gundam 00 2
Categories: anime, episodic review, gundam
Tagged: gundam 00
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Greatest. Toy. Commercial. Ever.
(Yeah, I getting sucked in.)
I hate to admit it, but poor naming choices aside, they have a good setup for the series. The three nations playing brinksmanship with the space elevator, and Celestial Being determined to stop them by destroying their will to fight each other or their ability to fight, whichever comes first. There is a legit story that could be told. The problem is how long will Sunrise stick to its guns and actually follow through on this premise and how many more occurrences we’re going to get of paradoxes like Hummers in a world that has run out of fossil fuels.
But what Gundam 00 does well, sell toys, it does exceptionally well. This episode was a nice showcase for the four models, showing off their capabilities, and resembling an NBA All-Star game in terms of gratuitous showboating. The fact that the HRL, AEU, and Union are talking about the Gundams is another example that the Gundams are the true stars of the show, and maybe that’s the way it should be. There’s as much mecha eye candy here as Mayu eye candy for Ninomiya 2. HD serves the show well, and the animation is noticeably improved from Destiny.
Points of Interest
Reason enough to watch Gundam 00. Andohbytheway, my Ms. Wong image folder is now almost larger than my Yoko image folder. The fanboy community has really, really been working hard. If only this energy and devotion could be used to find alternatives to fossil fuels or ending war.
(I hope Ms. Wong– I’m calling Wong Ryumin that to distinguish from Mai Otome‘s Mr. Wong– becomes Gundam 00′s version of Sara from Doujin Work where every episode she shows up in a different outfit. I vote for meido next.)
The mecha fodder looks more realistic and more like the mecha from Gasaraki. Watching Exia and company slice through them like a knife through butter, I was thinking has there been a historical battle featuring such lopsided technology? I mean besides my Civ IV games. Maybe when Japan invaded China in World War II or Operation Desert Storm.
I’m confused on how you can build a highly advanced weapon system and not have people know about it. They must test them out, right? Maybe they use the same defense contractor as Stargate SG-1… how the hell does the government build all those starcruisers without the public knowing?
So I was actually right in my previous post that Union is actually American plus Japan. I’m not sure what to feel about this depiction as Union seems to be focused on money and profits. And then there’s a blond vaporous Louise… is this how the Japanese see typical Americans? Egads.
(Though Louise has the same seiyuu as Natsumi.)
Acre is the new Mwu La Fraga? I hope so. All Gundam series needs the cocky pilot… the Gundam Meisters all seem to have a bug up their collective asses. They are an upgrade over the druggies of Destiny or the Zaft crew. Still, if I had to make up a Gundam team, I’d lead off with some random, clumsy hawt female (All Woman Mikuru), have a drunk as the long range specialist, a fat dude as the heavy weapons specialist, and Master Chief to round out the gang.
The other Gundam Meisters questioning the emotional stability of the “kid” Gundam Meister? I had episode four in the anime blogger pool. Damn it.
24 Responses to “gundam 00 2”
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I wonder if they can keep up this level of awesomeness, because right now, I’ve been enjoying these 2 episodes more than I did with the whole Seed+Destiny (which doesn’t say much but I actually liked them OTL) and I would hate if the series started to make use of old Seed tricks to just drag around stills of the mobile suits to save animation. : x
On a side note: There needs to be moar fanart of the pink-haired navigator girl. While her appearances have been brief, I need to confirm if she’s level A Hawke-class or lower as soon as possible!
I theorize that the Gundams were built using Nazi gold since the spokesman on JNN was German and wore a dark SS-ish uniform with Jackboots. War to end all Wars eh? Well I guess we all know who did not fight at the Somme, Verdun, or the Western Front in1914-1918…
Superb episode of Gundam showcase, cultural stereotypes, and queer eye fabulous. Hopefully we can get Jews VS. Arabs, Muslim extremist VS. West, and Christian extremists VS. all in the upcoming episodes. Another missed opportunity was the total lack of redesign for the AEU meeting place. I mean u got Made in China White House complete with the red colors, the pointy roofs, and even the interior pretty much like the White House why not make an European White House with the bullfighting ring in the east wing, the pizza place in the west wing, and quiet English guards dressed like Liberace.
I think that from now on, whenever I watch Gundam 00 I’ll think of the 4 pilots as the Gundam Park kids. There’s the blue and red Setsuna = Stan, the green Lockon =Kyle, the always in cocoon form orange Allelujah = Kenny, and the purple fabulous fat boy = Cartman.
My Gundam All-Star 4 team would be Rena Gundam for the great hatchet skills plus before rushing to battle she’ll yell histerically “I AM USOOO DAAA” , Siesta Gundam for the healing service, Guchuko Gundam has beams and scythe, and Zetsubou Gundam for the all around emo.
Really?
I was kind of bored halfway through the episode
Maybe it’s an acquired taste.
I think her actual Chinese name is Wang Liu Ming. Except it sounds like a guy’s name.
Hm, watched these two eps.
Shinn Asuka combines with Sagara Souske to bring a new emo kid up as hero…
Then we have the typical stereotypes of boys.
We have a distance gundam(buster), transformable gundam(aegis) and BFG gundam(from Gundam 0083) along with a melee version of Freedom.
Small changes to existing gundams and voila…
Which makes the show feel kinda boring.
The girls sofar are looking great on the other hand. So I´ll watch the show, since above all, it is Gundam.
Celestial Being’s whole ‘Don’t fight or we will kill you’ modus operandi reminds me of the Ikumi Oze dictatorship in Infinite Ryvius.
I can think of some very lopsided colonial slaughters (rifle vs. spear) involving the British Army. Though it didn’t always go to plan – on time they broke open their ammo boxes only to find that due to a supply mixup, they were full of nourishing biscuits.
Now if you’ll excuse me I have an overwhelming urge to go buy some plastic models of robots . . .
Well, animation quality remains superb, a definite improvement over Seed/Destiny as you said. Still, 00 carries a lot of obvious baggage from previous gundam shows, but I think I went over that already in ep 01 post.
Sadly predictable, but Africa was again the redheaded stepchild of the continents; although AEU’s solar power tower stands squarely in African territory, they are not part of the union nor any explanation given to this arrangement. Amusingly, what could be considered all that matters of Russia – the western parts – were joined to AEU, and all HRA got was… Siberia. Japan, Australia and NZ part of the Union though they are so far away from the American tower? Talk about inconvenient arrangement.
Another oddity was the spaceship Ptolemaios. It’s containers apparently rotate… why? It clearly lacks the diameter to produce any sort of discernible fake gravity, unless it rotated at speeds to make you motion sick. I’ll just put that on account of Sunrise staff’s lack of technical knowledge.
Oh, and the Petshop Boys pilot foursome? I’m getting tired of them already. Fortunately there’s ms. Wong and Life-like Texture ;_; Still waiting on for the plot revelations to come… I can’t see 00 remaining for its whole run as “Celestial Being makes an armed intervention” battle-of-the-week show.
I’m a sucker for fighting robots, and it’s interesting to see one finally bring something realistic to the table as storyline. I think if you look at the current world situation, not much is actually out of place as far as predictions; Africa has always been fodder for imperialism and apparently that hasn’t stopped in this vision of the future.
The story is predictable though. It’s going to degenerate into a fight-a-week, but I think it’s obvious their goals aren’t to stop war but to be the thorn in the side of everyone who uses war as a means of profit.
I’d question less about how they aquired this apparently awsome technology vs. the fact that their space-bound mothership doesn’t apparently ever get picked up on visual scans like the actual mechs do.
Master Chief should BE a gundam, not a pilot.
Gah. I mean, it’s a rotating mechanism for each Gundam to be placed into launch position. Each block is a hangar for the machine.
“I was thinking has there been a historical battle featuring such lopsided technology?”
i think there was an incident in ww2 where a german tank division was attacked by a cavaly unit(??polish??) (not sure if its true), i imagine the results were fairly similar to an episode of gundam.
“I was thinking has there been a historical battle featuring such lopsided technology? I mean besides my Civ IV games.”
Let’s see… American ‘Black Ships’ of Commodore Perry vs Japan, Cortez vs South and Central America (he wiped out the Aztecs with just a few hundred guys!), Alexander the Great vs. Persia.
Opp and I forgot, the German Panzers were better than any tank in WWII by a ratio of over 10:1. The Soviet and American tanks were absolutely no match for the Panzers.
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I’d have to say this show has hands down the best animation of any weekly series in the history of anime. That’s a pretty amazing feat!
Easy. The Philippine Theater of the Spanish-American War, where the American Fleet made the Spanish Armada its bitch.
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For those familiar with SRW:Divine Wars, Celestial Being = Divine Crusaders.
It’s 25th Century AD, and they’re still wearing 20th Century suits and ties…. sigh… WHERE ARE MY SKINTIGHT PLUGSUITS?
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>I think her actual Chinese name is Wang Liu Ming. Except it sounds like a guy’s name.
It’s Wong. The Chinese character means “king”, which is Wong, which is a very large percent of the total Chinese population’s last name. Although I’m still upholding the theory that she’s Chao Rin Shen from Negima… travelled through time AND parallel universes! And she got bustier. Still bent on World Domination perhaps?
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On that issue, I’m wondering why Light-o-kun is named Setsuna despite being a Kashim.
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I haven’t watched many mecha, but the first series that came to mind when I saw the Sri Lankan grunts was Full Metal Panic!. Every year the animation bar is set exponentially higher…
Actually, it is Wang. Wong is just the English spelling adaption of the pronunciation. In Chinese, the -ong suffix has a much different sound.
wait, so the sri lankans has been fighting for 4 centuries, and in the end both got beaten into a “peaceful” resolution by 4 imba gundams?
Best. Peacekeeping. Ever.
Her name is Wan Riu-Min according to the Japanese katakana pronunciation. According to the Chinese pronunciation based on the kanji, it is Wang Liu Mei. In Cantonese, it is pronounced as Wong Lau Mei. Take your pick. If you want to be anal about which is the “original” naming, stick to the Japanese pronunciation. Anyways, very few Chinese or Hongkonger will ever name their daughter “Riu Mei”. It’s just a crap way of taking the Japanese name “Rumi” and trying to pronounce it in Chinese (and it’s still wrong). Face it, the Japanese suck at making up foreign names.
hmm i wonder where our fellow anime blogger gets his collection of wong pictures from….4chan?
>>All Gundam series needs the cocky pilot… the Gundam Meisters all seem to have a bug up their collective asses. They are an upgrade over the druggies of Destiny or the Zaft crew.
Quite honestly, that ain’t sayin much…
>>For those familiar with SRW:Divine Wars, Celestial Being = Divine Crusaders.
Not really. I can see the simularities, but DC’s reason for doing what they did are different from Celestial Being.
Wait a minute… we need the masked man, a Gundam series isn’t complete without it’s masked man.
Love the pretty boy cast. All I gotta say. ^_^