The level to which Space Dandy ended up being forgotten by time remains shocking to me. It launched with such fanfare. Here was the director of Cowboy Bebop launching a new anime with a wide array of directorial talents that would run simultaneously abroad as it did in Japan. Yet it just kind of came and went. I thought it was incredible and loved the variety of stories it told every week, but had I just bought into the hype at the time? Maybe the historical view that it was bogged down in juvenile humour and pointless stories is the real truth? It’s been a decade since I saw it, so it’s time to return and find out if Space Dandy still is still one of my favourite anime of all time.
Episodes 1-4
I really do wish this series wasn’t so focused on juvenile humor. All the creativity in the world doesn’t matter if the punchline is just boobs. I enjoyed the first episode a lot. Felt like it showcased what I remembered about Space Dandy and why it was good. In particular I loved that the episode ended on the entire cast just dying. Really slams the concept through your head that this anime is Very Silly and Nothing Really Matters. But man, there are moments where I feel a certain level of second-hand embarrassment from it.
Even the zombie episode had some of that. Episode 4 is the one where they all become zombies and gradually everyone realizes being a zombie ain’t so bad and galactic peace is achieved. The second half of the episode is incredible and was one of the episodes I remember the most a decade later. But I hadn’t remembered the first half of the episode, which consisted of a bunch of sexy nurse jokes. It’s like unintentional cringe humor.
Episodes 5-6
There are a lot more down episodes than I remember. These 2 episodes were just kinda bland. Visually creative, sure, but content-wise I’m not really feeling it. The Dandy Becomes a Surrogate Dad episode felt off since it tried to make Dandy into something he fundamentally isn’t. Meanwhile the underwear war episode was…well, it had one good joke where they have the pre-peace talks on heart-shaped beds, but the rest was bland and felt like they designed an entire episode to get Dandy on a surfboard, which wasn’t worth the wait.
Episodes 7-9
That’s better. The Redline-esque episode was entertaining, but what really made it was how utterly deranged and out there it got at the end, with Dandy travelling through time to find a giant buddha statue of himself and then ending the episode right there. No explanation, that’s just what happens when you race faster than the speed of light baby. Apparently it was storyboarded by Goro Taniguchi, the Code Geass guy, which is especially funny.
Then there was the utterly bizarre plant episode, which fell right out of the strangest parts of Kaiba (the director of this did go on to found Science Saru alongside Yuasa). I can’t imagine there will be a weirder episode than this. There’s entire segments of Dandy sitting on the back of some camel plant thing while the most disconcerting happy music plays in the background. I actually liked the episode a lot, and the emotional twist at the end actually got me. What an odd show this is.
Episodes 10-13
What kind of wild story will Space Dandy run this week? How about a touching, down-to-earth story about returning to your backwater hometown where the main industry has dried up and you reconnect with your dad? Or will it be a bizarre, trippy piece about books and the nature of knowledge, all shot in a strange penciled monochrome visual style. Or how about an immensely silly episode about a shapeshifting alien which accurately prortrays just how stupid our main cast are.
The best episode of the lot by far was a surprisingly cute and heartful doomed robot romance, where QT falls in love with a coffee maker. Even if not all of these episodes work (the book one in particular was a bit eh), the show has re-earned my trust enough that I’m down for these stranger episodes for their sheer experimentation. I’m never bored by Space Dandy. Even the weaker episodes have me going “well that was strange, I wonder what the next episode will be”. Perhaps this is why those early episodes felt extra weak. They weren’t even that creative so when they were also not terribly funny, it felt extra momentum sapping.
Episodes 14-17
There’s a lot of neat ideas in all these episodes, and some very good moments. The one with interdimensional Dandy’s all converging into one universe, or the strange fish one with the flashlight that makes your head disappear, or the one that is basically High School Musical. They all have a couple of amazing moments, but I feel often don’t come together as a whole to create one amazing episode. The musical one is a good example, because it’s a hilarious idea that I’m delighted they put together. On the other hand, the music sucked. The disappearing head episode had some moments, like Dandy’s head zipping across the planet while he has a bored look on his face. On the other hand, the whole pushy boyfriend gag the episode was based around didn’t really work.
Episodes 18-22
My main reaction coming back to Space Dandy is that, while yes I really do appreciate the creativity on display, it feels a lot less impactful upon rewatch. It’s like throwaway popcorn entertainment. It isn’t necessarily trying to be more than that, but every now and then it manages to hit on themes or scenarios that are far more memorable in a way that feels…iconic? Like you’ll find yourself thinking back to those scenes years after the fact because the idea behind them is inherently memorable, whether that be for humor or it just struck a chord with you.
QT falling in love with the coffee machine. The zombie universe takeover and the happiness of the moment. The space race ending with the buddha Dandy at the end of time itself. The strange plant episode procession. Episode 22 is possibly the best, most memorable episode of the lot. It’s the one with the disco alien and it causing time itself to wrap back to the start of all creation, leading to the ending sequence being single celled organisms disco dancing to a funky beat. The whole episode is delightfully weird, and more of the kind of thing I like to see from this show.
But the show isn’t all hits. Like sketch comedy, it’s near impossible to hit with that much frequency. But like sketch comedy, you tend to remember the good gags and forget a lot of the pap in the middle. Space Dandy has a lot more pap than I remember.
Episodes 23-26
The final batch of episodes were excellent, and just a very fun end to the series in general. The penultimate episode was a very clever courtroom trial story, that has also aged weirdly due to the references to Twitter. Who knew how weird that would have aged. Meanwhile the final episode was the perfect parade of very serious dialogue taken with the appropriate lack of seriousness. With that being the end, and no new anime in sight, it’s time to ask:
Is Space Dandy still one of my favourite anime of all time?
No. It’s still wonderfully imaginative and creative, but it’s filled with so much more pap than I remember. The truly great episodes shine incredibly brightly, hogging the memory banks. I will continue to remember the disco alien, the singing plants, the zombie universe apocalypse, and QT falling in love with a coffee maker for a long time after I’ve finished. Those episodes sticking with me help elevate it in my mind, because something that hits great heights is generally better than something that’s merely quite good throughout.
But man, the episodes where it doesn’t work feel so much weaker because the juvenile humor that forms the basis of the series’ setup are so unfunny. It can’t fall back on just being fun characters or a good story. This makes it very similar to sketch comedies, except where sketch comedies have literally nothing to fall back on when a gag doesn’t work, Space Dandy falls back on boobies. It’s not even that all the juvenile humor is bad! It’s just lazy and uninspired.
Space Dandy is very good, but it definitely doesn’t hang near the top as one of my all-time favourites anymore.
- Millennium Actress
- Death Note
- Baccano
- Cowboy Bebop
- Redline
- Puella Magi Madoka Magica
- Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
- Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
- Mobile Suit Gundam: War in the Pocket
- Akira
- Roujin Z
- Berserk
- Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust
- Time of Eve
- Bunny Drop
- Black Lagoon
- Space Dandy
- Steins;Gate
- Arrietty
- Dominion Tank Police
- Arakawa Under the Bridge
- Porco Rosso
- Nodame Cantabile
- The Tatami Galaxy
- Kino’s Journey
- Detroit Metal City
- Princess Jellyfish
- Crest of the Stars
- Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
- School Rumble
- Daily Lives of Highschool Boys
- Dennou Coil
- Cromartie High School
Yikes, it sure has been a long time since my last one of these. The last one was June! So much for a new one every 2 weeks. Part of this can be blamed on the last review being Death Note, my old favourite anime, and returning to the metaphorical white whale of re-review took the wind out of my sails a little. What also happened was the next review was supposed to be Spice and Wolf, but then they dropped a trailer and a date for the remake, which killed my interest in returning to the original. Which then created a panic of me thinking “oh god I need to review something” before realising I was stressing myself out in a project that was supposed to be fun returns to favorite anime. What was a four week break became a four month break, making it harder to return, then real life happened, until we get to here.
Which is all to say my next review will be a return to Gankutsuou, but I won’t put a date on when it comes out so as to not stress myself out again.
The Cart Driver 
“Like you’ll find yourself thinking back to those scenes years after the fact because the idea behind them is inherently memorable, whether that be for humor or it just struck a chord with you.”
For me, that scene that I still flashback to years after the fact is the end of the episode where he’s stuck in an interdimensional afterlife. That ending scene where, after struggling to get back to life, it’s implied he eventually dies once again.
Instead of his usual smarmy, aggravated, frantic, stressed-out self, he seems content and at peace in a way that he rarely was in the rest of the show. And whereas most of his companions in the living world have kind of a fraught relationship with him, the beings he met in the afterlife run up to him with warm smiles and open arms.
I dunno, something about it just seemed strangely comforting and wholesome.
I watched Space Dandy along with some folks in discord, and a few of them also really enjoyed that episode. For the truly weird episodes I personally preferred the plants episode, but I see why people liked that one
Loved “The Big Fish is Huge, Baby” for the visuals and the subtle but not muted color direction. I think the reason people tend to forget about the show is due to it’s rapidly changing episodic narrative and nonlinear structures. Each work was itself an experience but like a gallery full of wonderful but disjointed pieces, you only tend to truly remember one or two moments that struck a chord. Serialized shows are so popular now it’s hard to imagine watching back to back comedic or satirical episodes as you mentioned.
Either way, happy to see it up there on your list but a little sad to see no Code Geass :O
if it’s the one i’m thinking off the music in that episode is amazing, too. incredible bass guitar!
and it’s not on the OSTs, which is a big shame.
Hey I’m not finished going back through all my old favourites yet! I’m just past halfway, still a while to go yet
“Something that hits great heights is generally better than something that’s merely quite good throughout.”
This! Very well said. I think the same for Space Dandy and for example Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex as well. There are some episodes, that lack, but on the other hand some so great, unparalleled, what makes them a classic still. Unfortunately the drop in quality can be quite hard with Space Dandy.
There is something to be said for something that remains consistently good through, like Fullmetal Alchemist, but in that case it’s sustained throughout 60+ episodes that makes it remarkable.