Let Justice be done, though the Heavens fall.

Aldnoah.Zero is a mecha Anime about martians invading the Earth. However, the Martians aren’t aliens, but human colonists who discovered ancient alien tech.
The series has a strange storyline and worldbuilding, with the worldbuilding raising several questions.

The first season is pretty good. The beginning of the story especially. We get introduced to the relationship between the Martians and Terrans well. The Martians actually come off as a threat and their starting move is so beautiful it brings me to tears every time I see it.
Unfortunately, the threat of the Martians gets decreased fairly quickly (which mostly stems from them being morons). The insert songs also feel poorly timed sometimes.
The second season pretends the end of the first season doesn’t happen by undoing most of it. Surprisingly though, I didn’t dislike that as much as I thought I would. The second season (in my mind) generally fails to make the Martians more threatening again. While there is a brief moment where it looks like they regain their threat level… that gets completely shat on by the MC and his goddamn robot eye.
I don’t actually dislike the series though. Overall I’d say it’s worth a watch.

This is either an alliance, federation or state (I don’t know for sure, but I assume it’s an alliance) that is on Earth.
It was formed after the first failed Martian invasion to prepare for a second one.

The Main Character and protagonist of the series. His knowledge regarding physics means he can figure out the Martian quirks fast, which leads to the death of many Martians.
His Kataphrakt (mech) is unique in that it is painted orange and has less armor. His exploits propel him to legendary status among both Terrans and Martians. It’s actually pretty strange the Terrans didn’t use him as a propaganda tool or to boost morale.

The naïve princess of the Martian Imperial family. Her attempted assassination led to the start of the second Terran-Vers war.
Over the course of the series she becomes less naïve. Until the end when she ends the war through more… forceful methods (her childhood best friend be damned!).
No, I don’t know how Martian names work.

Reshuffle Note: Although it’s been a while since I’ve seen the show, I’m starting to think her character development was rushed. Actually, I’m thinking her character at the end of season 1 doesn’t connect with how she is in season 2.

I don’t know why I have him listed here, considering he dies in the first few episodes.
His greatest legacy is the quote:

Fuck 火星人 (Kaseijin - Martians)

This is Rayet in a towel. Why is this the only picture of a character?
…

A Martian whose family was placed on Earth to prepare to orchestrate the war.
Her entire family is murdered after they do their job leaving her as the only survivor.
Eventually, she joins up with the Terrans to fight the Martians.

This is the most important character in the entire series. A hero of the Terran side, the Martians called him ‘Lion of Death.’ Martians would flee after seeing his confident figure on the battlefield.
Martian women swooned over him, which came as a mystery to many of them. Scientists following the war could not figure out what caused this. Theories range from his natural charisma to some form of chemical weapon.
Despite his glorious deeds in battle, Mustang 33 failed to survive the war. His country gave him a funeral fit for an emperor.
No pictures exist of him as the United Forces of Earth destroyed every picture of him as part of their treaty with Vers. Vers had feared the pictures would have been a dangerous influence on teenage Martian girls.

The Holy Empire of Vers is an empire located on Mars. I have no idea how much of Mars they actually control, but since they’re the only ones there it doesn’t really matter.
Their society is an absolute feudal monarchy. The twist is that instead of being built around land ownership the system is built around Aldnoah.

The Orbital Knights are 37 Clans that all live in what is left of the Moon in the Orbit of Earth. In theory, they are loyal to the Imperial Family of Vers.
They are highly militarist, violent and trigger-happy. To be fair, sitting on the Moon for about 20 years far from home and close to the enemy would drive anyone insane.
Why stay on the Moon? Because they couldn’t get home after the Moon had an unfortunate accident.

A Terran who, together with his father, defected to Mars before the start of the series. He has something of a crush on Princess Asseylum.
Continually abused by the Martians around him for being a Terran he decided to become their leader. He goes from staying with Count Cruhteo to staying with Count Saazbaum because the latter murdered the former. However, Saazbaum pisses him off after he shoots the princess so he pledges his allegiance to him? After a brief time staying with him he fucking murders Saazbaum after he adopts Slaine, as a result he inherits all of Saazbaum’s things and becomes the leader of the Martian invasion.
When you actually think about it, Slaine was fucking insane.
His story ends when Inaho captures him. So he gets imprisoned and blamed for everything. The media declares him dead. Kinda sad, but it was his own doing.

The Moon fucking exploded and now it’s controlled by the Martians. The bits of the Moon that didn’t stay with the Moon now form a ring around the Earth, which contains a number of stations owned by Martians and Terrans.
It used to house the hyper gate which is just a teleportation device. It got the Martians to Mars and it also brought the Orbital Knights to Earth. It getting overloaded is what led to the Moon exploding.

A mysterious technology left behind by a long dead alien race. It is basically magic and can do almost everything.
The greatest mystery of the series is how the Martians can’t terraform their own planet using this tech.
Aldnoah can only be activated by members of the Imperial family and those loyal to them. It should be noted here that the mechanics are not explained in detail so exactly how the transfer can occur is not known. The only known method is through the uh… “exchange”… of DNA (bodily fluids). A kiss should be sufficient… but imagining that old Emperor kissing generals is a bit…

Reshuffle Note: I’ve realized that there’s an issue regarding Aldnoah. All that is needed is an exchange of DNA/bodily fluids (and potentially some unknown method). Something important to keep in mind is that Inaho gains the ability to activate Aldnoah when the princess does mouth-to-mouth with him. It’s never made clear if she intentionally gave him the ability or not - but it’s implied in the scene itself that it wasn’t intentional. When considering this, activating Aldnoah seems painfully simple. More to be written at some point in the future.

This is still being worked on. I hope to get it written at some point.

• Official site
• American site
• The Wikia - Pretty bad, don’t bother.
• I think I heard SAO sound effects in the show. Not surprising since it’s made by A1 Pictures.
• Rumour has it the Martians eat children.
• This was one of the first articles I wrote for this wiki. As such, I decided to preserve the older version even if I think it’s bad.