Jeeez, the site got really slow to load when I reloaded for the announcement. But it is, in fact, Aria, as previously speculated. Or at least season 1 of it EDIT: Just heard back from Right Stuf; they’re not ready to announce more specs just yet but they’ll definitely have more than just the first season).

It’ll start coming out with a first season box set on September 30th, which will include all 13 episodes, sub-only, for $49.99. You can actually pre-order it right now.

For the chunk of you out there who don’t yet know the show, Aria is set in a future where humans have settled other planets, including Mars, which has taken on a Venice-like canal-city structure. As a result, the city is full of gondolas; the show follows a group of young girls training to become professional gondoliers. It’s an “atmosphere” kind of show, based on the manga by Kozue Amano (which also just finished recently, if I remember correctly).

• Title: ARIA the Origination
• Studio: HAL Filmworks
• Genre: Slice-of-Life

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥½

• Animation: ♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥½ (Those sure are some big yawns.)

Thoughts:
Okay, I admit it: I don’t really get the appeal of ARIA. Yes, it’s all really very pretty. But nothing particularly funny or interesting happens. In fact, nothing happens, period, pretty much.

ARIA is set in a future where humans have colonized other planets, including a planet called Aqua upon which a city called Neo-Venezia has been founded. Like its real-life counterpart, Neo-Venezia has canals instead of streets and gondolas instead of cars. ARIA’s lead character is Akari, an earth-born young woman who has come to Neo-Venezia to train to be an “undine,” a professional gondolier/tour guide. But she starts out as a trainee and will have to work her way up to being a “prima,” or fully-qualified gondolier.

Which, in and of itself, is a perfectly acceptable setup. But here is what happens in the first episode of ARIA: the Origination: Akari practices with two other trainees from other gondolier companies, bumps into a couple of guys she knows at a cafe, eats lunch with her supervisor/trainer Alicia, receives a package from a former client, and shares the package’s contents (some sakura jam and tea) with the other trainees and all three of their teachers. During their snack, they talk about how all of them– even the primas –can still improve at being gondoliers.

There’s no real conflict whatsoever; there’s just a bunch of nice, pretty girls living a nice, pretty life. Which, for me, is a problem; a story needs conflict or else there’s no story. And thus, ARIA and I have just never gotten along. I once discussed this with a friend of mine, who told me it was an “atmosphere” show, but I don’t think that’s any excuse really. I told him that if I wanted “atmosphere” I’d actually go somewhere where there was some instead of watching some on a screen. For me, it might as well be an incredibly well-animated screensaver.

That said, there are still plenty of people who really ARIA (and I’ve no doubt raised some of their ire). But if you’ve liked previous iterations of the series (such as the manga or the previous two seasons of the anime), you’ll no doubt continue to enjoy this third season. And if you like the idea of spending a calm, relaxing 20-25 minutes without any nasty burdens like a “story” or a “plot,” well, here’s your show.

It’s not my cup of tea, though.