Sunday 17 March 2013

Space Brothers - Episode 49

An epic trek across the desert continues for our astronaut candidates as their survival training gets well under way - will all of the characters we've come to know and love make it through this particular ordeal, and will the attempt to engender competition between the various countries represented have the effect that Bold assumes it will?

As we reach the end of the first day Team E, led by Kenji, are relived to find their food supply and all ready to pitch tents for a good night's sleep - whether this is a wise move is soon thrown into question by their overseers, who not only inform them that they're currently in last place, but that one of their number (excluding the current leader) has to take a penalty of some kind for their tardiness.  Fast-forward a couple of days and things really aren't looking much better - Team E are lacking behind the others, and their tiredness and low morale is only making things worse, leaving them needing ever-more frequent breaks.


It's only when Nitta steps up to take the leader's position that things begin to change - he might be very much the taskmaster of the group, but his insistence that the team pushes on relentlessly sees them move up to fourth place while catching on the others.  It's news that puts a spring back into the group's step, and Mutta takes the reigns with a similar determination to continue what Nitta started... but is the man who engendered this sense of progress and determination about to undo all of this hard work for the team?

Having expected more conflict and argument as this element of the group's training progressed, this week's Space Brothers was quite good at fostering my expectations then subverting them, turning what looked like Mutta losing his temper into anything but.  Ultimately though, our cliffhanger comes from Nitta and his current personal situation, and it's this which will drive the next installment - I have to admit, I'm curious as to where exactly it's going to go and what the fallout from it might be as we reach the big fifty episode mark for the series.

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