Category: Mobile Suit Gundam 00

Short Synopsis: Allelujah and Soma crash down on a remote island.
Highlights: Surprisingly quiet and focused for a Gundam 00-episode.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10 (Good)
Ooh, surprise. At first I wasn’t too much excited about a full episode dedicated to Allelujah and Soma, but the creators did a surprisingly good job on it, and it was an episode well spent. There was no melodrama, and yet their story reached a satisfying conclusion. I was wondering how Allelujah would finally convince Souma to stop attacking him, but it turns out that she too had a split personality. The twist has been built up for well enough, so it really shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.

I also liked the reaction of the rest of the team at the discovery that Allelujah brought a girl with him, at the end of the episode. Overall, this episode was really un-typical for this series, but it worked surprisingly well.

In other news: Marina learns that Azadistan is gone now, and the next episode should probably shed some more much-needed light into Tieria’s mysterious clone. I only have one complaint for this episode: Mr. Bushido.

It’s annoying, but I can live with the strange name. I can even deal with the fact that the Japanese are treating the “Mr.”-part as his last name. I can deal with the mask. But please: why the heck do you abandon your target after it’s had a technical breakdown? Seriously, finish the guy off already. This is war, for God’s sake, not a friendly baseball competition.

Short Synopsis: A-Laws prepares for the next wave of attack.
Highlights: Ooh, more background.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10 (Enjoyable)
You know, in a way I’m glad that the creators decided to wrap up Saji’s story in this part of the story instead of waiting for this until the end, but really: it has to stop somewhere. He was the most annoying character in the second half of the first season, and as much as I hate to admit it, he’s also the most annoying character of the second season. I don’t mind how you can have a character like him on the show, but the creators are really giving him way too much airtime.

Every episode I keep thinking that the guy has learned his lesson, and for every single episode so far he’s proved me wrong. Okay, so he sees that he screwed up big time in the previous episode; He wants to help; that’s good. Unfortunately, the episode ended at the point where he was about to shoot down Louise, something which will make him even more emo than he already was for goodness’ sake!

Okay, so those were the bad parts. The rest of the episode was pretty enjoyable, to say the least. “Mr. Bushido” seems to be finally coming into action, and I’m interested in what he can add to this archetype. The overall episode was a good aftermath that did let the deaths of the previous episodes sink in. I’m also glad that Setsuna has grown up really much, and didn’t just try to get to Ali as soon as possible (like he would have done in the first season). The guy knows his priorities, and overall he’s turned into a capable main character for this series.

Meanwhile, I was pleasantly surprised when this episode showed some of Sumeragi’s past. She had this whole life as a soldier behind her, explaining why she knows so much about tactics, and why she fell into a slump after the end of the first season: she already had lost some of her loved ones at one time, and she tried to use the Gundams to forget about these times, but that pretty much failed after that final episode. Then Billy took care of her for the next four years, which also wasn’t the smartest thing to do because he kept reminding her of her past.

I’m also warming up to that silver-haired official, thankfully. His big disadvantage is that he doesn’t have the season worth of build-up like the other characters have, but he works very nicely against the other, more moralistic characters. I still think that the military people act a little bit too sentimental, considering how they’re supposed to be rigorously trained and should be used to the fact that anyone of them might die, but this is just me being nitpicky.

Short Synopsis: Celestial Beings visit Kataron in an attempt to team up.
Highlights: Well, let’s hope Saji has learned his lesson now…
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10 (Good)
Overall, I liked this episode quite a bit as it continued to push the plot forward, although I do have a large complaint about the way it ended. It just reminded me too much of Code Geass, in which the creators just too often tried to evoke sympathy by creating an as large bloodbath as possible. The big problem is that the lead characters that were so morally unambiguous in the first season turned into the clichéd “heroes of justice”.

In the first season, there were some evil parties, but no party was pure good. Everyone was in it for his or her own ideals and agendas, and especially the split world into three equally powerful parties made up for a lot of interesting politics, where the viewer got the chance to side for a lot of differently possible parties. Unfortunately, they’ve now merged together into one big glob of a country where only the characters from the first season seem to feel any sympathy.

It’s not a complete disaster, but this series really NEEDS to do something to prevent A-LAWS from turning into your stereotyped evil empire that needs to be defeated. The top-decision makers are the biggest problem, I think. They just aren’t fleshed out as well as the people fro the first season. It’s a shame, we’ve got a series with some wonderful characters across the scale of good and evil, and now they have to take orders from pure evil people.

Gundam Wing had the same in its middle part, and it managed to pull through when said organization fell apart. That’s what I hope that this series is going to do as well: just let the evil empire do its stuff for a while, and then around the episode 13-mark make it fall apart with a big bang. I mentioned this before, but the most important thing that this series needs to do is to give each of its characters an identity: a unique role that’s going to create a lot of different parties one could side with.

Strangely enough, I was more annoyed with Louise than with Saji in this episode. Saji’s behaviour felt natural: we already know that he’s struggling between every different party, and he’s not exactly someone who can keep a secret. However, it seems that Louise didn’t enter the army to grow, but rather to take revenge on the Gundams for her hand.

Speaking of stereotypes… what was up with Ali al Sarshes? Has he spent four years getting more and more insane or something? I would have preferred a less direct scene.

Short Synopsis: Marina plans to go back to Azadistan, to try to rebuild her country again.
Highlights: That romance is either going to make or break this series.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10 (Enjoyable)
The ED of this series is starting to sound better and better, and I finally realized that it’s been done by Ishikawa Chiaki (who also did the theme songs of Bokura no). It’s pretty much the best theme song of this series so far, even though it still comes nowhere near the work she’s done for Bokura no.

In any case, this episode was pretty much about romance(or potential romance, in any case): Alelujah and Soma grew up together, but Soma doesn’t seem to realize this (most likely from the time when people messed with her brain, in the first half of the first season. Of course the removal of these berserk tendencies needed to have some repercussions). Then we have Feldt, who sees the image of Neil in Lyle, and Lyle uses this to hit on her. Meanwhile, Marina asks Setsuna to go with her to Azadistan, while both of them proclaim that they’re not in love in stereo (pretty much THE hint in anime of a future couple). Billy meanwhile is angry because Sumeragi “betrayed” him and started to develop new mobile suits for the enemy.

The thing is, that this series definitely can’t use some badly developed romance at this point. The creators are going to be very careful to actually develop all these relationships right, in the middle of the series. I’ll be happy as long as the romance is used wisely, and doesn’t get in the way of what’s really important in this series, and gets used as character-building. I was glad that the second season removed the teenaged-part from the series, but that doesn’t mean that this has given the light for cheesy romance now. It’s just too late now to turn this series into a romance-one.

There’s also one thing I’m wondering for a bit, but that may be because I’ve been watching the second season raw so far. But if four years have passed already, then why hasn’t the Earth-Federation gotten the chance yet to mass-produce the Solar Furnaces? Why haven’t they discovered the workings of the Trans-Am-system they’ve gotten from Alelujah’s machine when he was captured? Their tactics in this episode were pretty weak: they pretty much knew the position of the Poseidon, and yet they only attacked with a small number of Mobile Suits. But I guess that that was meant to be: to show the ineptness of the new white-haired commander, and push Kati up a rank.

And there’s one thing I’m also glad about: neither Saji nor Louise was annoying in this episode. Saji is already trying to work on the Poseidon (so my big fear of him becoming a Gundam pilot is unfounded), and Louise is growing up much more, although I’d like to see more screen-time of her, since she only appeared in two or three short scenes so far.

Short Synopsis: Allelujah is found and this episode shows how the Celestial Beings go and rescue him.
Highlights: Lots of different characters get a bit of development.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10
We’re three episodes in, and I’ve got a huge question burning on my mind: what the heck happened to Ali al Sarshes!? I mean, he was a pretty big villain in the first season. I can’t just imagine how he would have suddenly decided to retire or something. I can understand how the guy wouldn’t have a big role in the past few episodes, but not even one shot of him?

In any case, in this episode it becomes clear why the creators went through such lengths of making Setsuna meet up Saji and Marina Ismael: so that he could pick both of them up in the second season. In this episode, it’s Marina’s turn, as it seems that she screwed up with her country, and coincidentally ended up in the same prison. While that’s a bit questionable, I’m interested in what the two of them will turn into once they’re pas their angst-phase. Right now, it’s pretty logical for them to be confused about Setsuna’s ideals and stuff, but it mustn’t take too long.

One major advantage of the second season over the first season is that the characters are already fleshed out in the second one. I remember how the characters spent a lot of time warming up to the viewer in the first season, and that’s one problem we don’t have here. I originally thought that the second season would introduce lots of new characters, but to my surprise, the amount of new characters has been really low. None of the major characters of the second season didn’t appear in the first, and the only important new ones that I could pinpoint were the new young crewmembers of the Celestial Being, probably to replace Liechty and the other one who died at the end of the first season. The other big advantage of this is of course that now, there are hardly any teenagers left in the series. Always a good thing. ^^;

It’s a bit cheap to replace the dead Lockon with his twin brother, to not anger the guy’s fans too much, but then again this IS Sunrise after all. I appreciate that the creators at least give a bit of effort into reviving their characters, and don’t let them just appear from out of nowhere. Lyle also adds an interesting element to the group dynamic of the Celestial Beings: he didn’t go through the same things as the others, so he isn’t on the same line as the others yet. My only real complaint is the following: how the heck did he know how to pilot a Gundam right off the start? I really would have preferred to see the guy train a bit more and get used to the controls.

Oh, and is it just me, or did this episode have a different ED than the previous two? The song still really isn’t to my tastes, but some of the artwork that appears in it is downright gorgeous.

(* Note to self: Gundam 00 continues with some new material after the ED. I usually skip that part to avoid the next-episode preview and potential spoilers, but that’s not something that should be done with this series. *)

Short Synopsis: Setsuna recruits a new and an old Celestial Being.
Highlights: Good to see some build-up for the new setting.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
As for the shows I’m not blogging:
– Kannagi has excellent production-values, but at the same time the characters move like robots with weightless hair.
– To Aru Majutsu no Index… the freaking building was on fire, complete with fire alarm and sprinklers. Why the heck did nobody notice anything? Why was the building still in one piece?
– The sister in Kemeko Deluxe downright sucks. The second episode already shows that the inspiration (and budget) was running out. There are enough better comedies this season.

In any case, this series is quite refreshing after Code Geass and Macross Frontier of the past season. I like the 4-year time-skip a lot, and it has a lot of potential, but there still are a few questionable parts here and there. It’s great to see that Setsuna has grown up, but at the same time Saji is turning into the new Setsuna: the central immature character who questions everything and grows as the series continues. Ah well, at least he is just of the type that needs to calm down, but at the same time, I really don’t hope that he’s going to hijack a Gundam to kick Nena’s behind…

The different growth of the characters really differs from character to character: Soma didn’t change a bit, while Sumeragi lost all of her confidence in the past few years. Louise also surprised me that she turned into a soldier, but at the same time Tieria still feels pretty much the same as he did in the first season. I think a huge task of the first half of this season is going to be to establish the development for every single one of them, and make them feel more complete. Marina Ismael: what has she been doing for the past four years, really?

The OP and Ed are pretty much the same stuff. I really don’t get it: this series has a great soundtrack, which became even better with the second season, and yet it’s stuck with the OPs and EDs full of cheesy J-Rock. And to think that Gundam Wing had an such excellent OP. Ah well, at least the battles got some extra budget when compared to the first season, but I’d just wish that the creators would spend it on something other than flashy Solar Furnaces. The sparkles are nice and all, but they don’t really add anything.

Oh, and while it may seem that I’m criticizing a lot here, I actually really liked this episode. With a huge setting also come huge risks, and I appreciate this series to take a gamble and go with such a complex setting. It can fall apart very easily, but when it works, the results can turn out very interesting. And I guess that that’s the appeal of this series: it may make a few mistakes here and there, but it never forgets to remain solid and consistent. Really, the two mecha-epics this season promise to surpass the mecha-epics of previous season in every way, apart from perhaps Macross Frontier’s huge budget, but let’s not get too ahead of the facts.

What the? Did these people hear my prayers or what?? Major spoilers coming up in the next paragraph, and I really mean MAJOR spoilers. This is really an episode where Gundam has really set itself apart from the major other Mecha-epics. This line is here to prevent spoilers to appear on the blog-aggregators like animeblogger antenna.

Great god! I remember making a number of predictions about how this episode would turn out, and none of them came true. Has there really been another series that had the guts to kill off its main cast halfway through? I don’t remember any. And that’s the great thing about this episode, because there were a lot of great characters who remained alive. The technician and Sumeragi are fine and will play a major role in the second season as well, Soma Pieres and Papa Bear also have survived against all odds. Allelujah may be dead, but Hallelujah still shows signs of surviving.

One big surprise was also Graham Acre dying and then getting revived again four years later, bearing the mask that seems to be some kind of trademark for Gundam-series, and the annoying Alehandro Corner kicked the bucket as well. While there was a lack of politics, this remains without a doubt my favourite episode of this series, simply because it shattered so many stereotypes I had about this series. And not to mention, the fights were actually really well done. In the end, it indeed turns out that Livonze will be the major bad guy for the second season.

And then there was the aftermath, and the introduction to the second season. At the moment, I really have no idea what direction it’ll go. The earth is united, there’s no need left for the Gundams, and yet new models have been constructed, along with the help of Nena, the only surviving throne. I remember that the professor once noted that the unison of the world wasn’t Aeolia Schenberg’s original goal, so what would it have been? It looks like Nena will play a whole different role in the second season than I could have imagined.

Saji has also started working on the solar generator, though thankfully four years have passed now, so he isn’t an angsty teenager anymore. Thank god for that. I also loved how Setsuna sent his final messages not to his comrades, but to Marina Ismael. The impact she had on him turned out to be much larger than I expected. I do wonder whether she managed to solve all the problems in her home-country, though.

Some small things: I was surprised to see that Patrick’s still alive. We only see a glimpse of him, but it really looked like Tieria killed him back then. Also note how we never get to see Ali al Sarshes’ eyes. Did something happen to them? And who was this Tieria-lookalike near Louise, and what was Louise doing with him in the first place? The second season will probably shed light into who Nena, Tieria and Livonze are. Livonze also turned out to have some clones with him, so why wouldn’t this be the case for Tieria as well? Although I’d shiver at the thought of an army of Nena’s.

To finish this entry, I just can’t resist another Code Geass reference. It’s just such a good series to show how things should not be done. And the thing I’m talking about here is the cliff-hanger of the first season. I mean, it’s just too predictable: you just know that both Lelouch and Suzaku will both magically survive, and it’s not a god thing to have to wait nine months to confirm that this indeed is the case. Thankfully, in the meantime Dragonaut has showed up and brought us an even cheesier rivalry between childhood friends, and it looks like even Code Geass will be better than that one. I think that the thing that Code Geass needs to do for its second season is to stop putting so much attention to Lelouch, and instead focus more on the side-characters.

I’m not sure whether I should be happy or not to have been spoiled about the contents of this episode. In any case, I was right, and this episode basically built up for the major turning-point for this series that’ll happen in episode 25, but I never thought that it’d do this in such an extreme way.

There were several things wrong with this episode, though. And I’m not referring to the bloodbath. If the circumstances are right, then why not kill off a bunch of characters? It’s a great contrast with series that are just too afraid to kill off their characters because it’ll upset the fans or something. Just to give a small list of who died in this episode (obvious SPOILER warning)

– Tieria Erde
– Patrick Colasour
– Christina Sierra
– Lichtendahl Tsery

Which, if I’m not mistaken, brings the total body-count to ten important characters dead, eleven if Ali al Sarshes kicked the bucket as well.

In any case, my problem isn’t with these deaths. It’s with the sudden uber-technologies that suddenly got introduced out of nowhere. Okay, I can understand why Aeolia Scheinberg never put the Trans-am in his plans. It makes sense that he and his scientists discovered this technology at one point, but decided not to implement it due to the potential dangers of its limited usage. I can live with that.

But where did he pull such a huge space-ship from, and why the heck didn’t he use it?! With such a big cannon, it would have been perfect as an added safety-measure. Really, if the creators wanted, they could have used much better reasons to kill off the members of the cast. The enemies are really no idiots, and I could imagine a few sneaky battle-tactics that would have destroyed the Ptolemy anyway.

And this is just a minor detail, but Lichtendahl was badly developed. I only now realize this once he’s dead, but we should have gotten an introduction that androids or cyborg actually exist. The lieutenant… I still have no idea whether she was a cyborg as well, or just genetically modified. Before this episode, we hardly saw anything about him, which makes his death lack the impact it could have had.

But on the positive side: there was no Saji!

It really seems that Marina Ismael and Saji were meant to be characters for the second season. The next episode will probably kill off much more people, making the Celestial Beings disband without a doubt, and the survivors will probably be the main characters for the second season. Setsuna is the only one where I can say with certainty that he’ll live, as Allelujah also looked pretty bad in this episode.

This is just a guess, but it seems quite likely that the main characters for the second season will be Nena, Setsuna, Marina and Saji, with the major villains being Alehandro and Ali. Of course, there’ll probably be much more characters introduced, but I’m worried: these four are the most immature members of the entire cast. My biggest worry right now is that every sensible member of the cast will get killed off in the next episode. Please make at least one of Sumeragi, Feldt, Lasse or that mechanic-guy survive!