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Arpeggio of Blue Steel (蒼き鋼のアルペジオ Aoki Hagane no Arpeggio) è una serie anime composta da 26 episodi e prodotta da Ark Performance.

Si tratta di una serie di guerra, fantasy, fantascienza e azione ambienta sulla Terra nel 2039, dove le comunicazioni via mare saranno interrotta per via di una flotta, la "Fleet of Fog" (flotta della nebbia). L’umanità, incapace di difendersi, è stata schiacciata ed ha perso il dominio sui mari,

Trama

The series depict a slightly futuristic world of mid-21st century where humanity had lost much of the Earth's landmass due to the rising sea levels, caused by global warming. Almost as a responce of Nature itself, mysterious battleships that look like reincarnations of WWII vessels start appearing all around the world, always surrounded by fog.

In year 2038, the ships of the so-dubbed "Fleet of Fog" start to appear frequently, and in the very first battle between these battleships and human naval forces, a good portion of Russian navy was annihilated. This battle had shown that the "Fleet of Fog" possesses weapons far beyond what humans had in their arsenal, and that the "Fog" battleships are surrounded by defensive shields that make any conventional weapons useless against them (While it is never discussed directly in the series, it is presumed that even nuclear weapons are useless or they are not effective enough to be considered as a countermeasure).

By the end of the year 2038, the "Fleet of Fog" began attacking human navies and soon had driven humanity entirely out of the seas. Since then, the "Fog" took a rather passive role and only maintained naval blocades, occasionally destroying some brave fools that tried to set sails in the open seas.

Characters

At the beginning, the story centers around Gunzou Chihaya, a former student of the Japanese National Maritime Institute of Technology, who is in possession of I-401 submarine, the only "Fog" vessel known to have defected to the humans' side, as well as Iona - the Mental Model and avatar of I-401 - and the rest of the small crew of the submarine.

As the series progress, other characters - both human and Mental Models of the "Fog" vessels - become additional focuses of the story.

The full list characters can be found here.

Plotline (anime)

Anime begins with a brief history lesson about the "Fleet of Fog" and the Great Battle of 2039. Following that, the we are introduced to I-401 and her crew as they protect the SSTO launch site in Saga prefecture from light cruiser Nagara. The battle is qutie similar to how it was made in manga, however, in anime I-401 goes all-out offensive right away, instead of trying to sneak up on Nagara first.

Following this battle, there is a flashback, showing how Gunzou came in possession of I-401: something that is not really shown in manga. Notable details about this flashback are the following: I-401 had a Mental Model fully-formed before she made contact with Gunzou; and there are no mentions of the Facility #4 fire or Kotono Amaha in anime. While it not clear, it also appears that Gunzou's mother, Saori, is dead in anime adaptation of the series.

The flashback is followed by the scene where Gunzou is in the meeting with Ryuujirou Kamikage, a representative of Japanese military. Kamikage reveals that the SSTO Gunzou has protected was delivering a Vibration Warhead Torpedo prototype to USA and was destroyed while in orbit. Then Gunzou is asked to do the delivery himself on I-401, something that he apparently agrees to do as he sets sails for Yokosuka.

On her way to Yokosuka, I-401 clashes with heavy cruiser Takao. This battle happens in the same way it does in manga and also results in the I-401's Super-Graviton Cannon collapsing and becoming unusable until it can be repaired with nanomaterials. Takao, deciding that she wants a captain of her own, runs away from the fleet (without a plan) and decided to switch sides. She is later (in episode 3) confronted by I-400 and I-402 about this.

Upon arriving to Yokosuka, Gunzou has another meeting with Kamikage. Unlike how it happens in manga, vice-admiral Uragami doesn't make an appearance, while Iona is accompanying Gunzou instead of remaining in the docks with her hull.

After the meeting with Kamikage, Gunzou and Iona visit the cemetery where Gunzou pays his respect to those who had died during the Great Battle (instead of bringing flowerst to Kotono's grave as he does in manga). Just before that, they also run across Makie Osakabe who was running away from her maids. It seems that unlike how the things were in manga, anime version of Makie has no hate towards Gunzou.

Like it happens in manga, all of the I-401's crew is collected by the army in order to bring them to Ryoukan Kita. In anime, however, Iona also comes as she was with Gunzou. Kita asks Gunzou to surrender I-401 to government,  but was answered with refusal. He tried to use force by summoning a group of armed soldiers, but the arrival of battleships Haruna and Kirishima prevented him from ...suppressing I-401's crew. At the end of the third episode I-401 is seen heading out to combat the battleships by herself.

I-401 dragged both battleships to the submerged part of Yokosuka, where she had prepared a minefield. And using the explosions of the mines, I-401 escaped Haruna's and Kirishima's sensors. With some of her nanomaterials placed on a husk of battleship Mikasa, I-401 managed to keep the battleships occupied until she could attack them from behind. That, however, didn't work, and I-401 was forced to escape the barrages of missiles Haruna and Kirishima unleashed.

It resulted in I-401 being burried under the rubble from the destroyed buildings and allowed the two battleships to catch her with a graviton pull of their combined Super-Graviton Cannon. Knowing that the Klein Field of the Wave-Force armor must be opened in order to fire the Super-Graviton Cannon, Gunzou tried to destroy both battleships with a single Corrosive Warhead Torpedo fired from I-401. That torpedo, however, was blocked. The second torpedo, fired from the semi-automatic launcher hidden in the shadow of Mikasa, however, successfully reached its intended targed and blew both battleships up. As a result, Haruna lost her hull while Kirishima was stripped down to her core.

Following her victory in this battle, I-401 returned to the docks in order to get some much needed repairs as well as to have the Vibration Warhead Torpedo prototype brought inboard of it. While the said prototype was delivered to the docks, Gunzou observed Makie Osakabe ordering the men around as she instructed them on how to care for the torpedo prototype.

When Makie returns to the Osakabe mansion, she goes to her room, where to she brought 'uncounscious' Haruna, whom she had discovered in one of the old warehouses. When Haruna awakens, she tries to pose herself as a human in order to avoid being ousted for what she is: a Mental Model. This leads to a bond of friendship forming between her and Makie. At that time, Haruna also allowed Kirishima's core to possess a body of a teddy bear.

However, her true nature was already known to the real master of the manor, Toujirou Osakabe, the creator of the Design Children and something like a father to Makie. (unlike how he was a butler in manga, in anime he is a bed-ridden and dying man who is holding onto his life in order to ensure Makie's happiness) Yet, despite knowing that Haruna was from the "Fleet of Fog", he still asked her to be Makie's friend. Soon after that he dies.

The government also knew about Haruna being a Mental Model and in order to nullify the threat of her kidnapping the Design Child and learning the secrets of the Vibration Warhead Torpedo, the attack on the manor in order to kill Makie was authorized.

Desiring to protect Makie, Haruna asked Kirishima to keep an eye on her while she confronted the military. Unfortunately, that didn't work out and Makie discovered Haruna's true nature; then she ran away in tears. Still desiring to protect the girl, Haruna created her dummy with nanomaterials and headed out to the mansion's backyard, drawing the military's attention to herself. Meanwhile Kirishima and Makie were to escape via the front gates. However, once the walking tanks, the "Stone crabs" were deployed, Haruna was forced to reabsorb the nanomaterials from the decoy, thus revealing that the real Makie was elsewhere.

A group of soldiers had discovered Makie a minute later, however, Kirishima in her bear form was able to knock them out before they could hurt the girl. And since Makie had resolved to still be Haruna's friend, she did something stupid and headed to where Haruna was still fighting against the military forces - Kirishima was unable to stop her. This all resulted in Haruna being forced to use all of her Wave-Force armor's strength to protect the girl with no chance of her to counterattacking. Knowing that sooner or later her defenses would be breached, Haruna cried out for help and, surprisingly, Iona showed up and forced the wounded military forces to finally retreat.

Instead of regroupping at Maya, Haruna and Kirishima (along with Makie) for some reason decided to join Iona inboard of I-401 as she sailed towards the Iwo Jima island.

Philosophical topics in manga/anime

"Aoki Hagane no Arpeggio" series raise and try to answer several important philosophical questions:

• What kinds of relationships between Humans and sentient Artificial Intelligence can be? It is shown throughout the series that AI of sufficient level can interract with humans much like another human would. The relationships possible vary from coopertaional to antogonistic.
• What can and cannot be called 'human' or 'humane'? Mental Models that spent some quality time around humans appear to become almost humans themselves. Iona, Yamato, and later Takao, Haruna and Hyuuga all act in the ways that make it practically impossible to distinguish them from humans through their behavior only. Many other Mental Models are also showing human-like tendencies, like having hobbies.
• Artificial creation of life and playing God in laboratiories, Is this allowed within human morale, and where to this can lead? This is still an open question even within the series: Makie and the leader of Northern region, Makoto, are two of the genetically-engineered for specific purpose humans. Makie had completed her mission already and thus her future depends on whether the politicians think she had earned her further life or not.