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Odin - Potentially the worst space opera ever

By teepee_uk
10th Nov 04

I love Star Wars. I don't buy the models, have any of the films on DVD, or know the name of the person who played the third Ewok
to the left of Luke in the celebration scene at the end of ROTJ. But I love it regardless, mostly for the space battles if I'm honest. Space battles are great. They even made Babylon 5 and even the first two seasons of TNG watchable.

I love anime and manga too. So when I saw 'Odin' sitting alone in a charity shop, I knew what to do. It was all about a 'photon lightship... setting sail on its maiden voyage' and had picture of the recruits posing in bodywarmers as though they were straight out of Battle of the Planets. I owned it within a minute, and was a happy bunny all the way home.

I watched it with a friend one evening, and my joy turned to despair, very gradually. I was thrilled by the the additional bonus of 1985 style guitar led rock on the soundtrack, and was thoroughly enjoying the machismo of the young crew members (not to mention the insane amount of super-fake-technical language). I even got a brief kick out of watching their ship, the Starlight (not kidding) tear through space with the kind of phallicised penetration imagery one can only dream of.

However, mid eigties cheesieness and essay material will only save a film for so long. And the plot is so mind numbingly slow that by the end I was willing the tv to explode.
When the exposition arrives, it tends to come in long, drawn out speeches, which doesn't help much either.

Add to this some token moralising on the nature of war against an unknown enemy (who unsuprisingly turn out to be 'just like us' after one of them is shot dead) and you have a real treat. Tragically, even the battles, the saving grace of half baked sci-fi everywhere aren't up to scratch. They barely even relieve the boredom.

But the real capper is this. The ending isn't an ending at all. It's just the two main characters wondering what will happen when they reach Odin. Fantastic. There isn't even a payoff. I've watched ninety minutes of this hokey for nothing. It's called Odin, it's all about finding and getting to Odin but you never get to see Odin!

My copy of 'Odin' is about to go on Ebay.
Happy bidding and good luck!

-- teepee_uk 10th Nov 04

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Odin - Potentially the worst space opera ever

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