Voices of a Distant Star
Encyclopedia
is a Japanese anime
OVA
by Makoto Shinkai
. It chronicles a long-distance relationship
between two close friends who communicate by sending emails via their mobile phones across interstellar space. It was originally released to DVD on February 2, 2002, and has since been broadcast across Japan on the anime satellite television
network, Animax
.
in a war against a group of aliens
called the Tarsians, named after the Martian region (Tharsis
) where they were first encountered. As a Special Agent, Mikako pilots a Tracer, a giant robotic mecha
as part of a fighting squadron attached to the spacecraft carrier Lysithea.
When the Lysithea leaves Earth to search for the Tarsians with Mikako on board, Mikako's friend Noboru Terao remains behind. The two continue to communicate across interplanetary, and eventually interstellar space via the email
facilities on their mobile phones.
As the Lysithea travels deeper into space, the emails take increasingly longer to reach Noboru on Earth, and the time-lag of their correspondence eventually spans years.
The narrative begins in 2047. Mikako is apparently alone in a hauntingly empty city, trying to contact people through her cell phone. She finally says, in an empty classroom with stacked chairs, "Noboru? I'm going home, okay?", a rhetorical question which is answered with a busy line on her cell phone. Then she wakes up to discover that she is in her Tracer orbiting an alien gas giant
. She then goes to a moon or planet in the background, the fictional 4th world of Sirius
System, Agartha.
In the middle of the anime proper, she sends an email to Noboru (which shows the date 2047-09-16), with the subject "I am here", saying "to the 24 year old Noboru, from the 15 year old Mikako" which would only reach him 8 years, 224 days and 18 hours later, and just hopes it reaches him. Some flashes of imagery, perhaps indicative of memory, a hallucination, or even a mystical encounter, are then shown. It is a morphing character that looks like a younger Mikako. While they're speaking however, that character morphs into a Tarsian and then into an older version of herself. The same room where she woke up in the beginning of the animation is presented again, with the same ambience, but this time she is squatting in the corner, sobbing and pleading with her doppelganger
to let her see Noboru just one more time to be able to say "I love you" to him.
The other being says "It will be all right. You will see him again". The ship's alarm starts warning her that the Tarsians are suddenly coming from everywhere. Mikako cries even more, yelling "I don't understand!". A climactic battle ensues. Meanwhile, back on Earth, Noboru receives the message, albeit almost 9 years in the future. A voice-over dialogue commences between the two of them which functions as a synchronous soliloquy
on the same subject. Meanwhile, back at Agartha, three of the four carriers equipped with the warp engines which brought the expeditionary force to Sirius have been destroyed. The Lysithea is still intact after Mikako joins the fight and stops its destruction. After winning the battle, Mikako lets her damaged Tracer drift in space.
. Makoto and his wife, Miko provided the voice acting for the working dub (A second Japanese dub was later created for the DVD release with professional voice actors). Makoto's friend Tenmon
, who had worked with Makoto at his video game company, provided the soundtrack. Shinkai cited Dracula
and Laputa
as inspirations to make Voices.
network, Animax
.
In July 2002, ADV Films announced that they had licensed Voices of a Distant Star for U.S.
distribution and would release the 30-minute short. The finished DVD premiered in May 2003 at Project A-Kon
in Dallas, Texas
. The DVD version also includes Shinkai's earlier work, She and Her Cat
.
and all song lyrics written by K. JUNO
.
serialization
based on the series in Afternoon magazine from Kodansha
in Japan. It was run monthly from February 2004 to December 2004. The story of the manga begins at the same point as the start of the anime and carries the story a little bit beyond the anime itself. Makoto Shinkai wrote the manga, with illustration work done by Mizu Sahara
. The manga was translated into English by Tokyopop
.
's Top 100 DVD Films list. It has also won the Animation Kobe
in 2002 for packaging.
Anime News Network
's Jonathan Mays criticises the dubbing of the film by Steven Foster. He says, "When ADV began the dubbing process, they handed the job to Steven Foster, an anime enthusiast with a reputation for adapting (instead of translating) the script for a series. The trend continues here, as Foster carelessly omits critical details, completely rewrites some scenes, misinterprets emotions, and even adds new dialogue where the original track had silence". In an Anime News Network
interview, Steven Foster defends his decision to change the script saying, "we made some changes to make the jokes more accessible". THEM Anime Review's Carlos Ross commends the film's quality despite having a small budget, saying "The voice-acting is remarkable, the directing is solid, and music is quite competent. But the real kicker here is the animation quality, which actually equals (and sometimes exceeds) that of excellent television series like Vandread
and Full Metal Panic. I can think of many big-money productions that can only hope to be half as good. And for how short this anime is, there is a remarkable amount of storyline; the plot is well-written and executed, and never gets a chance to be too drawn out. And Shinkai gives equal time to the slick action sequences and the well-handled, genuinely touching romance". IGN
's A.E. Sparrow criticises the film by saying "While [the film] was visually one of the best pieces of eye-candy I have seen in a year or so, it's ultimately a voice track over a sequence of pretty pictures. Don't get me wrong, it was absolutely beautiful, but it left me wanting more". Mania's Chris Beveridge commends ADV Films's use of the video, saying "ADV managed to score very big with this release in terms of source materials by getting the actual original hard drive files that were used to create it. Quite simply, you cannot get any better than that. Working with that, the transfer here is simply gorgeous. Colors are amazingly lush and deep, saturated without bleeding. Cross coloration is non-existent and only a few very minor areas of aliasing occur. The only real “flaw” that I could see with this transfer is during some of the panning sequences up and down, there’s a slight stutter that’s simply inherent in the materials". DVDs Worth Watching's Johanna Draper Carlson criticises the art, saying "the character designs are familiar and uninspired, and the cross-cutting choppy". DVD Verdict
's Rob Lineberger commends the music, saying "the simple score infuses the animation with meaning. Solitary piano notes are sluggish, as though the pianist lacked the enthusiasm needed to pick up his fingers. When the action kicks in, it arrives with a sonic punch from 5.1 speakers. Rockets scream around you, birds move overhead, engines thrum quietly in your wake. The soundtrack does what it is supposed to do: transport you to another world".
IGN
's A.E. Sparrow commends the manga for "a healthy amount of additional storylines, characters and dialogue have been added to this manga" compared to the film. He further comments that manga artist
"Mizu Sahara's artwork brings a bit of clarity to scenes that might have come off as muddled in the anime". Anime News Network
's Theron Martin commends the manga for having a "strong storytelling which carries good emotional appeal, fleshes out the original anime" but her criticises it for the unimpressive artistry and "unnecessarily adds on to the ending". He comments on Sahara's artwork saying "Character designs were not Shinkai's strong point, and Sahara's are only a slight improvement. Her take on Mikako makes her look a lot taller and at least a couple of years older, while Noboru looks more or less the same but with sharper lines. There's also inconsistency in the shading for the hair of the two leads, especially for Mikako, and some of the shading in other places obscures actions more than it should. Background art, where present, is decent but unremarkable, as are designs for side characters". Manga Worth Reading's Johanna Draper Carlson commends the manga's art saying "the art is denser than in many manga, with toned backgrounds anchoring the drawn world. Faces are often in shadow, suggesting separation and loss. Wordless flashbacks capture everyday moments, such as kids taking shelter from a sudden shower. There’s nothing particularly special about those incidents; their significance is only in their absence, something never to be shared again and remembered more powerfully for that". Pop Culture Shock's Melinda Beasi commends Sahana's art saying, "the manga is absolutely beautiful. The art is nicely detailed and very expressive, and the panel layouts, including the placement and style of dialogue and narrative text, make the story visually interesting and easy to follow". She also comments that "Sahara also spends more time exploring both Mikako’s and Noboru’s feelings about Mikako’s appointment to the Lysithea, which is very revealing for both characters".
Anime
is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....
OVA
Original video animation
, abbreviated as media , are animated films and series made specially for release in home-video formats. The term originated in relation to Japanese animation...
by Makoto Shinkai
Makoto Shinkai
, better known by the stage name , is a Japanese anime director, animator, and voice actor. A native of the Koumi Nagano Prefecture in Japan, he studied Japanese literature at Chuo University. He traces his passion for creation to the manga, anime, and novels he was exposed to while in middle...
. It chronicles a long-distance relationship
Long-distance relationship
A long-distance relationship is typically an intimate relationship that takes place when the partners are separated by a considerable distance....
between two close friends who communicate by sending emails via their mobile phones across interstellar space. It was originally released to DVD on February 2, 2002, and has since been broadcast across Japan on the anime satellite television
Satellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...
network, Animax
Animax
is a Japanese anime satellite television network, dedicated to broadcasting anime programming. A subsidiary of Japanese media conglomerate Sony, it is headquartered in in Minato, Tokyo, Japan, with its co-founders and shareholders including Sony Pictures Entertainment and the noted anime studios...
.
Plot
A middle-school girl named Mikako Nagamine is recruited to the UN Space ArmyU.N. Spacy
The U.N. Spacy is the fictional military arm of the Earth U.N. Government from the Japanese anime series Macross.-Fictional Organization Background:...
in a war against a group of aliens
Extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
called the Tarsians, named after the Martian region (Tharsis
Tharsis
The Tharsis region on Mars is a vast volcanic plateau centered near the equator in Mars’ western hemisphere. The region is home to the largest volcanoes in the Solar System, including the three enormous shield volcanoes Arsia Mons, Pavonis Mons, and Ascraeus Mons, which are collectively known as...
) where they were first encountered. As a Special Agent, Mikako pilots a Tracer, a giant robotic mecha
Mecha
A mech , is a science fiction term for a large walking bipedal tank or robot, including ones on treads and animal shapes.-Characteristics:...
as part of a fighting squadron attached to the spacecraft carrier Lysithea.
When the Lysithea leaves Earth to search for the Tarsians with Mikako on board, Mikako's friend Noboru Terao remains behind. The two continue to communicate across interplanetary, and eventually interstellar space via the email
Email
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
facilities on their mobile phones.
As the Lysithea travels deeper into space, the emails take increasingly longer to reach Noboru on Earth, and the time-lag of their correspondence eventually spans years.
The narrative begins in 2047. Mikako is apparently alone in a hauntingly empty city, trying to contact people through her cell phone. She finally says, in an empty classroom with stacked chairs, "Noboru? I'm going home, okay?", a rhetorical question which is answered with a busy line on her cell phone. Then she wakes up to discover that she is in her Tracer orbiting an alien gas giant
Gas giant
A gas giant is a large planet that is not primarily composed of rock or other solid matter. There are four gas giants in the Solar System: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune...
. She then goes to a moon or planet in the background, the fictional 4th world of Sirius
Sirius
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, it is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. The name "Sirius" is derived from the Ancient Greek: Seirios . The star has the Bayer designation Alpha Canis Majoris...
System, Agartha.
In the middle of the anime proper, she sends an email to Noboru (which shows the date 2047-09-16), with the subject "I am here", saying "to the 24 year old Noboru, from the 15 year old Mikako" which would only reach him 8 years, 224 days and 18 hours later, and just hopes it reaches him. Some flashes of imagery, perhaps indicative of memory, a hallucination, or even a mystical encounter, are then shown. It is a morphing character that looks like a younger Mikako. While they're speaking however, that character morphs into a Tarsian and then into an older version of herself. The same room where she woke up in the beginning of the animation is presented again, with the same ambience, but this time she is squatting in the corner, sobbing and pleading with her doppelganger
Doppelgänger
In fiction and folklore, a doppelgänger is a paranormal double of a living person, typically representing evil or misfortune...
to let her see Noboru just one more time to be able to say "I love you" to him.
The other being says "It will be all right. You will see him again". The ship's alarm starts warning her that the Tarsians are suddenly coming from everywhere. Mikako cries even more, yelling "I don't understand!". A climactic battle ensues. Meanwhile, back on Earth, Noboru receives the message, albeit almost 9 years in the future. A voice-over dialogue commences between the two of them which functions as a synchronous soliloquy
Soliloquy
A soliloquy is a device often used in drama whereby a character relates his or her thoughts and feelings to him/herself and to the audience without addressing any of the other characters, and is delivered often when they are alone or think they are alone. Soliloquy is distinct from monologue and...
on the same subject. Meanwhile, back at Agartha, three of the four carriers equipped with the warp engines which brought the expeditionary force to Sirius have been destroyed. The Lysithea is still intact after Mikako joins the fight and stops its destruction. After winning the battle, Mikako lets her damaged Tracer drift in space.
Production
Voices of a Distant Star was written, directed and produced entirely by Makoto on his Power Mac G4Power Mac G4
The Power Mac G4 was a series of personal computers that was designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple between 1999 and 2004. They used the PowerPC G4 series of microprocessors. They were heralded by Apple to be the first personal supercomputers, reaching speeds of 4 to 20 Gigaflops...
. Makoto and his wife, Miko provided the voice acting for the working dub (A second Japanese dub was later created for the DVD release with professional voice actors). Makoto's friend Tenmon
Tenmon (composer)
, born , is a Japanese music composer from Tokyo, Japan born in 1971. He worked in the Nihon Falcom Corporation as one of the members of Falcom Sound Team J.D.K.. During his time with Falcom, he has composed much music for Falcom games, most notably Brandish....
, who had worked with Makoto at his video game company, provided the soundtrack. Shinkai cited Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...
and Laputa
Castle in the Sky
All compositions by Joe Hisaishi.#"The Girl Who Fell from the Sky" – 2:27#"Morning in Slag Ravine" – 3:04#"A Fun Brawl " – 4:27#"Memories of Gondoa" – 2:46#"Discouraged Pazu" – 1:46#"Robot Soldier " – 2:34...
as inspirations to make Voices.
- Noboru Terao
- Mikako Nagamine
- Operator of the Lysithea Voiced by: Donna BurkeDonna BurkeDonna Burke, a singer, narrator, and entrepreneur, was born in Perth, Australia, and moved to Tokyo, Japan in 1996. She lives with her guitarist and husband Bill Benfield and her three cats....
in both Japanese and English Versions
OVA
The single disc OVA was released on February 2, 2002. It was later broadcast across Japan on the anime satellite televisionSatellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...
network, Animax
Animax
is a Japanese anime satellite television network, dedicated to broadcasting anime programming. A subsidiary of Japanese media conglomerate Sony, it is headquartered in in Minato, Tokyo, Japan, with its co-founders and shareholders including Sony Pictures Entertainment and the noted anime studios...
.
In July 2002, ADV Films announced that they had licensed Voices of a Distant Star for U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
distribution and would release the 30-minute short. The finished DVD premiered in May 2003 at Project A-Kon
Project A-Kon
A-Kon, formerly known as Project: A-Kon, is a three day anime convention held annually in Dallas, Texas usually on the last weekend of May. First held in 1990 with just 380 people in attendance, A-Kon is North America's longest running national anime convention.-Departments:A-Kon consists of...
in Dallas, Texas
Dallas, Texas
Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the ninth-largest in the United States. The Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is the largest metropolitan area in the South and fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
. The DVD version also includes Shinkai's earlier work, She and Her Cat
She and Her Cat
, subtitled Their standing points, is an independent five minute anime OVA about the relationship between a male cat and his female owner told from the cat's perspective. It was created mostly by Makoto Shinkai, except the soundtrack, which was done by his friend Tenmon. She and Her Cat is also the...
.
CD
A CD soundtrack was released for the OVA, with music by TenmonTenmon (composer)
, born , is a Japanese music composer from Tokyo, Japan born in 1971. He worked in the Nihon Falcom Corporation as one of the members of Falcom Sound Team J.D.K.. During his time with Falcom, he has composed much music for Falcom games, most notably Brandish....
and all song lyrics written by K. JUNO
K. JUNO
K. Juno is a female rock singer/songwriter from Japan, mainly singing in English. There are many collaborative works with other artists as well as her solo works...
.
Manga
There was a mangaManga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
serialization
Serialization
In computer science, in the context of data storage and transmission, serialization is the process of converting a data structure or object state into a format that can be stored and "resurrected" later in the same or another computer environment...
based on the series in Afternoon magazine from Kodansha
Kodansha
, the largest Japanese publisher, produces the manga magazines Nakayoshi, Afternoon, Evening, and Weekly Shonen Magazine, as well as more literary magazines such as Gunzō, Shūkan Gendai, and the Japanese dictionary Nihongo Daijiten. The company has its headquarters in Bunkyō, Tokyo...
in Japan. It was run monthly from February 2004 to December 2004. The story of the manga begins at the same point as the start of the anime and carries the story a little bit beyond the anime itself. Makoto Shinkai wrote the manga, with illustration work done by Mizu Sahara
Sumomo Yumeka
is the pseudonym of a Japanese manga artist, who also writes as and . She writes in a variety of demographics, publishing yaoi manga as Sumomo Yumeka, seinen manga as Mizu Sahara, and shōjo manga as Sahara Keita...
. The manga was translated into English by Tokyopop
Tokyopop
Tokyopop, styled TOKYOPOP, and formerly known as Mixx, is a distributor, licensor, and publisher of anime, manga, manhwa, and Western manga-style works. The existing German publishing division produces German translations of licensed Japanese properties and original English-language manga, as well...
.
Reception
Voices of A Distant Star film was listed 100th on DVD VerdictDVD Verdict
DVD Verdict is a judicial themed website for DVD reviews. The site was founded in 1999. Current editor in chief is Michael Stailey, who also reviews for Rotten Tomatoes...
's Top 100 DVD Films list. It has also won the Animation Kobe
Animation Kobe
The is an event created by Kobe city in 1996, to promote anime and other visual media. In the event, the are awarded annually by Kobe and the Organizing Committee of the event, to creators and creations.-Event:...
in 2002 for packaging.
Anime News Network
Anime News Network
Anime News Network is an anime industry news website that reports on the status of anime, manga, Japanese popular music and other otaku-related culture within North America, Australia and Japan. Additionally, it sometimes features similar happenings throughout the Anglosphere and elsewhere in the...
's Jonathan Mays criticises the dubbing of the film by Steven Foster. He says, "When ADV began the dubbing process, they handed the job to Steven Foster, an anime enthusiast with a reputation for adapting (instead of translating) the script for a series. The trend continues here, as Foster carelessly omits critical details, completely rewrites some scenes, misinterprets emotions, and even adds new dialogue where the original track had silence". In an Anime News Network
Anime News Network
Anime News Network is an anime industry news website that reports on the status of anime, manga, Japanese popular music and other otaku-related culture within North America, Australia and Japan. Additionally, it sometimes features similar happenings throughout the Anglosphere and elsewhere in the...
interview, Steven Foster defends his decision to change the script saying, "we made some changes to make the jokes more accessible". THEM Anime Review's Carlos Ross commends the film's quality despite having a small budget, saying "The voice-acting is remarkable, the directing is solid, and music is quite competent. But the real kicker here is the animation quality, which actually equals (and sometimes exceeds) that of excellent television series like Vandread
Vandread
is a Japanese anime series directed by Takeshi Mori and created by Gonzo and Media Factory animation studios. It also utilizes well-animated characters and cleanly rendered CG action sequences....
and Full Metal Panic. I can think of many big-money productions that can only hope to be half as good. And for how short this anime is, there is a remarkable amount of storyline; the plot is well-written and executed, and never gets a chance to be too drawn out. And Shinkai gives equal time to the slick action sequences and the well-handled, genuinely touching romance". IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
's A.E. Sparrow criticises the film by saying "While [the film] was visually one of the best pieces of eye-candy I have seen in a year or so, it's ultimately a voice track over a sequence of pretty pictures. Don't get me wrong, it was absolutely beautiful, but it left me wanting more". Mania's Chris Beveridge commends ADV Films's use of the video, saying "ADV managed to score very big with this release in terms of source materials by getting the actual original hard drive files that were used to create it. Quite simply, you cannot get any better than that. Working with that, the transfer here is simply gorgeous. Colors are amazingly lush and deep, saturated without bleeding. Cross coloration is non-existent and only a few very minor areas of aliasing occur. The only real “flaw” that I could see with this transfer is during some of the panning sequences up and down, there’s a slight stutter that’s simply inherent in the materials". DVDs Worth Watching's Johanna Draper Carlson criticises the art, saying "the character designs are familiar and uninspired, and the cross-cutting choppy". DVD Verdict
DVD Verdict
DVD Verdict is a judicial themed website for DVD reviews. The site was founded in 1999. Current editor in chief is Michael Stailey, who also reviews for Rotten Tomatoes...
's Rob Lineberger commends the music, saying "the simple score infuses the animation with meaning. Solitary piano notes are sluggish, as though the pianist lacked the enthusiasm needed to pick up his fingers. When the action kicks in, it arrives with a sonic punch from 5.1 speakers. Rockets scream around you, birds move overhead, engines thrum quietly in your wake. The soundtrack does what it is supposed to do: transport you to another world".
IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
's A.E. Sparrow commends the manga for "a healthy amount of additional storylines, characters and dialogue have been added to this manga" compared to the film. He further comments that manga artist
Mangaka
is the Japanese word for a comic artist or cartoonist. Outside of Japan, manga usually refers to a Japanese comic book and mangaka refers to the author of the manga, who is usually Japanese...
"Mizu Sahara's artwork brings a bit of clarity to scenes that might have come off as muddled in the anime". Anime News Network
Anime News Network
Anime News Network is an anime industry news website that reports on the status of anime, manga, Japanese popular music and other otaku-related culture within North America, Australia and Japan. Additionally, it sometimes features similar happenings throughout the Anglosphere and elsewhere in the...
's Theron Martin commends the manga for having a "strong storytelling which carries good emotional appeal, fleshes out the original anime" but her criticises it for the unimpressive artistry and "unnecessarily adds on to the ending". He comments on Sahara's artwork saying "Character designs were not Shinkai's strong point, and Sahara's are only a slight improvement. Her take on Mikako makes her look a lot taller and at least a couple of years older, while Noboru looks more or less the same but with sharper lines. There's also inconsistency in the shading for the hair of the two leads, especially for Mikako, and some of the shading in other places obscures actions more than it should. Background art, where present, is decent but unremarkable, as are designs for side characters". Manga Worth Reading's Johanna Draper Carlson commends the manga's art saying "the art is denser than in many manga, with toned backgrounds anchoring the drawn world. Faces are often in shadow, suggesting separation and loss. Wordless flashbacks capture everyday moments, such as kids taking shelter from a sudden shower. There’s nothing particularly special about those incidents; their significance is only in their absence, something never to be shared again and remembered more powerfully for that". Pop Culture Shock's Melinda Beasi commends Sahana's art saying, "the manga is absolutely beautiful. The art is nicely detailed and very expressive, and the panel layouts, including the placement and style of dialogue and narrative text, make the story visually interesting and easy to follow". She also comments that "Sahara also spends more time exploring both Mikako’s and Noboru’s feelings about Mikako’s appointment to the Lysithea, which is very revealing for both characters".