Char-clone #50: A Gundam thread

[Egarwaen]

One pattern that shows up throughout Tomino's works is that the antagonists are defined by an extreme sense of self-importance. This is what leads them to dark places, and causes them to fall short even when they have noble aims. Char's arc in Zeta is extremely of a part with this; he spends the entire series grappling with his own legacy and what it would mean for him to lead the AEUG. But this preoccupation leads to him repeatedly failing his comrades - he fails to mentor Kamille, he fails to respect Reccoa, he fails to protect Katz, and he ultimately fails to provide the AEUG with a viable strategy. He's totally unable to get over himself. The culmination of that failure is his contribution to the finale being only a duel with Haman; he's literally crushed by his own legacy, the AEUG wins a Pyrrhic victory, and all his efforts are for nothing.

Mashymre is wonderful in the opening arc of ZZ because he's got that same self-importance, but its nearly impossible to think he's cool. He's a total buffoon, which contrasts with Judau's utter lack of pretension. But even with that there's still some subtlety to his presentation - consider why, for example, he seems to be able to constantly remember conversations with Haman that just happen to directly pertain to his predicaments. It could be just that he's delusional and prone to flights of fancy, or it could be an early indicator of his Cyber-Newtype conditioning.

 

[FelixSH]

Just 7 episodes into ZZ, it's a very nice change of pace. Hashymre is delightful (that's partly just me liking guys whose symbol are flowers). It's clear from the get-go that Haman is just using him. Him remembering these conversations makes it just better, because I always enjoy seeing Haman doing whatever. I love how Hashymre is also a decent guy, who tries really hard not to hurt any civilians.

Still enjoying Judau and his friends, too. While I'm not quite sure how to feel about the fact, that this show goes against the deconstruction of a kid finding a Gundam, a war machine, being gifted with it, and it's fine. But this is the third show, I think a break from that is ok, and it seems to get grimmer when we get more into the show.

Enjoying it a lot, in any case. From pure enjoyment, this might be my favorite for now.

Also, while I really like Bright, I always enjoy when the show puts him in silly situations, like when a chicken lands on his head.

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

I love how Mashymre is also a decent guy, who tries really hard not to hurt any civilians.

 

[FelixSH]

Oops, didn't intend to take such a long break. Just wanted to mention that the ZZ Gundam has a transformation sequence, which is amazing. I love transformation sequences.

That Mashymre comments this means that this (connecting multiple parts to form a super-mobile suit) is a trope, right? Was just wondering if this was an invention of ZZ Gundam.

Also, looks like we slowly change to a grimmer tone.

 

[Kirin]

Yeah, combining super robots well predate ZZ. Heck, that sort of thing was more of the norm before original Gundam came along and popularized more “practical” military-esque suit designs.

 

[estragon]

Asking here because I'm hesitant to search the title on Google or social media so soon after the last episode:

Did the finale of Witch from Mercury seem to set up for a sequel so this has a ~50 episode run like the older shows and major modern ones like 00/AGE/IBO, or is it actually over over at ~25 episodes?

I don't want to watch until it's complete.

 

[q 3]

It's complete.

 

[FelixSH]

After taking a quite long break, I'm back at Gundam ZZ. Starting with the Moon Moon two-parter. It was fun. And goofy. But yeah, I enjoyed it, even though (or maybe because) it felt a bit Saturday Morning cartoon-y. And it had a bit of a Star Trek TOS vibe going on, I thought.

I did hope to learn, that this was a colony that got wrecked during OG or Zeta, everyone thinking it got destroyed (and therefor forgotten), but somehow had people surviving. Who then, due to the war, declared themselves anti-technology. Oh, well.

The I learned that the internet seems to hate it, because it's too goofy, feels like filler, something like that. Dunno, didn't dig too deep there.

I think I never mentioned, how much I love the character design of some of these people. Char in Zeta, with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, or the women with (what I consider as) 80s punk esthatic, hair with (multiple) wild colors, for example. I really like this show, and this franchise, from what I have seen by now. But also looking forward to ZZ getting grimmer. It's just always interesting to see, where these shows are going.

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

Moon-Moon is great. The guy who wrote Unicorn Gundam is making a spin-off comic about Moon-Moon and the repercussion of ZZ. I like what I have read of that comic. And it stars a pretty cool lead-mech: the Moon Gundam

Don't read into Moon Gundam btw, it's all spoilers for ZZ

 

[estragon]

lol

the head:body ratios on some of these designs is cracking me up

even for the characters that don't look like they're from an SD gag manga spinoff, many of the heads look bizarrely disconnected from/mismatched with the bodies

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

They're all just 4' tall, it's not nice to make fun of people of short stature

for real tho lmao

 

[estragon]

Watching it for the first time, and the soundtrack for Gundam X is fantastic.

Granted, sometimes it's fantastic because it's extremely ripping off Gustav Holst. That being said, ripping off Holst is a tried and true method for making a soundtrack.

(tried a bunch of youtube videos of Holst's Mars to find one that would embed, but apparently no one uploading Holst is willing to embed, or maybe the rights holders don't allow it, or something...)

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

Watching it for the first time, and the soundtrack for Gundam X is fantastic.

Excellent! How is the rest of the show for you so far? And how would you rank Gundam X music against the rest of the franchise?

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

IMPORTANT EMERGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT:

Banrise's Gundam.Info channel on youtube now has all of Turn-A Gundam up, available to watch for free, remastered in 1080p.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJV1h9xQ7Hx-KWgqO7AKxmINiYGi6VM7e

If you've somehow not seen this show before, now is your time! Don't continue sleeping on the secret best Gundam show!

They also put up all five of the G-Reco movies as well:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJV1h9xQ7Hx__EYtJfa1u6f9BtDnvMNBw

 

[Daikaiju]

 

[Vaeran]

Coming soon to PlayStation 3

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

 

[estragon]

Excellent! How is the rest of the show for you so far? And how would you rank Gundam X music against the rest of the franchise?

I finished it, and I think it's very strong. I haven't been posting about it, but since rewatching 0079 I've been going forward through every show in production order, both to listen to some GGP seasons I hadn't seen the source material for and because my initial encounter with Gundam was very haphazard. I was living in Japan and outside of 0079-->Zeta-->Double Zeta I was just watching things in whatever order DVDs were available from a pre-ubiquitous streaming video Netflix style service (i.e. getting DVDs shipped to you, then shipping them back for more) run by a brick and mortal rental chain.

Going in production order for the first time and using that as a metric to evaluate everything, I think X is both the strongest non-Tomino Gundam show and also the first AU that I like without reservations. I know that Tomino himself disagrees and says it's a Gundam show that's limited by being too much about Gundam, and I get why he as a creator would think that it's derivative. But, as a viewer, I think it both uses that premise to engage more thoughtfully with the themes of the Tomino shows than almost all of the rest of non-Tomino UC as of its release, while also just generally being well made on an episode-to-episode level. The only other non-Tomino show that consistently does both of these things successfully for me so far (in this production order watch) is War in the Pocket. Some are entertaining, some deal interestingly with Gundam themes, but very few do both well like War in the Pocket and Gundam X.

I generally don't care much about Gundam scores beyond a few synth tracks in Zeta that are very memorable to me, so for me Gundam X is an exception in how much its music stands out to me.

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

Thanks for the update on your adventure, estragon! I think I can get behind everything you laid down about X, and the franchise in general. Expect for the music, I really dig most of the music from every Gundam show through the 90s.

I’ve been slowly rewatching Turn-A and man. It’s really just a masterpiece, straight up. Everything about it is just friggin’ aces. I would compare it to Princess Mononoke, in terms of being the Director’s magnum opus of this career. It’s gone already from YouTube which is a shame. But I think I’ll probably buy the BDs with my Xmas money.

Also I cannot emphasize how powerful and well done the soundtrack is. It really helps sell the setting as a character in a way that only the best media can. Can’t wait until you get into Turn-A finally estragon. It’s a magical experience and easily the best Gundam show ever made.

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

Crunchyroll's store (formerly RiteStuff) is having a big Gundam sale going on right now. Just picked up Turn-A and G Gundam on sale for half off. Still a little pricy, but the cheapest I've seen those BDs. Would have picked up Gundam X, but the first set is out of stock

 

[Vaeran]

Those are good prices! I already own most of the Gundam I want in one form or another, so I decided I'd be happiest upgrading my G Gundam DVDs to blu ray.

Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Kirin]

Wait, Crunchy bought RiteStuff? Geez I’m out of the loop, and also that idea feels so fuckin weird to an old school anime nerd.

 

[Vaeran]

Yeah, I remember the delight of getting my telephone book-sized RightStuf catalog in the mail once or twice a year in the late 90s/early 2000s, and I'd read the damn thing cover to cover. Shame.

 

[estragon]

Thanks for the update on your adventure, estragon! I think I can get behind everything you laid down about X, and the franchise in general. Expect for the music, I really dig most of the music from every Gundam show through the 90s.

I’ve been slowly rewatching Turn-A and man. It’s really just a masterpiece, straight up. Everything about it is just friggin’ aces. I would compare it to Princess Mononoke, in terms of being the Director’s magnum opus of this career. It’s gone already from YouTube which is a shame. But I think I’ll probably buy the BDs with my Xmas money.

Also I cannot emphasize how powerful and well done the soundtrack is. It really helps sell the setting as a character in a way that only the best media can. Can’t wait until you get into Turn-A finally estragon. It’s a magical experience and easily the best Gundam show ever made.

Yeah I started watching Turn-A soon after and immediately remembered that Kanno Yoko did the score and that this is the other Gundam show where the soundtrack is actively a draw for me. Not exactly surprising because it's Kanno Yoko, but she really nails it here, as usual. Turn A was a rewatch for me and something I was looking forward to a lot in this chronological watch through. I kept having to restrain my desire to just skip to it. But it was even better than a remembered, because it's very tightly plotted in a way that really rewards a second viewing. It's basically a miracle of a show.

I don't really know if I have much new to add to everyone singing the praises of Turn A though, so instead I'm going to move onto the next thing and say that G-Saviour was surprisingly entertaining. You have to go in with realistic expectations for what a Canadian made for TV movie from the late 90s featuring CGI mech battles is going to look like, but if you do that honestly it's a fun little side story. I went in expecting something so bad it's good or maybe extremely confused, but I thought it was well made within the context of what it was and more or less worked. I'm curious about the production process, because it felt much more Gundam-y than I expected, since I had received the impression that this was just this totally off the rails disaster. I kind of want to watch the Japanese dub to see how they localized it...

 

[Vaeran]

Those are good prices! I already own most of the Gundam I want in one form or another, so I decided I'd be happiest upgrading my G Gundam DVDs to blu ray.

Thanks for the heads up.

These arrived today, and I opened them up to make sure there were no loose discs sliding around getting scratched. The discs each have a single Ookawara Gundam illustration on the label, and they made some wild choices for who made the cut and who didn't:

Disc 1: Shining Gundam (makes perfect sense)
Disc 2:

...

...Actually, I was going to look the ones I didn't recognize up on MAHQ, but I can't even find them on there. The only ones I know are Shining, Nobel, Master and Devil. The other four have designs I swear I've never seen before, not even as one-off Gundam Fighter of the Week. Three of them look like alternate designs for Rose, Dragon and John Bull, but I can't even tell what the one on disc 2 is supposed to be. Super weird!

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

These arrived today, and I opened them up to make sure there were no loose discs sliding around getting scratched. The discs each have a single Ookawara Gundam illustration on the label, and they made some wild choices for who made the cut and who didn't:

Disc 1: Shining Gundam (makes perfect sense)
Disc 2:

...

...Actually, I was going to look the ones I didn't recognize up on MAHQ, but I can't even find them on there. The only ones I know are Shining, Nobel, Master and Devil. The other four have designs I swear I've never seen before, not even as one-off Gundam Fighter of the Week. Three of them look like alternate designs for Rose, Dragon and John Bull, but I can't even tell what the one on disc 2 is supposed to be. Super weird!

It's a really strange decision to make those the disk art. To the degree I wonder if someone got things mixed up, or was a superfan and just trying to add the deepest cuts possible to prove their nerd cred. At first I thought it was just fanart or something that got thrown onto the disks, but the designs are clearly by Kunio Okawara so it had to have been official in some capacity.

So, those four designs, are from a 1996 prequel manga, following a young Master Asia 20+ years before the events of the show, when he was a part of the Shuffle Alliance in the 7th Gundam Tournament. Those four are all predecessor mobile suits to the Maxter, Rose, Bolt, and Dragon Gundams respectively.

Disk 2: Gundam Freedom - https://www.mahq.net/gf7-023na/
Disk 3: Eiffel Gundam - https://www.mahq.net/gf7-019nf/
Disk 4: Mosque Gundam - https://www.mahq.net/gf7-018nr/
Disk 5: Kouga Gundam - https://www.mahq.net/gf7-010nc/

 

[Vaeran]

That is absolutely bananas. Thanks for the MAHQ links!

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

You can tell The Gundam Freedom is the American Gundam because it has spurs on the heels, and a vague police-motif

 

[estragon]

SEED is also a rewatch for me (although Destiny will be new when I get to it), and it definitely suffers the most of any show so far both as a rewatch and due to being put into the context of release order, with all the Tomino shows before it relatively fresh in my mind. The first time I saw SEED, I could just kind of turn my brain off and enjoy the dumb melodrama, but with a clearer memory of 0079 it's just frustratingly stupid, because when it's tracing those beats it draws too many direct comparisons that aren't in SEED's favor. I really don't remember where the plot goes in detail, but I know it branches off more in the latter half or the latter third (with the Lacus faction stuff), so maybe I'll be able to take it on its terms better later...

I'm watching the HD remaster for the first time and thought it might at least be visually enjoyable, but it's a show that appears to really suffer from being an early digital show, even with the benefit of a remaster. I'm not sure if this is the fault of the original show or trying to change the aspect ratio for the remaster or a little of both, but so many of the cuts are extremely blurry digital zooms. I would guess at least some of that was there originally, because this happened from time to time in Turn A too, although very rarely.

 

[WisteriaHysteria]

The fault lies in the original mastering. Turn-A (and a few Sunrise shows before and after) have a small amount of CGI interspersed throughout the production. Almost like in a trial-basis for figuring out how the tech works. But the show on the whole was mastered in traditional, analog filming. So if there's a rare CGI moment that was originally mastered at a lower resolution, it's very brief and doesn't detract from the rest of the show. Turn-A was, if I recall, the last Gundam - and maybe even last Sunrise - production that was traditionally animated.

SEED was originally mastered not by filming celluloid with analog cameras, but done digitally. For time and expense, it was only mastered for analog TV. 480i. Just like with video games in the same era, the original assets weren't maintained, and remastering from scratch is pretty much impossible. So when they did the HD remaster of SEED - all they could do was do some primitive digital image smoothing. It was remastered a relatively long time ago, so a lot of our AI tools to help sharpen things and make Digital SD content seem HD didn't exist yet.

It also helped Turn-A that immediately after production of the show, they began working on theatrical cuts of the show, so a lot of the digital assets were rendered a bit higher quality than in SEED. This is why the 90s CGI work on anime films like Princess Mononoke or Spirited Away or Macross Plus still look good in HD when it looks like garbage in TV shows.

If you want a good companion piece to your Gundam franchise watch, watch Tomino's show he made contemporaneously to SEED - King Gainer. It feels like one of his Gundam shows but with the serial numbers filed off. It might be one of his best shows ever. But for whatever reason, that show had the foresight to be originally mastered in 16x9, in HD. (Probably an early HDTV test - like how Star Trek: Enterprise was one of American TV's first test pilot shows for HDTV). Still looks utterly gorgeous. It's actually hilarious to watch the rest of the anime industry take over a decade to catch up to what Tomino & Sunrise were doing with digital productions in 2002: