We continue across the sea of stars, where Gee and Iro watch the seminal 1988-1997 Legend of the Galactic Heroes OVA a few episodes at a time. Keep an eye out for this podcast between main installments of The GLORIO Chat as we work our way through the history books.
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Opening Song: Sea of Stars
Interlude Song: Fourth Battle of Tiamat (Bolero composed by Maurice Ravel)
Ending Song: Crossing the Bridge of Light (Orchestral Version)
Show Notes
This installment covers episodes:
- 99. The Approach Run toward the Future
- 100. Long Live the Empress (Hoffe Kaiserin)
- 101. An Invitation to War
04:09 – Episode 99
05:00 – If only Reuenthal were here
07:40 – How the present influences the future
11:20 – New Papa Mittermeyer
15:25 – Sex Politics in the Empire
19:00 – Earth Cult still at it
21:07 – Bungling Poet and the Child Kaiser
28:30 – Meanwhile, at Iserlohn
30:50 – Happy New Year!
33:50 – Episode 100
36:10 – Mittermeyer’s future
38:45 – How much power should the Empress have?
42:45 – Annerose is here!
47:50 – The Wedding!
50:40 – Oberstein don’t give a fuck
56:25 – Hilda’s role going forward
57:47 – Earth Cult and the current status quo
1:01:50 – Episode 101
1:03:15 – Food Shortages
1:05:43 – Empire’s Plans for the future
1:11:40 – Iserlohn’s Plans for the future
1:14:20 – Interpersonal relationships on Iserlohn
1:17:15 – Time to go to war
1:20:45 – Aggressive Diplomacy
1:24:55 – Time for Julian to prove himself
1:29:00 – Speculation and Housekeeping
And don’t forget that Legend of the Galactic Heroes is available for streaming on HIDIVE!
The Glorio Blog 
I think you guys missed the latter part explaining why oberstein didn’t tell anyone about his suspicions. The narrator said Oberstein wasn’t confident enough to say it out loud.
The kid kaiser dying like that brings up Reihard saying at the end of season 2 that there was no need to hunt them because they are just going to wither away. That definitely will make it into the history books made in this new era.
I’ve always liked that bit where they were discussing the mutually exclusive goals of democracy and the iserholn republic. Had former phezzan not stirred up the riots as the weaker power Iserholn might not have the opportunity to fight and be forced into playing a vassal role.
That bit where they were discussing the role of the empress got to me because I did scoff at the absurdity of it all before the narrator pointed it out.
Also Bittenfield gets the distinction of being the first empire guy to shout Hoffe Kaiserin. I definitely will try to write down the list of notable things Bittenfield managed to do in the show. It’s also interesting that the younger military officers that heard about the coming wedding were distinctly war weary. Their one overriding desire was to live in an era of peace. It seems like grillpalzer was really that power hungry he was an outlier for his generation that is tiring of war.
My read on Oberstein interrupting the wedding is that he is aware but does not care at all. His ideal Kaiser is one that prioritizes his duties over everything else 24/7. He decided that interrupting the wedding has little downsides. It is after all at best a soft power pageantry show. The bigwigs get mad at him but they already are. The common people will be happy that the wedding took place at all and the actual important thing is that the succession is secure. I believe the precedent he wanted to avoid was the Kaiser ignoring stuff. There was that Kaiser in the empire history episode that Reinhard was reading about that ignored an accident in a military base that killed a lot of people. As far as precedents go it seems like the intent was to establish that whatever the Kaiser as a private individual is doing if matters of state comes up he has to drop it in favor of that.
My what if scenario for the fpa would be what if Lapp survived the first battle. The few scenes we have of him seems to paint him as someone that is competent enough because he was advocating for the same thing Yang was saying except he got unlucky and died. He might be someone that would be more willing to risk establishing a bad precedent and make moves against the more corrupt elements of the fpa or at least actually be more active in the politics game from the military side compared to Yang. Maybe he’s the one that gets into politics so Yang has someone that has his back.
That is one of the bigger practical things that hamstrung the fpa. A large chunk of their body politic is in the military and those in their young adult and adult age ranges were disproportionately in the military. Meaning you would get a scenario where the people most likely to chafe at the status quo but if they believed in yang things then they would be constrained from voicing their opinions.
The empire what if scenario is too easy. Kircheis living through the assassination attempt would basically end the series right then and there. Reinhard gets scared straight and heals the growing rift between them forcing Oberstein to either retire or just be ignored. We just get a montage of the Empire and the FPA getting a peace treaty and maybe even Kircheis after some talking from Yang pushes Reinhard to make a constitution. For sure Reinhard would be attending the Yang wedding and vice versa. The biggest question for me would be if Kircheis and Annerose would actually marry and have kids because that’s basically creating source of strife down the road by creating another royal line.