Knights of Sidonia - Episode 2

As first sorties go, you can't get much worse luck than Tanikaze, as our protagonist faces the appearance of the Gauna in the midst of the mission - their first appearance in the vicinity of Sidonia for a century.

Badly injured and seemingly dead, even this seems to be a better stroke of luck than squad-mate Yamano, who is introduced to us via a few flashbacks before... well, she gets eaten.  With things rapidly turning south, the powers that be have no choice but to take drastic measures to keep the Gauna at bay, no matter what that might mean for the well-being of those still on the ground.  Somehow, Tanikaze manages to revive out of nowhere to launch his own attack on the Gauna before being lifted to safety by his escaping teammates.

Understandably given the circumstances, Tanikaze finds the aftermath of this incident difficult to cope with - he can't eat, and anything that provokes thought of the Gauna attack leaves vomiting or worse.  With the Gauna having recovered from its temporary incapacitation, it's going to take some of Sidonia's finest to put paid to the terror it could unleash... is Tanikaze one of the individuals best suited for the job, or is he going to be too busy fending off the attention of an ever-growing number of females?

Much like its first episode, this instalment of Knights of Sidonia is an odd one to sum up - its world-building is fascinating, even if a lot of the facts about said world are thrown out apropos of nothing, but its story-telling is disjointed and flits around in a frustrating fashion.  Throw in the weird way in which the show is setting Tanikaze up as some kind of harem comedy lead at times and it feels like the show is turning its focus in all the wrong directions.  There's clearly a great series fighting to get out here, but between the narrative frustrations and the struggles of the show's CG to look anything other than terrible a lot of the time it's a fight that it's currently losing.