Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
uchu_no_otaku
I just finished this one even tho I really didnt like the anime that much 😂 The story itself is actually pretty nice and has an interesting idea behind it, but the way it was presented didnt really work for me. It felt too short and I wanted more time to understand the characters and what they were going through.
That said, I think the concept has a lot of potential. The whole long distance communication thing and how the story handles time and separation was actually pretty interesting. It gives you that feeling of wanting to see what could happen if the story had more time to develop.
Honestly, if this were recreated with modern animation and expanded into a longer series or movie, I think it could be really damn good. There is a solid story underneath it, it just feels like it needed…
Read at the sourceSonicfan__
I can't believe it. An actual good Makoto Shinkai film.
The writing was actually pretty good for the most part, the story was interesting, if a bit cliche at parts, and the voice acting was stellar.
The animation is still very nice to look at, but it has that low budget look on it since some shots of characters are a bit off model and the CGI has that early 2000s look on it, but then again, this was entirely animated by Shinaki himself in goddamn Lightwave.
I do think I also like this one the best because of the sci-fi and mecha stuff in it and you know I love me some mecha. I actually wish this was longer because I would love to see some more backstory about the alien race that Mikako was fighting against and just the whole world around them.
I just can't get over how Shinkai went f…
Read at the sourceStellehead
This is my first review here because I find reviewing more popular anime basically useless and don't watch an insane amount so rarely stumble upon hidden gems. But that is what Hoshi no Koe is; a hidden gem.
The animation is certainly not that of modern standards, and the world and characters could've used more building. But the fundamental idea, and pure love of connection and life comes across beautifully. For a short film, it would be hard to ask to deliver more in a way that moves the viewer quite as much as this piece. It's one of those works that makes you sit back and appreciate the world around you for how rare and beautiful it is, and long for a connection as withstanding and truthful as the one between Mikako and Nobaru.
If you can look past the rough animation and still be abl…
Read at the source1stDecame4Danime
Created/animated pretty much entirely by Shinkai. I see now that he is pretty much in charge of CoMix Wave Flims, the nepotistic self-fellation of him there makes now.
Only 2 characters with no background or character traits of any kind beyond apparently having been classmates/friends with unvoiced crushes and 1 went off to be a space mecha pilot fighting aliens in space. These noncharacters fundamentally break the entire point of the movie centered around their star-crossed nonlove story of longing because it's all about their wanting to communicate over a long distance relationship despite the difficulty of time delay, yet NEITHER EVER ACTUALLY HAS ANYTHING TO SAY TO THE OTHER because these are noncharacters with nothing between them nor anything themselves to talk about. And it's not as…
Read at the sourceFAKECROSS97
Hoshi No Koe, or Voices of a Distant Star, is an anime that will make you question whether or not you've accidentally stumbled upon a PowerPoint presentation. The story follows two lovers separated by space and time, and their attempts to stay connected through text messages and giant robot battles. Because, you know, nothing says "romance" like fighting off alien invaders.
The style of Hoshi No Koe is...well, let's just say it's not for everyone. The animation is a strange mix of 2D and 3D, with character designs that are reminiscent of a middle schooler's doodles. But hey, who needs actual artistic talent when you can just throw some fancy camera angles and lens flares into the mix, right?
As for the main characters, we have the angsty teenage boy who's always brooding and trying to ac…
Read at the sourceYoAdi
“The Voices Of A Distant Star” doesn’t have good animation. The plot is a fair one and it does try to highlight the theme of distance but the runtime is too short for the proper execution of it. The background score is also just fair. The movie clearly lacks a lot in terms of character development as well.
However, one thing that does shine in the movie is the strong emotions which are clearly portrayed. This fact alone makes this short-film a strong piece of work.
Ultimately, this movie does make a great impact on the viewer at first but this impact is not long-lasting and it fades away within some days.
Read at the sourceRyanSpring
For context, I watched this for the first time in late 2022 and I'd already seen (and enjoyed) several other Shinkai works such as 5 Centimeters Per Second, The Garden of Words, Your Name and others. As it happens, this came before any of those, so maybe that makes my perspective a little wonky, but it certainly seems to me like this was the bedrock that Shinkai would go on to build off of with his future works.
This is, in just about every way, what one would expect from an early Shinkai film, and in fact it's the first film, minus the extremely short She and Her Cat, that he himself wrote. As with his other works there is a profound message about the connection between two humans who are separated by a tremendous distance in one form or another (a theme he'd go on to repeat with physica…
Read at the sourceMur-CuoreDiVirgo
A little gem by Makoto Shinkai not easy to review for me. At the beginning I was a bit uncertain about it, due to the clearly unpolished and almost experimental graphic style, but then I found out what was all about and changed my mind. This was one of the very first works of Makoto, but especially, a one man work. Basically he did everything almost alone (if not alone at all) when still younger as a sort of promo work.
However, aside from the issue with the graphic aspect, when it comes to the soft and sentimental narration instead, along with certain use of warm light throughout the scenes, I immediately recognized his typical style which can be found again in its subsequent work 5 Centimeters per Second, something which positively surprised me.
The same is for the story, where Makoto…
Read at the sourceAnata_no_kotei
[Spoilers]
Knowing Shinkai's style as a director, I expected a good amount of romance and drama in Hoshi no Koe. What I didn't expect was him trying to fit it all in 25 minutes.
The story is pretty straightforward - it tells the tale of two lovers separated by time and space, desperately yearning to see each other again; but the universe seems intent on making their reunion impossible. While this is a familiar concept, it can be executed in a plethora of different ways. This time, Shinkai frames it in the context of an intergalactic war between humans and hostile aliens known as Tarsians.
The war is mainly used as a plot device to forcibly separate the female protagonist through a military draft, but it also leads to the interesting concept of letters “lagging” in time. It’s quite a un…
Read at the sourceVaasi
By modern standards, the art of Hoshi no Koe (Voices of a Distant Star) is certainly lacklustre — the character designs are uninspired, with squashed heads and poor movement animation.
However, the focus of this short film isn't to amaze you with art ahead of its time or really inspire any form of connection to the characters themselves, but rather tell a story. Centred around the theme of emotional connection between two individuals and the ever-growing distance of space that divide them, it's a somewhat original and certainly interesting watch compared to a lot of anime we get these days.
Would I say it's perfect or even amazing? Far from it. But as a short film around the length of 25 minutes, I definitely recommend watching it.
Read at the sourceProtocultured
[Spoilers... sort of]
As someone who considers Gunbuster one of his favorite interdimentional timey-wimey emotional space operas, I was going into Voices of a Distant Star with a handful of recommendations and comparisons to the classic Gainax OVA. What I got was... ehhh. Thankfully, other than the basic concept of time distortion, the mecha setup, and the pacing issues (more on that later), Voices of a Distant Star is it's own thing, so I'm going to do my due diligence and not compare it to the Other Time Dilation Mecha Anime.
I should start off by saying that yes, it's awfully impressive that this was made on some dude's laptop in it's entirety - in 2002! How often do you get genuine passion projects in anime? Not very often. Mad kudos. With that being said, bad animation is bad animati…
Read at the sourceHudsonwt
Despite the rough animation and 3D effects, I actually quite enjoyed this. I was expecting to not really get invested into it, but somehow Shinkai made me care about this story. The theme of strained relationships is found in all of his work with this being no exception. The character designs are kind of wack and the 3D is extremely dated, but the landscapes and lighting really stand out just like any of his other work. It's really cool to see the early work of someone who has made it as big as him and see how far they've progressed. It's kind of inspirational in a way. Probably won't watch this again as it's leaving Crunchyroll at the end of the month, which is the main reason why I decided to watch it.
Read at the sourceveemon23
Okay first off just to state the obvious, the animation isn't top notch. It's not the best or even close to being decent. But you aren't watching this for the animation. It has a unique story that keeps you wanting to see what happens next.
I know this is basically like 5cm apart if you ever watched that, but a shorter version of it. Basically focusing on the idea of how far love can transcend... even time and space and even in the empty void of space and nothingness. As we question ourselves how far our love for someone can take us.
It captures the heart of how hard long distance relationship is. Though I won't say it leaves us exactly with a conclusive ending. It gives us the idea of how tough it it to really love someone and hold onto this hope of one day. How long will you be willi…
Read at the sourceNeil1998
A couple of days back, I had the distinct honour of watching the last remaining film in Stanley Kubrick's filmography who I believe to be one of the greatest filmmakers who ever lived. And today marks another such occasion as I have once again completed the filmography of a director that I hold in much esteem(not counting any of his short films that were less than 10 minutes long of course).
Maybe not as much as Kubrick but the impact that Makoto Shinkai had on me should be obvious for anyone who's known me long enough as not only did he make what I consider to be my all time favourite movie with 2016's Your Name but he also delivered what would eventually become the very first anime film that I have ever seen with 2007's Five Centimetres Per Second. (I am not counting the The Digimon Mov…
Read at the sourceVioletRose824
A friend had suggested this anime to me a while back and a couple of days ago I had the time to watch it.
No spoilers
Story - 8/10
In my opinion, the story and concept were beautifully written and thought of. Especially considering that the entire story had to fit into a 25-minute episode. Two friends who are separated by distances far away, and try to keep in contact with each other. And as the distance grows, it grows more difficult, messages taking longer to go through. There isn't much more to say on the story due to the episode again- being only 25 minutes.
Art- 4/10
Unfortunately, comparing to other anime's art styles at the time it had come out, it was a poor art style. Though the art style did work well with the space battles, I'm afraid that's all. It was at the point where…
Read at the sourcenanayuk
From what I understand, the girl was chosen to fight mecha robots on a mission in space, and every time she moved away from Earth a little bit more time for messages to reach her friend, which she apparently had a crush on, it became longer. But why did she care more about her cell phone than saving Earth? In fact, why did you choose a child to defend the Earth in space?
I actually missed a lot of things, and I have many other unanswered questions about Hoshi no Koe. I still don't understand exactly what the 'threat' to the planet was, and why girls have to fight to denounce it and not adults. Maybe I didn't pay attention (I didn't lack reasons, I was completely disinterested while watching) and that is why I didn't fully understand the anime.
Hoshi no Koe has a great proposal, but it on…
Read at the sourcePastorGeorge
This cerebral work was pretty fun watch and a good way to spend half an hour. The visuals are definitely dated. This came out in the early stages of 3d animation mixing with 2d and it does not work well in this at all. However, I can overlook that due to the early nature of the medium in this case. The best thing about this is the story. It doesn't focus on mechas or action, but instead tries to tell a love story that is seperated not only by distance, but also time. I think it was pretty sweet. I think it would have been complimented by a stronger and more definitive ending, but we didn't really get that. As always it is just nice to see something, anything, that is different than the usual drivel that we are fed. I think that this could have easily been adapted or extended into a longer…
Read at the sourcePingPongYa
Hoshi no Koe is very similar to 5 Centimeters Per Second, they were both extremely bad. I personally think if it had been longer than 20 minutes, maybe 4 episodes, then it could have worked. But the time they set themselves to tell this story did not work.
Story: 3/10
I- I don't even understand what the story was? There wasn't a big introduction, this boy and girl were just friends and then she gets sent to space at 15 for no apparent reason. The idea of 90s phones in a futuristic anime is ludicrous to me. No effort was made to change the designs even slightly, and you would think for an anime set in 2046, there would be a more effective way of communicating, rather than it taking years just to send one email. Nothing really happens throughout the entire movie, there is definitely no con…
Read at the sourceAnimeBW
Continuing my odd quest to watch everything Makoto Shinkai’s made, his debut short, Voices of a Distant Star, is… well, it’s not good, but it IS informative. It’s got everything I’ve come to expect from him: underplayed melancholy monologues, sad piano music, landscapes colored in gradients of desaturated light, themes of love fading across an immeasurable divide and the necessary pain of growing up and leaving things behind, the whole works. This is very much the RWBY volume 1 of Shinkai’s work: evidence of considerable talent that will be tapped much more completely later on, but for the moment is let down by amateur construction that’s the clear result of someone just getting used to the medium he’s employing. The themes are haphazardly exposited instead of intimately felt, the animatio…
Read at the sourceKLerrr
As a fan of Makoto Shinkai's more recent films, I was curious to take a look at some of his earliest works. "Voices of a Distant Star" is a masterful short film which displays how suffering can bring forth maturity. Through a skilfully crafted futuristic setting, a beautiful coming-of-age story is told.
I will try to explain my take on the film the best I can.
During the scene where the alien communicates with Mikako, it says that: "Growing up can be painful sometimes, but I know you will make it much, much further." Mikako is pretty far from earth, in fact, light-years away; yet, the alien states that it is possible for Mikako to venture even further into space. In my opinion, the 'space travel' idea is a metaphor for growing into adulthood. In other words, what the alien is saying is…
Read at the source
