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In my youth there were some cartoons I had to watch religiously. One of those deals where you'd watch the cartoon then the next day you and your friends would be all hyped up to discuss and relive it. Didn't matter if it was an episode you'd seen twenty times or more already, you just couldn't wait to get home from school and watch it. And if you rode the bus and it broke down so you missed even the first five minutes it was like missing the whole show. Even today there are shows I have to absolutely see whenever they air, getting upset if I miss 'em for any reason.Exosquad came along in my late teens to early twenties and instantly captured my interest. I'm not sure exactly what it was about it that made it a must watch for me. It could have been the war itself (I enjoy studying WWII, but at the time I never consciously connected the show with WWII), it could have been the characters, could have been the E-frames, could have even been the story itself. Or a combination of all of these. Whatever the case I hated missing a single episode, especially since the show wasn't an individualized story per episode that didn't depend on other episodes.And that was one of the things about Exosquad which still makes it so great today, there were no actual stand alone episodes like there are in so many other series. The episodes were like chapters in a novel, if you missed one you might be at a bit of a loss as to what was happening later on. Sure there's the "Last time on Exosquad" sequences, but all that really does is make you ask what you missed. Each episode had a story to tell, but that story was a minor part of the greater whole. Perhaps it would be better to say each episode was actually an individual novel within a series of novels rather than the chapters of a book when you consider that some episodes, such as the first five of season one, told one particular story arc within the overall story. Together the first five episodes of Season One tell the Fall of the Human Empire story arc which feature's Phaeton's plans for the Neosapiens to overthrow the Terran government coming into existence and the beginnings of the resistance on Earth. The final story arc within the series would be the five part Fall of the Neosapien Empire which would feature the final defeat of the Neosapiens. But it would be the episode Beyond Chaos that always had me a bit upset with my local station at the time Exosquad originally aired. I always wanted them to get more episodes so I could find out what followed on the heels of the Neosapien War and just what that was Marsh had witnessed. It wasn't until years later that I learned the series had been cancelled and Beyond Chaos was, sadly, the series finale. For all most of us may no, the episode may have been the start of yet another story arc within the greater story (Fall of the Human Empire, Veil of Doom, Into the Heart of Darkness, and Fall of the Neosapien Empire being the four mini arcs I know of for sure). Even today it's frustrating to know that the series was cancelled just as a new threat was introduced.Now, however, is the added feature of similarities to WWII. When I had to read Hamlet in 12th grade the student teacher we had was kinda cool in that they handed out pages of Shakespeare goes to the dogs. It was this comic kind of thing where the various characters in a particular play, in this case Hamlet, were portrayed as anthromorphic dogs. I'm guessing the comedic element is meant to get students who might struggle with Shakespeare to more easily pay attention to it by thinking of it in a different way. Perhaps a way they might better relate to. The same thing can be said here, that Exosquad may have been a way to better get students to relate to learning WWII by seeing parallels between actual history and what happened in the series. For instance the Neosapien effort to retake Venus after it's been taken by the Exofleet during their march to reclaim the home worlds can be seen as being similar to the Battle of the Bulge. In both the Neosapien/German forces planned to defeat the advances of the Exofleet/Allies and change the course of the war. The Ardennes Offensive was meant to divide the US and British forces into two halves, capture Antwerp, and then encircle and destroy four allied armies, thus forcing the allies to the peace table on Hitler's terms. The Neosapien plan to retake Venus was meant to push the Exofleet once more out of the home worlds, denying them a base from which to more easily launch the conquest of Earth.Exosquad, as far as I'm concerned was and still is one of the great shows of it's age and few today come close to it.
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