With the success of the first privately owned and created orbital spacecraft it looks like the unattainable dreams of commercial passenger spaceflight might not be such unattainable dreams for much longer! Even now, as a certain millionaire stargazer plots to build the world’s first passenger orbital spaceship (now no longer resembling original designs for said ship from years past) it’s time to start looking ahead to a time when we can buy a ticket to ride into the first touches of space surrounding our home world… and it’s also time to start worrying like nobody’s business!
Time to get the large alarm clocks out and wake up the TV slash Print Media to the ills of travelling in orbit without first cleaning the space up of the 10001 little deadly pieces of trash (“debris”) that can slash a ship open, exposing it’s passengers to the cold vaccum of space, and throwing them out headlong into said vaccum before they can say “AFLAC!!”(!)
Now that millionaires are dreaming of making a new fortune selling the dream of visiting outer space to the common folk, something that so far has only been available to millionaires who can write a big enough check c/o the Russian Space Agency, it’s time to start worrying about space debris.
That means it’s time, once again, to talk about the series that talks about the ills of space debris… more or less. That series being Planetes, and this (it’s second volume).

Oh, before we begin…
WARNING! The following review may contain things known as “spoilers”. Things that may reveal aspects of the Anime that has yet to occur (if you are where I am now in watching it). If you don’t feel comfortable reading on then don’t… if you do read on? Well, I warned you. Ok. I said my peace, moving on.

Despite the fact that this is about cleaning space one piece of debris at a time this volume has little to do with space debris. It seems that this time out it’s about Hackimaki’s dream to become part of the mission to Jupiter (the planet with the gases needed to make long range interstellar spacetravel possible), so much so that the story either revolves around his work to get into the mission or his father’s work to get away from the mission, or fight those Defense League terrorists, or something. Oh, and this is also the first appearance of Tanabe in the manga. Oh, Hachimaki’s father? He’s only been mentioned briefly in DVD Vol. 1 and Manga Vol. 1 but we haven’t seen him in any major capacity… yet. Now we get to see him, and he lives up to expectations… I guess.
Oh, and it looks like the guy Hachimaki admires (the inventor of the new drive engine that’ll be used for the trip to Jupiter), he who is also looking for Hachimaki’s father at the start of the second manga, is not above snuffing out hundreds of innocent lives in testing his engine. Oh, yes, he does that when his engine, well, explodes and kills hundreds who were working on it. Yeah, nice guy.

Let’s see… Tanabe premieres and we relive part of Episode 3 in her premiere.
Then we have a few Azumanga Daioh type four panel strips. Then the Defense jerks from last volume return and cause trouble. Another appearance of the father figure, Tanabe freaks everyone out, then some more stuff and it ends. Can’t say too much because of spoilers, but you can read it all yourself. Let’s just say very little space debris was picked up this volume, and next volume should have a certain character leaving the Half Section for good (and it’s only in it’s 3rd volume)! But then again I did warn about spoilers so you can’t say I didn’t warn you. Now the breakdown.

Planetes Breakdown the 2nd
What’s Hot?
It’s still a solid read, and I still recommend it. This is something worth owning as a series, in both manga (TOKYOPOP) and anime (BANDAI). It’s nicely written and nicely drawn, and overall a good egg of a series… only without the high cholestrol.

What’s Not?
I kind of don’t like how this is so disconnected (such a different beast of a title) from it’s Anime counterpart. This seems to rush forward quickly while the Anime has a more gradual roll along in it’s story. You don’t get rushed to Hachimaki wanting to go to Jupiter so fast in the Anime, and you get more time to get to know everyone more there than in the manga which has abit of a rushed feel to it at this point.
That and I feel the manga is “saying” more than I probably need to know at this point of my reviews of the Anime.

Moments to Remember?
Last time out the Defense League losers showed up they got into the face of lifetime TRUTH.com enemy slash eternal smoker Fee, now they go and get into Hachimaki’s face. However unlike Fee this time out Hachimaki gets the chance to snuff his Defense League problem the easy way, but will he? Guess not since peacenik and love lover Tanabe has to butt in and stop him. How does she stop him? Let’s just say she does it in a way that shocks Hachimaki, nearly gives Hachi’s dad a seizure, and freaks out the Defense League dude at the same time. Hmm… looks like he’s been psychologically scarred for life by Tanabe’s actions, especially since he seemingly gives up his “evil ways”. Thanks, Tanabe, you truly showed that you can cause psychological harm to others through the use of your heart! Way to go!

What to Ignore?
Me. It’s not like Tanabe crippled Hachi or something vile, you know! And while I’m at it she didn’t strip naked nor did she knee him in the groin! Hmm… it still gave them such a shocked look though!

Overall?
You’ve heard the hype, including the hype from me personally, but now you know the facts.
Still solid, still good, still recommended. If you are looking for quality sci-fi then here you go.
Try it out, I’m sure you’ll find it good.