas and the reasons behind her seemingly perpetual coldness.

Funnily enough, the main story actually doesn’t focus on Emeraldas much at all, instead following an energetic young orphan boy going by the name of Hiroshi Umino.
Bluntly intent on making his own way in life, Hiroshi dreams of building his own spaceship and achieving (in his mind) true freedom.
Only after being saved from a vicious group of imperial soldiers (by our hero; Emeraldas) does he realize how much more he still has left to learn about life. Unfortunately for him, Hiroshi must come of age, and fast.

At times, Queen Emeraldas feels extremely cliché and more than a little unoriginal, however, provided you aren’t coming into this anime expecting something earth shatteringly good, I expect you’ll be paid off with what is a fun little action feature.

The scenes of space-battle are enjoyable to watch, and the climatic sword duel hints at something a little deeper than this little story dares to go.

The animation used, as expected, is extremely stylish and has a certain retro feel to it – especially the character designs, which are naturally very cool and original.
The soundtrack, while occasionally sounding like a cheap James Bond rip-off, is of an acceptable standard.

In Summary

Although the more seasoned fans of Matsumoto’s universe will be able to enjoy Queen Emeraldas a little more, I must admit that I had fun with this too.
It’s a slightly above average action story, with a hidden depth that can only be released by delving further into Leiji Matsumoto’s other works.
Queen Emeraldas is fun, but not without flaws.