Before we get started, let me get this out of the way: I watched the English version.  After a quick search on Google to confirm something, I learned more than what I expected.  I knew that the movie reeked of “series compressed into a movie,” and that’s exactly what happened.  What I didn’t expect was the fact that the English version cut out 45 minutes from the Japanese original.  Whether this was for the better or worse is up in the air.  I know I didn’t want to watch any more of what I did, but on the other hand those extra 45 minutes might have actually allowed the movie to make sense.

The movie starts off with the words “The Search for Odin.”  Not Photon Space Sailer Starlight.  Afterwards, it’s an awkward infodump about the advances in technology in the far future, and how we’ve created spaceships that are powered by giant sails that absorb energy from lasers.  The lasers themselves absorb energy from the sun.  Which immediately makes me ask why the giant sails don’t just directly absorb energy from the sun.

The infodump finally ends, and we cut to a bunch of teenagers acting rowdy and hopping aboard the Starlight, one of said ships.  They do this to FREAKING AWESOME HAIR METAL MUSIC.  Immediately you get the sense that this was made in the 80s.  And that’s the only reason to watch it.

Now, I know you’re expecting certain things from me based on previous reviews, but the movie was such a mess that I just didn’t take a lot of plot-relevant screencaps.  So, the bulk of the screencaps I’ll be sharing will be of images I thought would look great on the cover of a Boston album.

Okay, so this crew consists mostly of what looks like teenagers, though they’re probably more college age.  They’re also all incredibly brilliant and completely willing to ramble on a bunch of technobabble that means nothing but somehow advances the story.  Shortly after they leave… I wanna say Earth? they receive an SOS signal and immediately respond.  As we cut to the source of the SOS, we see innocent people getting caught up in the destruction… and the camera lingers on one girl in particular being carried off somewhere.

As the crew decides to test out a brand-new er, engine of some sort (I think the word “polarity” was used in the description) that should allow them to reach the source of the signal faster than anyone else, they are very briefly sidetracked by some douchebag doing flips and shit in his fighter craft.

The kid’s name is Akira, and he graduated with the rest of the crew, but wasn’t selected to be part of the project.  He requests permission to join anyway, and the captain gives him the okay if he can land in the short time before preparations to space hop are complete.  Predictably, he makes the landing.

The experimental jump works after a long, drawn out sequence involving the crew trying to handle its effects.  Think 100G training combined with Ludicrous Speed.

Akira is made chief pilot or somesuch because the last pilot collapsed during the space hop.  No need to dwell; we’ve got to keep this movie going.

Upon arrival, the crew learns that they are too late.  Well, almost.  In full defiance of logic, a single escape pod containing the only plot-relevant character is retrieved from the site.  The girl inside is alive, but unconscious.

Sadly, despite being the perfect opportunity, there is no topless scene here.

The crew soon discovers what appears to be the cause of the colony’s destruction: a Terminator.  No, not THAT Terminator.  In this case, it’s a giant mecha asteroid that scans for things around them, and, if it determines they are man-made, destroys them.  Or absorbs them.  It’s hard to keep track.

The crew shuts down their engines to hide from the Terminator’s scanners.  After some observation, they learn, somehow to their surprise, that the Terminator is NOT a natural phenomenon, but in fact quite possibly a construction of alien life forms!  YOU DON’T SAY!  Was the fact that it appeared to be sentient not a massive tip-off?

The girl they rescued, Sara Cyanbakers (I had to look this up because it literally sounds like she’s saying Sara-chan Bakers) wakes up and seems to “know things” about the interior of the Terminator, which the crew is foolishly exploring.  Although they manage to retrieve something, seven crew members die.

Now here’s the interesting and cliche part: the crew seems to have recovered a ship log, and for some reason, Sara can read it.  It also hurts her head to do so.  For some reason, she tells them to “stop it!” because, apparently, just NOT READING isn’t an option.

In the log are ominous entries like “the third planet is beautiful, but the inhabitants are slowly killing it,” and other things that make it plain to anyone that these aliens plan to wipe out humans and claim Earth as their own.  Well, everyone except anyone in this film.

Before Sara eventually collapses from reading too much, she screams one word: “Odin!”  At this point I think I missed something, because the crew also finds out that Odin is located somewhere in the Argo constellation.

Rather than wonder what it means, we are treated to some history and jump straight to THAT Odin.  Yeah, apparently, the crew comes to the conclusion that Norse legends are true, and that there was in fact a REAL Odin, only it wasn’t a person but a star.  Or a planet.  It’s confusing.

The crew, for some reason, wants to head to the star Canopis, where Odin is located.  Just then, they get orders to return to Earth.  Even though EVERYONE wants to head to Canopis, the captain has no choice but follow orders.

And so, the only sane choice is made: MUTINY!  As soon as Akira puts the idea out there, the rest of the crew thinks it’s a good idea and acts like the mindless teens they were in the beginning of the movie.  They succeed in trapping the captain and the other senior crew in the a room and take over the Starlight to head toward Canopis.

Somehow, on the way they meet with resistance from the aliens forces, which is surprising because I have NO FREAKING CLUE where they’re supposed to be when these skirmishes happen or why they happen to be so well-defended.  They manage to make it through the skirmishes because of a bunch of technobabble BS, and… The hell with it.  I’ll just post some screencaps and fast forward through to the parts I can comprehend.

So, after a bunch of bland fighting and traveling, Akira and Sara finally have a moment… to talk about their backstories.  There’s no actual romance, and for that I’m grateful.  That would have been insulting to all of us.

Akira’s father once promised him that he would take Akira to Canopis.  But he disappeared somewhere and was never seen again.  But I’m sure he’ll be back to guide Akira and the crew of the Starlight back to Earth after they blow up Andross.

The crew finally makes it to… well, a giant mechanized battlestation, maybe?  I’m not sure what the hell happened.  But they meet the aliens and it turns out they’re not robots.  Oh, and they’re hostile.  Surprise surprise.

After more uninteresting fighting, the crew learns from one of the aliens that the people of Odin built a machine to save their planet from disaster.  Kind of like Krypton, only everyone listened to Jor-El.  The only problem was that the machine they built became sentient, evolved, made slaves of the people of Odin, and decided that, since it was superior to all life forms, all life should be destroyed and turned into fuel.  Kind of like Brainiac and Amazo, only not as interesting.  Which has to be some kind of record because Brainiac and Amazo were NEVER interesting.

I forget why, but the Starlight suddenly went into a space where time doesn’t exist.  Which makes no sense, because then they wouldn’t be able to comprehend whoever was explaining the concept.  By the way, the crew seems to have an uncanny knack for always knowing exactly what’s happening to him.  And since there is no idiot on board, no one has any reason to dumb down their explanations.  Everyone just inherently understands what everyone else is saying.

I forget how they get out of that space, and I honestly don’t care.  There was a sargasso in that space and I was expecting them to see at least the wreckage of Akira’s father’s ship, but not even that.

At some point, Sara’s memories come flooding back to her and she remembers seeing visions of Odin, only she was born and raised on Earth, and she merely has some of the genetic material of the Queen of Odin, who was also named Sara, meaning her memories and her name were encoded in her DNA, which is, again, freaking stupid.

Anyway, the crew decides to destroy the rogue machine, but their weapons are useless.  Luckily, one crew member pulls out a device he’d been working on as a hobby.

As it turns out, it’s a device powerful enough to create a MENTAL BLACK HOLE.  WHICH THEN BECOMES A PHYSICAL BLACK HOLE.  His explanation makes no damn sense, but he sounds so confident that it MUST be true.  After another crew member lowers the core’s shield, in goes the black hole bomb, and the crew gets the hell out of there.

Afterwards there’s some discussion about the intention to continue to the star, or to Odin, or to find the other survivors of Odin or somesuch.  Doesn’t really matter.  This was planned to be a trilogy, but this is all we got.  And I’m perfectly OK with that.  About all it was good for was looking pretty and having EPIC 80’s HAIR METAL TUNES.  Seriously, just watch (or listen) to this:

Cheez: -5
The sad part is that it’s mostly unintentional.  There’s a load of recycled themes, out-of-place epic 80’s music, and an overabundance of special effects visuals.  The latter two are supposed to distract you from the former.  If this were actually a series and not compressed into an hour and a half, it could merely be half as good as Galaxy Express 999, a fraction the length, and just as boring.

Pleasure Rating: I Can’t Believe I Watched the Whole Thing / Must’ve Been High
Odin ranks right in between those two.  Because some of the visuals sure look like they were drawn while high.

Rewatchability: None.  Relistenability on the other hand…

Music: Flippin.  Awesome.  There are three modes: Silence, Awesome 80’s Hair Metal, and Ys Soundtrack.  You can’t go wrong.

Marketability: 0.  I’m sorry, but it’s just so damned generic.  Not only are the characters worthless and completely lacking in memorability, but the Starlight is just plain goofy.  You can’t sell that thing to anyone except as an airbrush painting on the side of a van.

Odin is objectively bad, but I can’t stay mad at it.  The soundtrack is just plain fun, and I had fun making fun of it.  But I’m not watching it again.  Hell no.

At least it made more sense than Sword for Truth.