Maetel's Journey

Maetel’s Journey

Manga Chapter 15-3

TV Episodes 109 - 110

Manga Chapter Summary:

The chapter continues where the last chapter, 15-2, “Destruction of Macaroni Au Gratin” left off. Tetsuro and Maetel are still of tiny size. Tetsuro spots another 999 flying parallel to them and within the window sees Maetel with another boy! The 999 shakes and the two of them are suddenly normal size again. Maetel wonders if the transfer control device broke, returning them to normal. While the Conductor begs Maetel to get dressed, Tetsuro quickly goes through his things and uses a binoculars to stare at the other 999. He is able to confirm that a Maetel is also riding the other 999, and a boy is with her. Tetsuro wonders if it’s a fake train, or if it is something from the past or future. The Conductor says things may have been complicated due to the warp. Maetel says she doesn’t want to see it and asks Tetsuro to lower the blinds, which he does.

The two 999s get very close to each other. The Conductor and Tetsuro head to the Locomotive, which says the other 999 is constructed the same way and is from a different time, although it doesn’t know if it’s the past or future. The Locomotive soon says they are in danger, as they will be crossing the orbit of the other train in mere seconds. The two 999s crash into each other and come to a stop. The Conductor says this isn’t good and Tetsuro has disappeared! He has in fact head onto the other 999 and approaches Maetel, who is sitting with another boy his age, who says his name is Redrill. Redrill claims they are going to the planet where he can get a free machine body. The other Maetel says hello to Tetsuro, confusing him, but the original Maetel soon comes on, and Redrill has just as shocked a reaction. The Locomotive warns the Conductor that a planet is approaching them. They won’t’ be able to escape and will be crashing on the planet.

As the 999s descend into the planet’s orbit, the two of them separate, and the 999 with the Maetels on it flies off, leaving Tetsuro with Redrill, as well as two versions of the Conductor! The Locomotive uses its gravity breaks to slow the descent. The planet they are descending to has black clouds, and Redrill says Maetel called it Phantom. The two 999s crash to the ground, into a substance that Tetsuro says is like Hijiki seaweed. Looking outside, they see a black meadow as far as the eye can see. They step out onto the grass and Tetsuro says it feels like they are on the back or belly of a black cat. Suddenly a shot rings out and goes through Tetsuro’s hat. He and Redrill hide in the grass and notice that they both possess the warrior’s gun, with the same serial number! Tetsuro sees scratches and rust on Redrill’s version that aren’t on his, so they realize Redrill is from further in the future. Tetsuro wonders if he died and his gun fell into the hands of Redrill as its new owner. Tetsuro asks him when and where he was born and Redrill says the planet Kiades of the Argol galaxy in the year 66766.

Tetsuro realizes that Redrill doesn’t recognize Andromeda and upon looking at his pass realizes his destination is different, despite having the same quest for a free mechanical body. They decide to move forward, with the oldest going first, which is the Conductors. Eventually they come across Maetel’s coat. Suddenly a voice shouts out to dispose of their weapons or they’ll be destroyed. They spot both Maetels, naked and passed out on the ground. Alien beings tell them to stop and reveal themselves. Tetsuro wonders which Maetel is which. Tetsuro and the others stick up their hands and are told to take off their clothes and go calmly. This makes the Conductors nervous, but they are ordered to do so anyway. Tetsuro and Redrill strip down to their boxer shorts. They are told they are not enemies and to go back to the train. They can take the Maetels with them. The Conductors are ordered to stay there and asked if they will take their clothes off if the others return.

Tetsuro and Redrill make it back to the 999 and worry about the Conductors. The Conductors take off their clothes, revealing their invisible selves and are permitted to put their clothes back on. The Conductors make it back to the 999 and Tetsuro gets confused on which 999 and Maetel are his. Suddenly they hear screaming. It is the Conductors from the other car, where aliens have taken a hold of the two of them. The aliens demand to be able to ride the 999 or they will kill them. The beings appear to be 2 smaller versions of the aliens encountered earlier causing Tetsuro and Redrill to wonder if they are their children. The aliens say they are boarding the 999 and Tetsuro and Redrill must get off. The aliens want to board as they believe their planet to be a savage one where those with mechanical bodies are hunted.  They continue to make threats, but then the aliens suddenly throw down the Conductors, claim they were thinking about being Conductors themselves and leave. Redrill and Tetsuro say goodbye to each other and return to their respective 999s. Both 999s take off.

The Conductor apologizes for the inconvenience and says they’ll leave the warp and return to the normal orbit. Maetel asks the Conductor what was in his mind as the aliens held them. Maetel says the humans of this planet can’t fight when they touch the heart of a person and is hurt. Tetsuro thinks it’s not as ugly as they are. He’s used to a universe where bad guys cheat each other. Maetel says it’s too kind to protect her planet from the machine then stops and realizes that she mistakenly put on the other Maetel’s clothes. She says she is both Maetels so it doesn’t matter that they have the wrong clothes. She says the clothes make it seem like the other Maetel is traveling longer than her. Her trip is very long and she doesn’t know which is the past and which is the future. The narrator explains how Tetsuro felt as if he was traveling with a phantom named Maetel. There are many illusions of Maetel and young people from various worlds.

TV Episode Summary:

This storyline is adapted across two episodes. The first episode begins with Tetsuro having a nightmare where he is now in a mechanical body, with the same face as Count Mecha, and his mother is calling out to him. Because Tetsuro and Maetel returned to normal in the previous episode, they are not small as they were at the start of the manga chapter. The Conductor announces they will accelerate by 120% to make up for the delay on the last planet. Maetel says they will be taking a warp that skips time. Within this warp they identify the other 999, as in the manga. Once Tetsuro goes on the other 999, he and Redrill argue a bit about whose 999 hit whose. We have an added scene where the two Conductors first encounter each other. We also see the Conductor meet Redrill as he and the other Conductor head to the Locomotive to have the 999s separate from each other. The regular Conductor gets mad at the other 999’s Conductor due to him leaving behind the other 999 by being on their 999 when they separate. The first episode ends when the Maetels are found and the voice tells them to stop.

In the second episode, Tetsuro and Redrill strip buck naked instead of down to their boxer shorts. We can see that Redrill has a long scar across his back just like Tetsuro. The two of them are shined in a bright green light by which the aliens can tell they are humans rather than having mechanical bodies. When they get back to the 999, Tetsuro and Redrill talk more about how they are the only thing different on board the two 999s. We get a flashback to Redrill on his home planet. He leaves his mother behind in a tent and heads to a store where there’s some bread but has no money to buy it so he steals it and flees. Redrill makes it back to the tent but his mother is already dead. The policeman coming after him shows up and is about to kill him when Maetel blasts through him. Tetsuro explains his mother’s death and we have a flashback to it (although it looks like new animation this time!) and they realize they both have the same goal of traveling to get a mechanical body for their mother’s sake. Tetsuro ponders why Maetel showed up like she did.

Maetel wakes up shortly afterwards. The aliens permit the Conductors to put their clothes back on. The aliens comment on how the Conductors are beings without a shade of darkness on them. There is more dialogue between the Conductors on trying to figure out which 999 is which. The Conductors while held by the aliens show willingness to leave the 999 instead of the boys so they can continue on their journey. The aliens realize that Tetsuro and Redrill are not mechanical humans and we see a flashback of those aliens who are mechanical being hunted (note that they call themselves humans). The mechanical aliens make it to a building where they free more of their kind, but they are also fired upon by those with organic bodies.   Tetsuro explains how their circumstances are the opposite of theirs. The aliens feel guilty of seizing the spot on the train of two kind hearted humans and leave. We have an extended goodbye between Tetsuro, Redrill and the Maetels. We also see a brief scene with the Conductor talking to the Locomotive before it takes off.  Tetsuro has some more dialogue at the end where he realizes that if Redrill is from the future, he and Maetel will separate from each other at some point.

TV Episode Cast:

Tetsuro Hoshino – Masako Nozawa

Maetel – Masako Ikeda

Conductor – Kaneta Kimotsuki

Redrill – Mie Azuma

Mechanical Car Voice – Kouji Totani (Episode 109 only)

Other Conductor – Keisuke Yamashita

Other Maetel – Ai Sakuma

Lifeform A – Chiyoko Kawashima (Episode 110 only)

Lifeform B – Yumi Nakatani (Episode 110 only)

Narrator – Hitoshi Takagi

The two lifeforms that get on the 999 are uncredited. Ai Sukuma previously appeared as Kil in episode 102. Chiyoko Kawashima has previously appeared as Claire (episode 3), Chromeria (episode 25), Santana (episodes 47 – 48), Maria (episode 67), Rei (episode 83) and Karel (episode 102). Yumi Nakatani previously appeared as a dentist (episode 67), Merusa (episode 84), a handmaiden (episodes 94 – 95) and Miets (episode 102). Kouji Totani, beyond playing the 999 Locomotive has appeared as various minor characters.

Non-Spoiler Analysis:

This is the last chapter from the manga to be adapted for the TV show and what a chapter it is! Matsumoto and the TV show producers give us one of the best storylines of the series. Due to traveling through a warp, the 999 encounters a version of itself from another time. We see Maetel and the Conductor are still on the 999, but oddly enough there is another boy there in place of Tetsuro, Redrill. We learn that Redrill has a history very similar to Tetsuro. He lives on a planet dominated by those with mechanical bodies and was poor, losing his mother to starvation. Maetel showed up just in time to save him and he started a journey with her to get a free mechanical body. His story and Tetsuro’s are so similar it’s scary! They even hold the same warrior’s gun! This forces Tetsuro to come to a powerful realization; he and Maetel are not going to be together forever. Something has happened to him in the future such that they are not traveling together any longer. Did Tetsuro get his mechanical body and roam the galaxy on his own? Did he end up dying? Both are legitimate questions to ask.

The other Maetel seems very quiet throughout the chapter and we don’t get much interaction between her and Tetsuro. I’d assume this is intentional. Whatever is going on, clearly this future Maetel knows what has happened to split her and Tetsuro up, but she isn’t saying what has caused it. We also have original Maetel at first not wanting Tetsuro to see what is on the other 999 and asking him to close the blinds. If I had to guess I’d say she wished this interaction didn’t happen at all. The interactions between the two Conductors was quite fun to see, with our regular 999’s Conductor basically acting as the senior version and bossing around or helping the somewhat less competent Conductor from the future (who should still be the same person!). The TV episode helps make things more clear by giving future Conductor and Maetel different voice actors than their usual roles.

Another thing I really liked about the storyline was we get to see a planet where the dynamic is completely flipped. Rather than those with mechanical bodies being in charge and those who have human bodies scraping to get by, those with mechanical bodies are on the run and in danger of being killed by those who still have their original bodies. Despite being creatures on an alien world, the beings are still called humans, which I found interesting. It raises another question; is the planet Phantom a future version of Earth? Or are these creatures evolved versions of what humans currently are? We have seen so many planets colonized by humans beings throughout the storyline that it is a possibility. Ultimately it’s the good heartedness of Tetsuro and Redrill that cause the creatures to give up on their quest and depart the 999 (in the TV version anyway, the original manga has it more due to the mentality of the Conductors), and I found this a good way to wrap up that part of the storyline.

Beyond the strong storyline, the manga chapter/episodes have some good imagery as well. I enjoy the warp sequence in the first episode, which is very trippy and reminds me of footage we’ll also get in the Adieu Galaxy Express 999 movie. The planet Phantom has a really interesting look to it. Also the creatures there have a really unique and interesting design. Matsumoto did a great job giving us beings that are completely otherworldly looking.

Overall this is a strong place to end the TV show’s adaption of the manga. While there are still a number of manga chapters remaining before we reach the finale, many of them are more akin to earlier storylines in the show where the 999 visits interesting new worlds, and I don’t think carry the same power as this one does at this late a point in the storyline. Starting next time I’ll be reviewing these manga-only storylines before we return to the TV show with 3 more original episodes to wrap the show up.

Spoiler Analysis

Going through this storyline through the lens of someone who has been spoiled would know that Maetel has made this journey with many boys, Tetsuro is not the first. Although depending on which storyline you are going through, the other 999 being from the future may not be correct. Maetel has brought many young men to Andromeda to have them turned into mechanical parts for the planet with the eventual goal of being used to destroy it. Tetsuro is when Maetel and Dr. Ban finally see their plan come to fruition, so there isn’t really a need for Maetel to continue to bring other young boys with her on a journey to get a free mechanical body. So it could be that Redrill is from the past. After all, the year that he was born in could be from the past, his planet may not use the same year system Tetsuro is used to. Of course this has its own problems as the gun he carries and the 999 he is on board are described to come off as if they are older versions. In the TV show ending only, Maetel is shown traveling with another boy, so even with the defeat of her mother she continues to travel with other boys as part of that continuity. While the manga ending is still a ways off, one must remember that the movie had revealed the ending a couple of years before, so Matsumoto knew when he wrote this chapter that Tetsuro was intended to by the last boy to travel with Maetel to Andromeda before she and her father would confront her mother and take her down. The other possibility to think of is it could be an alternate universe, one where Maetel and Dr. Ban don’t take down her mother and she continues on her journey with more boys.