Legend of the Galactic Heroes

Legend of the Galactic Heroes (LotGH) is basically Japanese Star Trek... if Star Trek was about Alexander the Great conquering space in order to settle a long running debate with his nemesis about the relative merits of dictatorship vs representative democracy.

Epic space war. Humans fighting humans. Death Stars colliding. Peaceful protesters getting nuked. Manly men in power armor hacking at each other with axes. Exterminators used on Mormons. Eighty proof coffee. Foppery and whim. And above all else, good people, remarkable people, being killed meaninglessly.

Plot

LotGH follows two commanders on opposite sides of a space war, alternating between their perspectives between chapters and episodes:

Yang Wenli

Representing the righteous freedom fighters of the Free Planets Alliance we have Admiral Yang Wenli, a reluctant soldier who enlisted because he wanted to be a historian but couldn't afford college. His coffee is straight brandy, and he wins his battles running away. Yang wants nothing more than to conclude the war in a peaceful stalemate so that FPA is still around to pay his pension, but freely admits that if he'd been born in the Empire, he'd be happily fighting for Reinhard.

Reinhard von Lohengramm

Fighting for the Imperious forces of the Goldenbaum Dynasty of the Galactic Empire, we have Reinhard von Lohengramm. Fighting to save his sister by taking over the entire goddamn galaxy. Has sex once before dying of space-AIDS literally days after conquering everything. Lost his best friend to assassins, lost his nemesis to religious terrorists; got revenge for both of them.