Last Exile is a showcase of the best of what modern TV anime has to offer. © Geneon/Pioneer Ent.

Last Exile. V.1, First Move. V.2, Positional Play. V.3, Discovered Attack. V.4, Breakthrough. V.5, Grand Stream. V.6, Queen Delphine. V.7, Sealed Move.
TV series (26 episodes), 2003. Director: Kouichi Chigira. V.1-5, four episodes/100 minutes; v.6-7, three episodes/75 minutes. Price & format: DVD bilingual $29.98. Distributor: Geneon/Pioneer Entertainment.

A couple of anime studios are contending for the title of most cutting-edge/technically advanced in Japan. Gonzo Digimation is one of these, and Last Exile (26 episodes, broadcast April 8 through Sept. 30, 2003) was designed to be its 10th anniversary showpiece. It features top-quality direction by Kouichi Chigira, top-quality character designs by Range Murata, top-quality music... well, just go down the whole credits list. The Gonzo studio in general is credited with the story. The concept and look are definitely inspired by Miyazaki’s Laputa: The Castle in the Sky, but the plot is wholly original. A fantasy world with a 19th century German and Russian appearance is divided into the two powerful empires of Anatoray and Disith, which have been locked for centuries in ritualized warfare refereed by a stately Guild (roughly a cross between the Catholic Church and the League of Nations). Battles take place between fleets of giant Jules-Vernean aerial battleships commanded by the nobility.

The commoners occupy a role similar to that in the real 19th century except that there is also a guild of couriers that make speedy deliveries in two-man aerial vanships. A wild card is the enigmatic Captain Nemo-like Alex Row with his unbeatable battleship, the Silvana (also comparable to the pirate airship and crew in The Castle in the Sky, though more dramatic), manned by a rowdy but skilled international crew personally loyal to him.

Claus Valca and Lavie Head are two young teens who inherited Claus’ father’s vanship and position in the Vanship Union of couriers. They accept a risky assignment to deliver a message to the commander of the Anatoray fleet on his flagship on the eve of an aerial battle. Anatoray is winning when the Disith fleet begins a new attack in a manner flouting the pre-agreed conventions of chivalry, apparently with the connivance of the Guild.

Claus and Lavie are asked by a dying vanship courier to complete his mission for him, which brings them under attack by a completely unknown type of high-tech fighter craft (Anatoray’s, Disith’s, the Guild’s, or that of an unsuspected new power?). This forces them into an unwanted sanctuary aboard the Silvana where they become inadvertent recruits into Alex Row’s mysterious intrusion into this world’s politics.

Last Exile starts out with an intelligent plot, which introduces surprises and adds new characters in almost every episode. The characters are sympathetic and the dialogue is witty. The world with its complex “steampunk” look of 19th century sci-fi illustrations is fascinating. Most animated theatrical features are not this good, in either animation or story quality.