To Survive

"Space: The final frontier."

"Star Trek"

There are always many, many interesting-looking titles that I want to get to eventually, but which in the end never actually make it out of the wish list. Sometimes though, my interest in a title on the want-to-read list is reignited when I learn an adaptation is on the way, which prompts me to read the original work before the adaptation is released. This happened with Lord of the Rings for example, which I finally decided to read when the live-action films were almost released, even though I had been interested in them before. The same holds for today's title.

For I have been hearing for years about Shinohara Kenta's science-fiction manga Kanata no Astra, which also has the English title of Astra Lost In Space. This series by the creator of Sket Dance was originally serialized online on the Shonen Jump + (Plus) website/app between 2016-2017 and while initially it was touted as a science-fiction adventure series, I heard more and more mystery aficionados recommend Astra Lost In Space to other mystery fans as story developments unfolded, with people praising it as a rewarding mystery series too. Last year's excellent study into mystery manga, Honkaku Mystery Comics Seminar, too mentioned the title, so it had been on my radar for some time now. And by the time the anime adaptation started this summer, I figured it was really time for me to get started on this five-volume series. In the year 2063, space travel to other planets has become a viable means of transport, opening up the exploration of the universe. A group of students from Caird High School is sent to a nearby planet for Planet Camp: they are to live and work together on the planet McPa for a few days without the help of the adults. Almost immediately after the group arrives on the planet though, a mysterious sphere of light appears in front of them, swallowing the children. The next moment, they find themselves floating in the orbit of an unknown planet. The small boosters in their spacesuits turn out to be true life-savers, as they barely make it to an abandoned spaceship floating nearby.  When they check the ship's computers, they have the greatest shock of their life: they have been transported over 5000 light years from home! While the situation seems hopeless at first as the spaceship's communication systems are down, making it impossible to call back home for help, the group realizes there's still hope at returning home safely on their own. The students have to work and life together on board of the old vessel, now dubbed The Astra, as they depart on a three month journey back to their own home while visiting the few habitable planets with life and water on the route to replenish their own supplies. But small incidents on the dangerous trip also makes the Astra's new captain, Kanata, aware that their current predicament was no mere accident and that one of them may very well be a betrayer.

I didn't manage to finish reading the manga before the anime broadcast ended by the way, I only read the last volume a couple of hours after the last episode was broadcast in Japan...

Like Hogan's Inherit The Stars, this is a series that most would initially look at, and discuss as a science-fiction series (in Astra Lost in Space's case, an action-comedy science-fiction adventure), but which in hindsight can also be examined as a mystery story. Of course, I had the 'advantage' of knowing this in advance, as opposed to people who read this series with no prior knowledge, but once the series passes the halfway point, it becomes clear very quickly that this is also a mystery story. The first half however might make you think the focus is more on the space adventure. After the crew realizes they have a harsh three-month trip ahead of them, we slowly learn about the colorful characters together with the characters themselves, as most of them don't know each other either. The nine students have to learn to work together and trust each other, as they arrive at unknown planets to replenish their supplies (the ship can't store enough water/supplies to last for three months). Some are more willing to open up to their fellow students than others, but they all have interesting background stories, each posessing a specific set of skills which become useful as they explore the universe (Captain Kanata is for example extremely athletic, while Aries has photographic memory). The set-up reminds of titles like Hagio Moto's They Were Eleven! (about space cadets stuck on a broken spaceship which for some unknown reason, has one more crew member than should be) and the Danganronpa games, where students with extreme proficiency in specific fields are locked up together with other students they don't know in a closed environment, where they are forced to participate in a sadistic killing game and where they have to learn who they can trust and who not. This might make Astra Lost in Space sound like a dark story where everybody is suspicious of each other while cooped in claustrophobic circumstances, but the atmosphere of this series is actually quite lighthearted, as the crew members slowly become friends. There's plenty of room for comedy with the students fooling around and having fun with each other, and overall, the tone is really positive.

While the first half of the series is focused on introducing this cast to us and showing how they learn to work together as they try to survive, their early adventures on the various alien planets are actually already a good example of how Astra Lost in Space works as a mystery story. While some planets are almost like a paradise, other pitstop planets prove to be far more dangerous, with both 'obvious' treats as gigantic man-eating plants, but also other threats which only manifest when it's almost too late. Astra Lost in Space really shines in these moments, as these 'creeping' dangers on the various planets are always well-hinted and foreshadowed before they actually manifest themselves. On the second planet they encounter for example, the assumption that everything is as back home almost leads to fatal conclusions, but both the team, and the reader, could've foreseen the reveal, as Shinohara hinted at this threat in various ways from the moment the Astra landed on the planet. Shinohara does a great job at placing these Chekhov's Guns throughout the whole narrative, and then picking them up again as the storyline reaches its climax, showing you that that we all should've been prepared for that threat. We might not be reading about murders or impossible disappearances or any 'familiar' mystery tropes in Astra Lost in Space, but the execution is the same: proper hinting and foreshadowing that all make perfect sense when all is revealed to the reader.

From the fourth volume on, the story starts to focus more on the matter of why and how these students were thrown into space in the first place as the series works towards the conclusion. This is definitely a science-fiction story, involving a core mystery plot of a scale you will seldom see in any 'conventional' detective story (think Hogan's Inherit The Stars scale), but Shinohara makes it work, again, because his foreshadowing and clewing is really good. This is obviously a well-planned story, as Shinohara makes sure to prepare for the grand reveal through various little scenes he has cleverly spread across the whole narrative, and scenes that seem liked innocent filler turn to be extremely important. Whereas the Chekhov's Guns for the various planets are restricted to the chapters on the respective planet, the clues to the grand mystery of how and why these students were suddenly flung into the orbit of an unknown planet 5000 light years far from home are spread across the whole series, making it a cohesive and rewarding read. It's a mystery story that only works because it's a science-fiction story, but it's also a science-fiction story that really manages to impress because it's written as a tightly plotted mystery story. The motive for example could only work in a science-fiction story, but it's presented convincingly here, and the clewing is impeccable. Astra Lost in Space is a unique mystery tale in that sense, one that really manages to leave an impression.

I haven't seen the anime adaptation of Astra Lost in Space myself as I opted to read the original comic, but critical reception of that series seems to be quite favorable, so I guess one could also try that one out instead of the comic. But whatever the medium, I can definitely recommend Astra Lost in Space. Despite the relative short length for a Jump-branded title, it's  undoubtedly a genuine Shonen Jump story, with an emphasis on the universal Jump themes Friendship, Determination and Victory, but it's also an entertaining and excellently written science-fiction mystery story, with fun characters and a pleasant vibe. It's not your conventional murder mystery, or even anything you'd usually expect from a mystery story, but Astra Lost in Space goes a long way in showing how much fun the mystery genre can be in unconventional setting and a great example of how proper clewing and set-up can make a mystery story so much more satisfying.

Original Japanese title(s):  篠原健太 『彼方のアストラ』