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Welcome to the Space Show Movie Review

Welcome to the Space Show is a 2010 science fiction anime film directed by Koji Masunari. It’s a messy, but very enjoyable flick.

Five children rescue an alien dog, and are rewarded a trip to the Moon in response. After events cause the group to become stranded in space, they must find a way to return to Earth before the kids’ parents arrive. Many critics have pinpointed this film’s similarity to Ghibli works, especially ‘Totoro’, but I personally disagree. This is a much lighter, more comedic and more childlike movie than any Ghibli offering for sure.

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And that certainly somewhat limited its appeal to adult viewers, but for anyone interested in solid, very entertaining, lightweight SF, the movie delivered in spades. I particularly adored its world building, which is stupendous. Couple that with a grandiose runtime of over two hours and you’ve got one truly epic anime for all ages.

My main issue with the movie, though, has to be its disparate nature to the structure and very off pace. The movie is, as a result, never as engaging as it should have been. There are so many terrific elements to this flick, but most are so rushed in execution that the movie ended up being abrupt and too chaotic.

The characterization itself is also solid, but far from great in my opinion. Natsuki and Amane are among the most memorable and well developed of the bunch, but others are less developed, though as a group they are all wonderful and very endearing. Pochi is undoubtedly the movie’s shining point when it comes to personalities. This alien that looks like an ordinary dog at first glance is very endearing while also being cool at the same time.

Welcome to the Space Show is also gorgeously animated. The visual style here is very colorful, pleasing and quite cozy, which are all the qualities that you would like to associate with your family entertainment. The score is also pretty good, the world is very imaginative, some of the action scenes are so much fun and the film is exciting and intriguing in its first half, but the second half was more tiresome and repetitive, which was a problem as the movie should have been magical throughout.

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