Sora to Umi no Aida boasts quite the insane premise, sending young girls to capture giant fish in space fish tanks. It doesn’t exactly scream greatness from its premise alone, but I could never forgive myself if I didn’t give it a try.
The show follows Haru Soramachi, an aspiring space fisher with big dreams and a textbook example of airhead with a heart of gold main character. Furthermore, we’re introduced to numerous other girls of varying character design quality. Namino Murakami is our resident dark haired tsundere type, elite in ability but lacking in tact. Accompanying her is the green Makiko Maki, who contrasts her partner through her kindness and sympathy. Makoto Mitsurugi and Maiko Sakura are the final two that complete the set, but we don’t see much of them at all. Instead the episode chooses to highlight the first three and give us a taste of what the show is really about! 
The story isn’t something we haven’t seen before, a classic story of, “Cute girl pursues big dreams with other cute girls.” No matter, the important part is execution! Unlike any other anime we’ve probably ever seen, the dream here is to become a space fisher. How do young girls fish in space? Well, the only way we know how, with underwater submarines and deities channeled through a phone application.
It’s quite absurd at first glance, but it adds to the charm of the show. The characters we’ve been introduced to channel gods and spirits of various races from the well known Odin to the legendary dragon Kuraokami. Using the powers of their respective deities, the fishers enter massive water globes to hunt carnivorous fish.
In terms of animation, the show is fairly unimpressive. The portion of the episode that took place in Japan is rather lackluster and the lower end budget is quite apparent from the lack of character movement. However, the fish fight scenes in space are decent, and the actual art of the show is quite good. Most particularly, the coral reef of their first water globe is quite stunning. Initial impression of the soundtrack is nothing special, and the character designs are passable. The voice acting is mediocre and occasionally bad, even our main character has a tendency to act like Asta from Black Clover which can get old really quick.
Something interesting the show does is its take on sexism in the fishing industry, perhaps this is an actual reference to the gender inequality in our real world, or perhaps I’m overestimating the show. Regardless, the idea of female space fishers is looked down upon in this universe, and I’m sure our airheaded Haru will change that by the end. In fact, I was convinced the show would take the classic shounen formula of an unlikely main character having innate talent, but they didn’t! I was expecting Haru to be an amazing space fisher right off the bat, or for her cute deity to be insanely useful but underutilized. Instead, I got neither, and our characters have to learn from scratch. It’s a pleasant change of pace, and I’m glad that our characters will actually have to work diligently to achieve their dreams.
Overall, the episode isn’t too bad. However, I don’t believe this will be one of those sleeper hits that come from absurd premises. I’m not sure, perhaps someone will actually be eaten by a giant fish and the show will become Madoka Magica.
Possibility of Watching: 10%
Possibility of Blogging: 1%
Well, we all thought that SoraYori was all about cute girls doing cute things in Antarctica, right? Boy were we wrong.