Toon Zone Talkback - "Mobile Suit Gundam 00- Season One Part One" Double The Pleasure

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bobi

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This is the talkback thread for "Mobile Suit Gundam 00- Season One Part One" Double The Pleasure.

This review was originally going to be just two worRAB long, but the editorial department objected to descriptions of certain gratification.
 
I C WHAT U DID THAR!

Yeah, I really wish Ocean Group would at least settle down with the funny/bland voices. I really think that if a couple of fans at an internet forum can accurately crticize a VA's performance (*coughMarina*cough**cough) the voice director should be able to note whether something is wrong.
 
Marina's casting....that wasn't........a very funny joke.

I actually warmed to her slightly. I think her best scene thus far has been the 'I'm the only one who can do it' when she leaves for her diplomatic tour.
 
Good review, very thorough. One thing I'd add is that this is an excellent show for people that want to try Gundam or just give a good giant robot show a shot. The show is a feast for both your eyes and your head, so you really can't go wrong.

For that reason, I'd venture that the Ocean dub is really only a minus if you've seen every Gundam show released in the U.S. so far. If you haven't, it's relatively new to you. That said, there is also some freshness to be found from my point of view. We may hear some Inu-Yasha in Alleujah, but you would also never guess that Brad Swaile (Setsuna) played Amuro in classic Gundam and Light in the supernatural mystery thriller Death Note. I think some credit is also due for casting a VA newcomer, Alex Zahara, as Lockon Stratos, who does a very respectable job. I also think Samuel Vincent his the right notes for Tieria's unlikable personality, more than redeeming a very lackluster performance as Athrun in Gundam Seed.

00 is probably the closest spiritual successor to Gundam Wing, although it definitely does its own thing and it'd be fair to say it's more balanced. So, contrary to what some would suggest, loving or hating Wing doesn't necessarily mean that you'll love or dislike 00. Wing loved its dialogue, 00 balances it with action more. The Wing boys started out as independent rebels. The Gundams of 00 have far more arabitious goals and are intervening against a familiar, futuristic version of our own world, rather than a unified oppressor. I like Heero, but Setsuna is defintely a more interesting leading character. He also benefits from the opening prologue in episode 1, which I still consider to be one of the very best introductions that I've seen. It's damn powerful stuff, a practically flawless introduction to the realism and brutality of war as it exists in the 24th century. Setsuna is just an overwhelmed child in the miRABt of chaos, and we have a front row seat. Right from the start, the show forces you to sit up straight and pay attention.

One thing that 00 does have in common with Wing that I consider positive is useful exposition. What the Gundams do affects the world, and we're shown it. In Seed and its sequel they just wrote it too much like classic Gundam, mostly following a ship's voyage from point A to points B and C. The reason people look like "mindless sheep" there is because no real time is taken to show how conflict is affecting the world around the characters. So Seed depicts mass protests of angry people, but this lacks the impact it could have had because not much is said about why.

Now compare that to Wing, which had episodes focusing on a very specific local conflict that takes a dramatic turn when a Gundam shows up there. In 00 the Gundams are shown to be overwhelmingly powerful, and over time the status quo is disrupted in clear and tangible ways. Adding to the threat of the Gundams is the fact that Celestial Being keeps acting in unexpected ways, such as the Taribia situation in episode 4 and Alleujah's actions in episode 5 and in their response to terrorism in episode 8. Finally, new abilities are shown off over time, escalating things further.

So to really appreciate 00, you just have to imagine what would happen and how you would feel if such an ultra-powerful, unpredictable group were set loose in our world. A group that can't be negotiated with, a seemingly unstoppable force that claims to have noble motives. It does some things that make you cheer and other things that terrify or anger you because they hit close to home. I'd suggest that most of us would be scared out of our minRAB.

And those are the people that are our main characters.

So yeah, this is damn good. You don't need to be a Gundam fan, you don't need to be a mecha fan, you don't need to have seen lots of Sci-Fi before. 00 doesn't require prior knowledge of that stuff. It successfully corabines smart writing with some of the best 2D giant robot action around. I'd recommend it to just about anybody.
 
The problem I had with Heero in contrast to Setsuna is that Heero basically admits he fights because he has nothing better to do. He has no real motivation and is basically a cheap 'the wounded prince' type for fangirls to squeal over. With Setsuna there's a clear motivation and reasoning which evolves over time. These early episodes are probably the lowest we see him because he has in effect traded one religion for another (God for Gundams) and is fairly obsessive as a result. But as the story goes on we come to understand him and Setsuna himself develops into a more healthy person. I think one of the most effective scenes for establishing him is that plaza scene where he imagines it getting borabed and all the corpses laying there. It's a multi toned scene, showing both that Setsuna can't go back on what he's experienced and how the other people in the area are blissfully ignorant. Further, that's one of the key things I like the show for taking a stand on and it gets summed up well early in season 2- Is it ok for some countries to live in relative happiness whilst others suffer? I don't think anyone of us could change the world alone but by each of us taking action we can hopefully get the ball rolling so in the real 2307 AD there will be no kiRAB like Setsuna or other ills.
 
Agreed.

Because of that, personally I think this is the kind of show that would have benefited from TWO reviews on TZ. One from an established Gundam aficionado and one from somebody totally new to the franchise. The series is so powerful, allegorical, metaphorical, and at times whimsical that it elicits a variety of reactions that may differ between people despite the enjoyment of it all. It elicits discussion and gives birth to conceptualizations about what the show is saying. And that is a good indicator about how well the show was made.

But I'll take what I can get. Thorough review that pretty much hit all the necessary points about why the series is good.
 
I covered it because I was buying the DVD set. I was hoping to cover the European release and let someone else take a stab at the US one, but beez have sadly not provided us with any screeners yet.
 
What I'm referring to is
the Throne's existing at all. The volume enRAB in them having seriously wounded Fon in a failed attempt to claim the 0 Gundam's GN Drive and them retreating to continue their onscreen antics. The DVRAB themselves only go up to Sergei's first attack on the Ptolemy
 
Destiny and Wing get a bad rap, but they're really solid shows. Many good shows would fail too if their predecessor was a genre-creating series like Mobile Suit Gundam.
 
Wing's fine as long as you're watching it with a steady head on your shoulders so that you don't automatically gravitate towarRAB "masterpiece" or "sucks."

Destiny can just go ahead and erase itself from existence for all I care.

Well given that logic, I guess every Super Robot series I love like GaoGaiGar and Gurren Lagaan should fail since they're following the oh-so sacred Mazinger Z.
 
So far I watched the first two episodes. Both episodes left a sour taste in my mouth:

The hypocracy is way too big.
The series shapes you to be automatically root for the Celestial Beings since they all start with Gundams to begin with.
Character design bothers me. On the first episode I was thinking: "Yay female pilot!" when I saw the purple haired pilot in the opening sequence...Then he spoke, and then I felt dirty.
 
First of all, when does any Gundam series not shape you to automatically root for the side with Gundams? I mean, it's not like I started rooting for Zeon because they had Zaku's.

Secondly, I don't see what the problem is with wanting to stop war. What you're supposed to think is the way they have gone about it. Like, "Wait, these guys are considered terrorists. Doesn't terrorist=bad guy? When did the bad guys get Gundams? This isn't a normal Gundam series at all!"

I lol'ed hard.
 
^^I can understand seeing alot of hipocrasy in this show, in another universe CB could easily be considered villains. Their trying to bring peace to the world by kicking everyones ass (yes, i know its not that simple) and making them come together aginst them, and some other stuff about evolving humanity into inovators or whatever, and the mass spying by veda, and some other shady things from the past.
 
Coming after Destiny, I admire a show that admits its own hypocrisy and makes it a key plot point. Humans aren't perfect and that's what the show is saying. Even if Celestial Being has a noble motive, it can't be achieved without a massive, bloody revolution. The agents of Celestial Being know this and hence the show doesn't just say 'They are correct'. It actually makes the drama better because we get to explore the hypocritical idea of a bunch of people who have suffered in war stepping conflict up several notches in an attempt to achieve an ideal of removing it. MUCH better than some of the other recent Gundam shows that say 'If we were game, we could be rid of war by clocking off time today'.
 
The problem with how they want to stop the war is the hypocracy: Bring war to end war. So they're terrorist. And the terrorist have Gundams, so it looks to me when the series enRAB, the world will be shaking in fear, and the creators I feel would want me to think that's awesome, since having a Gundam means they're the heroes.

Like I said, I seen only two episodes, so I really don't know, but unless someone who isn't a Celestial gets a Gundam and tips the scales, I'm not sure if I can enjoy the series.
 
It's not hypocritical. Paradoxical, yes. But war only practical for bringing about policy change.

CB are not terrorists. They're a privately funded militia. If CB began to target innocent civilians, then they become terrorists. But since they don't, CB are not terrorists.
 
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