Recap: After the battle at Pluto, the Yamato prepares to leave the Solar System once and for all. The crew hold a line-crossing ceremony and are given the opportunity to contact friends and family for what may be the last time.
Gee’s Thoughts:
This episode might have been completely devoid of action, but it honestly may be my favorite one of the entire series so far. What separates the average space operas from the truly amazing ones is the human element. Not just the exciting space battles or exploration of new frontiers, but the men and women who experience it. This episode pretty much gives a chance to take a brief glimpse into everyone’s lives, whether it be the struggle of a grandfather seeing his children suffer on Earth, a young man who may never see his mother again, a pilot determined to survive no matter what, or any of the various crew members on the Yamato, each one of them has a reason to be here and a reason to return back to Earth. I won’t lie, I was crying manly tears at some of the moments in this episode. There were a lot of good poignant moments in between the characters’ vignettes, and it’s the surprisingly strong degree of characterization despite the huge cast, that makes Yamato 2199 one of the highlights of the season for me.
I suppose in the end, there isn’t much more to say about this episode, from a certain standpoint, the episode is basically 22 minutes of character development. But is that really such a bad thing? The next episode’s preview shows that the Yamato’s crew have little time to rest and are going to be thrown into the fire yet again. In fact, it seems as if though much of the time spent on the Yamato will be a desperate struggle for survival against overwhelming odds. If things truly are so grim for the crew of the Yamato, I think they deserve a bit of respite before entering the fray again.
The Glorio Blog 
“Manly Tears”. I’ll be using that. 😀 If this episode made it for you, you’ll love episode 9 which is almost totally focused on Analyzer and, in a subliminal way, Sanada, and episodes 11 and 12 where, aside a small dogfight and a flashback to the first battle with the Garmillas, it’ll be almost all about the characters, especially Shima, who gets a bit of bad news (epically bad). And episode 14…well, that’s just plain nuts. In a good way. 😀 After that, the big action set pieces will roll, with only a brief breather with another character driven episode in 17. But i must say, this show, even when it slows its pace way down, it is never, and i mean NEVER, boring. Best remake in the history of remakes. It must also be noted that though they’ve stuck pretty close to the events of the original, so far, from this point on, though some original plot points and the major set pieces (battle of Balun and the Rainbow Star Cluster) are still a part of the story, most of it will be radically different from the original.
Hey hey, no need to go spilling all the secrets so early, I like the surprises! I’m hooked on the show so I look forward to what the future brings for the Yamato.