Loner Jass

Loner Jass is a newer anima from Japan, having only been published in 2006. The story is a "Space Opera," set in the future. The basic background is that mankind has begun to colonize various parts of space, most notably Mars, Venus, and the moons of Jupiter, but also parts of the asteroid belt, after two events occured to Earth: First, the Earth-Moon "Gate," which is never extrapolated on but is assumed to speed up interplanetary travel as seen in the series, is destroyed by some unknown force and a meteor shower bombards Earth. These events appear to take place in the year 2100, and the series takes place in 2132.

It follows, at first, the two bounty hunters Koichi "Koi" Yamadera, a man who had a past connection with the Mars mafia, and Beau Billingslea, a former police officer, who uses the space ship the "Jass" to move around the planets and moons to apprehend people for their reward. During the series, they get three other people to join their crew (though not neccesarily wanting them, it just happened...), Faye Easter (a women who is very stubborn, can't remember her past beyond just three years before, and is also a bounty hunter), Edvard Tada Fahn Olaf III (a girl who, while seemingly innocent, has an uncanny nack with electronics, as well as being confused early in the series to be a prebubescent boy), and a Cambrian Corgï named Nik (the dog appears to have been genitically altered to be very smart, on par with that as Edvard, but is, of course, a dog...).

During the manga series, each characters past is explored, truths revealed about them all to some extent, and an overarching plot involving Koi and his "archenemy" "Ruthless," though his real name is never revealed and all characters refer to him by that name.

The series was animated for the summer of 2008, and was released worldwide by the spring of 2009.

The series has become noted for its highly eclectic, obviously Jass-centric soundtrack, which is frequently considered to be one of the best anima soundtracks of all time.