Planetes: when TV is made of The Right Stuff
One of my favourite bands, Caspian, often play recorded recitals of Charles Bukowski poems at the start of their live shows. One that stands out is Roll the Dice, which begins with the following lines:
If you’re going to try,
go all the way.
otherwise, don’t even start.
If you’re going to try, go all the way. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe your mind.
I don’t consider myself to be a fan or an expert of poetry; I certainly can’t name or recite much that’s left a lasting impression on me, but for some reason this particular one did.
It was also running through my mind when I finished the final episodes of Planetes, a TV anime series that was broadcast around twenty years ago and seems to have an enthusiastic, if niche, fan following. It deserves to be more widely known and celebrated, honestly.
In many ways, it’s the opposite of most TV anime shows, even other SF ones: it’s grounded in realism and features adults with jobs, operating equipment that is visibly futuristic yet feels recognisable, tactile and functional. It tackles real-world socio-political issues, with a multicultural cast who have rich backstories, and it deliberately follows these ordinary people rather than the rich or powerful. If you want a break from the fantastical stories or those centred around children or teenagers, I’d recommend it on that alone.
Its merits go further than the “oh cool, it’s not another high school or isekai show, then?” however. It takes the familiar theme of space travel and spends a not-insignificant amount of time following the trials of the people preparing for the world’s first exploratory mission to Jupiter, but for the most part it is about, to quote the one-sentence pitch that friends used to recommend it to me, “rubbish collectors in space.”
Planetes takes the storytelling approach of showing things like travel, colonisation, tourism and exploration in space through the eyes of not the heroes and pioneers but the unexceptional ones who make small contributions that help to make the big things happen. For every award-winning scientist or elite pilot, there are teams of engineers doing the day-to-day problem-solving or debris haulers who keep everything else running smoothly. They are people like you and me: folks who turn up to work each day for little reward or recognition beyond their modest salaries. It’s refreshing to see a concept as glamorous as this shown from such a mundane perspective, where the characters are participants in a bigger story rather than heroes who save the day.
That’s not to say that these people and their lives are uninteresting. I personally can’t stand primetime TV soap operas, because the viewing experience feels like I’m some rubbernecking village gossip, taking cruel satisfaction in seeing bad things happen to unlikeable people because of their bad decisions. This is I think why I lean towards more “concept-driven” stories like hard SF rather than character melodrama, but in the case of Planetes I wasn’t at all disappointed to follow the lives of individuals instead geeking out over the wide-eyed Clarke-ian tech stuff.
For sure: the cast do make some bad decisions and say foolish things that occasionally left me frustrated with them, but this is because the characterisation is so relatable. The personalities of the two protagonists, Hachiroto Hoshino and Ai Tanabe, neatly encapsulate the two main themes of the show: ambition and idealism.
Hachi has the mindset of the traditional space hero, but we see not just his achievements but the personal price paid for his lofty ambitions. What does the application for an elite astronaut entail? How could an ordinary working man save up for his own spaceship? We later learn that his family have a true stake in space – his father is an accomplished astronaut in his own right, and his brother already shows the first signs of the old man’s technical aptitude – but for a lot of the series Hachi is asocial, moody and motivated to a self-destructive degree because of that glaring gulf between where he currently is and where he wants to be.
This comes to a head during the Jupiter mission story arc, where we see risks taken and lives put on the line. It shows Hachi’s defining traits, for better and for worse; the question, “is it worth the cost?” is posed, but not firmly answered one way or the other. I found it telling that the story follows those left behind on Earth as well as their loved ones involved in the mission itself.
Ai in contrast exemplifies the other defining feature of humanity’s break from its home planet: the romantic notion that love can conquer all adversity, and that all this bold exploration is being done because it really means something to people. If Hachi is the Bukowski poem, Ai is the famous JFK speech:
...[S]pace can be explored and mastered without feeding the fires of war, without repeating the mistakes that man has made in extending his writ around this globe of ours...We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.
As well as being an interesting personality contrast and example of “opposites attract,” Ai’s worldview helps introduce the political aspect, which bubbles away in the background as we follow her and her coworkers’ daily lives.
As well as firmly sticking to scientific principles (JAXA was involved in the production of the series in a scientific consultant capacity), I believe that Planetes is also an effective piece of SF in other areas. It’s an early example of fictional media examining the now-topical issue of space junk, but also highlighting other unintended consequences of society looking upwards to space and almost leaving, but not quite leaving, the old ways behind. For example: there’s a former petrostate ravaged by poverty and civil unrest in a post-fossil fuels economy; then there’s another minor war-torn nation that tries to gain a foothold in the orbital industries despite its low status on the world stage.
Ai doesn’t personally solve any of these global issues; in fact, none of them are fully resolved by the series’ end, although there are small steps made in the right direction. One criticism that Ai faces is: how can we justify the time, effort and expense of exploring outer space when there are so many problems still waiting to be solved down here on Earth? How might an orbiting hotel, or an exploratory spacecraft to Jupiter, help people in small and marginalised regions when corporate concerns and the international superpowers have seats at the top table? Again, Planetes doesn’t go as far as offering definitive solutions; it merely draws our attention to these people’s plight. A cop-out? Perhaps. Nuanced and realistic, with room for viewers to discuss and draw their own conclusions? Definitely.
I finished watching this series during the 2024 summer Olympic Games, a decidedly Earth-bound international event that nevertheless exhibits the same triumphs and controversies depicted in Planetes: political and corporate interests encroaching in on what is supposed to be a commendable goal of celebrating human talent, courage and dedication to competing, cooperating, going faster, higher, further. Again: it might be happening on a stage that most of us will never step onto, but there’s something life-affirming and inspiring about seeing people becoming better versions of themselves.
“If you’re going to try,
go all the way.
there is no other feeling like that.
you will be alone with the gods
and the nights will flame with fire.
do it, do it, do it.
do it.”