Review of Astra Lost in Space

Okay, so this anime surprised me immensely. It follows 8 students who are sent on an excursion into space and get lost after some misfortune befalls them. They are stranded 5000 light-years from home and need to find their way back while managing food, water, resources, and the knowledge that one of their teammates wants them dead. The series started slowly and up until the 6th episode I was sure this was going to be one of those middling anime that I would forget very quickly. However, from the second half of the season (it's 12 episodes long) it just threw up surprise after surprise,after surprise. It also benefitted from having an ending which means that the entire story was encapsulated in these 12 episodes. What this meant was that the story was able to be told fully and the ending was very satisfying. I loved the characters of this anime. Every single one of them was well developed and had character traits that I could identify and appreciate. Even the characters I initially thought were useless actually turned out to be quite useful and integral to the story. The animation was also a strong point and studio Lerche deserve some credit for their work here. Kanata no Astra was a heartwarming watch with moments of genuine feeling.

With all of that said, I did have a few problems with the show. Some of the plot points were very implausible and there were a few plot holes. Also, there was some inconsistency with Aries Spring's character (she was the protagonist) that I found annoying. That said, the question I asked myself was if I enjoyed this anime, and the answer is yes. Because of that, I'm more than willing to overlook some of its flaws. It also did that thing that I love with anime: It gave me a moral and philosophical question to ask myself.