You see, the manga was being developed in parallel with the anime, and it shows. If you read this without having seen the original show, then you'd have quite a few moments where you'd say, "Wait, where did THAT come from?" One of the most jarring is that, at the end of the first part, two ships leave Iscandar after the Yamato does. The first is Captain Harlock (who is a cyborg space pirate always covered in a shroud) and the second is believed to contain Starsha and Mamoru Kodai (aka Alex Wildstar for us Americans). The odd part there is that the last time we saw Mamoru was in the battle of Pluto where his ship was destroyed. There's no trip to Titan in the manga, where the crew find's Mamoru's ship in the anime, and there's pretty much nothing shown on Iscandar. So this revelation really comes out of nowhere.
I'm sorry to say it, but this collection is more "tell but don't show". Many of the iconic scenes from the anime are either missing all together, or are mentioned as "We'll tell you about that when we get back" and then never mentioned again. The story also isn't complete. Yes, the Earth is saved, but then the second arc featuring the Comet Empire is severely abridged and doesn't even have a conclusion.
I'm sorry to say that I can only recommend this to people who are already Star Blazers fans, and then only as a curiosity. Personally, I think it's telling that it only took me 3 nights of reading before bed to finish a 644 page manga.
Now, to finish on a high note, here's the opening theme to Star Blazers 2199:
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