History Anime / MobileSuitZetaGundam

* ObligatoryWarCrimeScene: Bombings, taking of hostages, murdering of hostages, usage of chemical weapons, deliberate bombardment of civilian targets, a ColonyDrop... It's clear that for all that the Titans call the AEUG terrorists, ''they're'' the ones who default to terrorist tactics.

* CreepyCoolCrosses: Present only in ''A New Translation''. To further highlight his Dark Messiah nature that was barely touched upon in the original, Scirocco's The O emits a cross-shaped beacon from its head to guide the Titan fleet with. [[spoiler:He winds up getting distracted by the Char/Haman psychodrama and leads his fleet right into the path of the colony laser]].

* PietaPlagiarism: When [[spoiler:Four]] amd [[spoiler:Emma]] die, Kamille holds their bodies this way.

* UnfortunateNames: Quattro Bajeena, Jamitov Hymem, and [[TheCasanova Scirocco's]] "The O" mobile suit.
** The official English spelling of Quattro Bajeena in Japan is Quattro Vagina.
** As bizarre as it sounds, this may actually be ThemeNaming. The disfunctional, controlling relationships between men and women are a major theme of this series, made explicit by [[spoiler: Reccoa's]] last words. Three of the most disfunctional, controlling main characters having names based on female anatomy actually kinda fits.
** While Jamitov and Quattro might be theme naming, Gundam Historica 11 confirms The O is named for Theo, a name which derives its meaning from the Greek word for God. Similarly, Scirocco's unfortunate first name is apparently a corruption of the [[SmartPeopleKnowLatin latin]] word Baptisma (a subtle reference to his DarkMessiah role) despite English speakers thinking of a certain term women are likely to hear from their gynecologists when they hear it.

** SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: The Titans are supposedly all-powerful among the Earth Federation forces, and big enough to proclaim they "rule" Earth with no one being able to disobey their orders. They're also reviled enough for their atrocities that multiple LaResistance forces have cropped up in their own supposed backyard, are similarly inefficient to the original Zeon due to the behind-the-scenes grabs for power among the commanding officers, and eventually [[spoiler:lose all of their power when recordings of their atrocities and gratuitous collateral damage destroy what public perception they have left and force the Federation to disband them to avoid association with what's effectively become a failure of a StateSec.]]

* NotSoDifferent: Jamitov and Scirocco, apparently. While the former appears to be little more than a figurehead of thuggish Earthnoid supremacists, in reality his goals are apparently the same as those Scirocco espouses: mass human migration from the Earth and into space. The difference between them is one of approach: Scirocco considers himself an "observer" who is content mostly to watch and only pulls strings when he thinks he has to, while Jamitov takes a more active and brutish hand. This is ultimately why Scirocco turns against him and kills him.

* RealityEnsues: The Titans are supposedly all-powerful among the Earth Federation forces, and big enough to proclaim they "rule" Earth with no one being able to disobey their orders. They're also reviled enough for their atrocities that multiple LaResistance forces have cropped up in their own supposed backyard, are similarly inefficient to the original Zeon due to the behind-the-scenes grabs for power among the commanding officers, and eventually [[spoiler:lose all of their power when recordings of their atrocities and gratuitous collateral damage destroy what public perception they have left and force the Federation to disband them to avoid association with what's effectively become a failure of a StateSec.]]

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: Throughout the series the Titans and AEUG repeatedly clash, but due to constant damages and limited ammunition on the field they often fall back so they don't lose all their forces in one fell swoop. While this keeps several protagonists and villains alive a lot longer than one would expect, [[spoiler:both sides being forced to fight to the death once and for all in the finale results in [[KillEmAll most of the cast dying]] because they can't afford to retreat.]]

! All spoilers for ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam'' are unmarked. Adminstrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned!

* PowerTrio: A lot of them:
** Kamille, Amuro, and Char
** Kamille, Katz, and Fa.
** Quattro, Apolly, and Roberto.
** Scirocco, Sarah, and [[spoiler: Reccoa]].
** Yazan, Dunkel, and Ramsus.

** As bizarre as it sounds, this may actually be ThemeNaming. The disfunctional, controlling relationships between men and women are a major theme of this series, made explicit by [[spoiler: Reccoa's]] FamousLastWords. Three of the most disfunctional, controlling main characters having names based on female anatomy actually kinda fits.

* PuttingOnTheReich:

''Zeta Gundam'' features a much older and mature new cast; however, this new cast is also supported by many characters from the original series such as Captain Bright Noah, Amuro Ray, and Char Aznable wearing a PaperThinDisguise as Quattro Bajeena.

** After Fa has a brief argument with Shinta and Qum while the Argama is docked at the moon, the kids are nowhere to be seen, and they are presumed to have made their way into the city when shortly after, a plot to blow the entire area where the Argama is docked is discovered. When [[spoiler:they fail to disarm the bomb and the Argama is forced to take off without finding them]] Kamille and Fa are heartbroken. [[spoiler:Though the bomb couldn’t be taken care of, Shinta and Qum were thankfully just hiding in the shower, thinking they’d get back at Fa by hiding in the shower, since she’d never think to look there.]]

* AnimationBump: The Compilation Films, being made twenty years after the original series, feature considerably better animation in some places. Unfortunately, Sunrise wouldn't give Tomino the budget to completely re-animate everything, so the new animation is mixed in with hefty amounts of the original footage and there is a stark contrast as a result.

** Finally averted with the PMX-003 The O, which was simply too big and tough for beam guns to make a dent in its armor. Paptimus Scirocco's engineering genius probably helped, too.

** Emma doesn't do anything too flashy, but she's the most consistently reliable of the pilots the Argama has to offer and easily qualifies as TheAce after her first few battles.

* BattleCouple: Jerid & Mouar, and possibly Jerid and Lila. [[spoiler: neither one ends well.]]
* BewareTheSuperman: Amuro's exploits during the OYW have instilled in the Federation a healthy fear of Newtypes, to the point where they have placed Amuro under house arrest and have much of the former White Base crew under surveillance. While this results in some unforgivable acts of cruelty, the ambitions and exploits of Paptimus Scirocco and Haman Karn show the audience what evil Newtypes are capable of.

** Fa always tries to establish herself among the other pilots of the Argama and only manages to do it a handful of times rather than consistently. It's even worse when the most she's able to get her hands on is the Methuss, which also qualifies for this trope.

** Bright somberly notes that he lost "[[Anime/MobileSuitGundam another]]" ship when he's forced to abandon the Temptation after he and the rest of the survivors from the Green Noa attack meet up with the Argama.
** To try and play up the idea that he's a person separate from Char, early in the series, Quattro feigns either ignorance or some admiration when he refers to characters and plot beats from the last series, such as saying he knows he can trust Hayato's and Kai's expertise because they were former members of the White Base.
* CartwrightCurse: Between Jerid and Kamille, [[spoiler: Mouar, Lila, Four and Rosamia are killed off. The first three get killed off by their love interest's rival, and the last is simply killed by Kamille to prevent her from destroying the Argama.]] As a point of interest, this is just one of the reasons Kamille and Jerid become rivals.
* ChickMagnet: Paptimus Scirocco. He manages to end the series with a harem of Newtype women ace pilots, most of which had defected to his side. He basically makes bishie charm a ''newtype power''. Kamille gets a bit of this as well, with Fa, Four Murasame, Rosamia, Sarah and arguably Emma...

* CoolBigSis: Emma to most of the younger members of the Argama, though for Kamille in particular she also borders on being a mother figure on top of it. Reccoa was also one for Kamille. [[spoiler:Until she defected, that is]].

* CreepyCoolCrosses: Present only in ''A New Translation''. To further highlight his Dark Messiah nature that was barely touched upon in the original, Paptimus Scirocco's The-O emits a cross-shaped beacon from its head to guide the Titan fleet with. [[spoiler:He winds up getting distracted by the Char/Haman psychodrama and leads his fleet right into the path of the colony laser]].

* DealWithTheDevil: In order to get help in disabling a Titan superweapon before it can destroy Granada, the AUEG is forced to [[spoiler:promise Haman Karn their support in restoring the Zabi family to control of Side 3 (Zeon), setting the stage for the sequel series.]]

* DownerEnding: Although [[spoiler: Kamille succeeds in destroying Paptimus Scirocco for good, his brain gets fried in retaliation as well. The evil Titans are finally annihilated for good, but save for Fa, Quattro, and Bright, all the other heroes of AEUG die a horrible death, and Haman Karn successfully gives Zeon a rise to its former power, shadowing the future of Earth once again.]]
** The Compilation Movies changed this [[spoiler:to something more bittersweet: yes, most of the cast still die. Yup, there's still a lot of bloodshed. However, Kamille doesn't get mind-fried, we see other characters reacting to the news (which includes Amuro, the Kobayashi family and Mirai), Haman retreats and arranges for Mineva to go to school on Earth, and the last scene is of Fa and Kamille hugging in space happily.]]

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Scirocco, who starts the series as TheStarscream, opposes the actions of his overlords Jamitov and Bask, and even sends his pawn Sarah Zabiarov to disrupt one of their plans. Granted, it was for self-serving purposes...

* EvilWearsBlack: The Titans have distinctive black uniforms to emphasize their StateSec nature and military rule, while Haman Karn's black clothing goes with her status as Evil Chancellor of Axis and would-be conqueror of Earth.

* FamedInStory: The surviving White Base crew in general are this, being treated as veterans and war heroes in public. In private however, TheFederation see likes of Amuro and Bright as a threat, in part due to and in spite of said reputation.

* FinalBossPreview: [[spoiler:Scirocco sorties against the Argama crew a couple times early in the series. After that he's not seen piloting a mobile suit again until the last five episodes.]]

* ForegoneConclusion: The moment that the EF Parliament outlaws the Titans, there is no longer a way for them to win. With nowhere left to turn except Haman Karn (who is simply using them for her own ends), the Titans are going down, no matter who wins out. The question is not if the Titans will lose, but rather how many of our heroes they are going to take down with them.

** Similarly, it is quite noticeable how '''''no one''''' in the main cast is smiling (apart from Four Murasame) in the 2nd Opening (even Kamille's gearing up in his normal suit with thumbs up edits the smile away). [[DownerEnding We all know where they were headed]].
** When Reccoa is first sent to try and infiltrate the Jupitris, only to meet Scirocco, she's still able to give very detailed sketches of what she saw of the ship's interior, save for one particular mobile suit that she strangely can't recall and leaves blank in its placement in the hangar in her sketches. [[spoiler: This mobile suit is the Palace Athene, which she will eventually pilot come her FaceHeelTurn]].

* GildedCage: It's revealed that Amuro and a number of the surviving White Base crew are kept under watch by the Federation authorities. That they're given rather comfortable lifestyles doesn't really distract from the overbearing dread.
* GoldColoredSuperiority: Char Aznable of Gundam fame changes his usual color from red in the original ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam'' to gold here [[spoiler:where he fights for the AEUG, piloting the Hyaku-Shiki under the alias of Quattro Bajeena]] The idea being that the Gold paintjob as actually an anti-beam coating. He goes back to using red for Char's Counterattack though. Even more iconic about this change is that Char caused [[CharClone an entire trope]] in part about his normal color scheme.

* HateSink: Whereas the Titan leaders Jamitov and [[DarkMessiah Paptimus]] have some leeway to be viewed as {{Well Intentioned Extremist}}s, and Haman UsedToBeASweetKid, these four subordinates are far more detestable:
** [[GeneralRipper Bask Om]], the second-in-command of [[StateSec the Titans]], is introduced beating war-hero Bright Noah for opposing a dangerous order. Favoring brutality in his army, Bask takes Kamille Bidan's mother as a hostage to retrieve the Gundam MK-II before lying to his soldier to get him to shoot at her capsule, killing her in front of her son. Using the Titans to commit multiple atrocities against them, the Titans use nerve gas against whole space colonies--killing all of their inhabitants--and experiment on teenagers to create Cyber Newtypes, unstable soldiers in semi-perpetual agony. Murderous, hateful and violent, Bask's brutality makes him stand out as the worst of the leadership of the Titans, leading to their being outlawed and eventual downfall. Notably, even ''the other Titans'' hate this guy -- including fellow Hate Sink Yazan!

** [[PsychoForHire Yazan Gable]] is a sadistic warmonger who joined the Titans to be able to kill people legally. Uncaring about the rules of war, he participates in an attempted ColonyDrop on a populated city and later arranges the death of an officer trying to prevent unnecessary bloodshed. Joining Paptimus Scirocco purely [[OnlyInItForTheMoney for the promise of cash]], Yazan [[HeroKiller kills many heroes]] from the Anti Earth Union Group--whom he considers "full of women and children"--and even kills one of his own allies while showing no concern at the deaths of his most friendly subordinates. Defeated by Kamille, Yazan survives the battle and [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ several days later]], he persuades a group of poor teenagers to infiltrate the Argama to steal the Zeta Gundam, taking the opportunity to kill another AEUG soldier before failing. Pathetically trying several attempts to steal the Zeta Gundam, Yazan joins Neo Zeon's soldiers, betraying the very purpose of the Titans. A beast in the skin of a man, Yazan earns the hatred of both Kamille and Judau.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: The bulk of [[spoiler:the Titan fleet] is destroyed by [[spoiler:a captured Titan WaveMotionGun]].

* IDidWhatIHadToDo: Bask Ohm tells Reccoa at one point that the Titans want a peaceful Earth Sphere, and their extreme methods are a result of impatience. However any possibility of a spark of goodness is extinguished when [[spoiler: he laughs maniacally after firing the Gryps Laser for the first time, killing an entire colony worth of civilians.]]

* LadyOfWar: Haman Karn, Emma Sheen.
* LaResistance: AEUG.
* LastVillainStand: Episodes 46-50 can be seen as one for Paptimus Scirocco and the Titans as a whole, as the AEUG, the EF, and Axis all try to find a way to co-opt or destroy what remains of the once mighty elite military force.

* LightIsNotGood: Titan baddie Paptimus Scirocco wears a variant of the standard black Titans uniform - guess what color he picks?

** The AEUG's Rick Dias is basically the designated suit for these. One of the Argama's Dias pilots, the unfortunately-named Lieutenant Botty, even manages to survive the show in one piece.
** Zeta also produced a couple of mauve shirts for this section of the Universal Century with the crew of the Argama. Torres, Saegusa, Astonage, Keithron, Anna Hanna, Dr. Hasan and others become recurring characters throughout this series, ZZ, Char's Counterattack, and Unicorn.

** A dark variation. The Titans, being a StateSec organization, have no respect for any military protocol that isn't their own; Bright Noa is beaten half to death for trying to bring them into line.

* MoreThanMindControl: Scirocco's modus operandi seems to be this. In addition to his immense reserves of personal charisma he can use his Newtype abilities to influence the emotions of others, as seen with Sarah and [[spoiler:Reccoa]] in ''Jupitris Infiltration''.
* MythologyGag: When Quattro's personal red Rick Dias is destroyed, he uses the Gundam Mk. II until he gets the Hyaku-Shiki, which is a nod to how Char ends up allying with White Base in the [[Literature/MobileSuitGundam Mobile Suit Gundam novels]] and gets his own personal Gundam to pilot after beginning any continuity on the mission to investigate or destroy it.
* NervesOfSteel: Only two pilots in ''Zeta'' have nerves of steel sufficient to pilot their MS without wearing Normal Suits: Paptimus Scirocco and Haman Karn. Everyone else, Kamille, Quattro, even ''Yazan'', all wear Normal Suits unfailingly. This seems to be a quirk of advanced Newtypes, as Quess Paraya of ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamCharsCounterattack Char's Counterattack]]'' and Iron Mask of ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamF91 Gundam F91]]'' would follow in their footsteps.

* ObligatoryWarCrimeScene: Bombings, taking of hostages, murdering of hostages, usage of chemical weapons, deliberate bombardment of civilian targets, a ColonyDrop... For all that the Titans call the AEUG terrorists, ''they're'' the ones who default to terrorist tactics.

* OpportunisticBastard: Jerid acts like a model Titan, but in truth he really doesn't care about their ideology. Interestingly enough, very few Titans actually do, to the point where one wonders if Bask Ohm is the only Titan who actually ''believes in'' being a Titan.

* PsychicPowers: Newtypes have these, though most of them are [[HowDoIShotWeb not very in control of their abilities]]. Haman Karn and Paptimus Scirocco represent two of the only Newtypes who ''are'' fully in control of their gifts, and their appearances show the {{Muggles}} of the UC world why they should BewareTheSuperman.
* PsychoForHire: Yazan Gable, a {{Sadist}} who joined the Titans simply to have an outlet for his SociopathicSoldier tendencies.
** PsychoSupporter: He evolves from a PsychoForHire into this after he throws his support behind Paptimus Scirocco.
* PuttingOnTheReich: The Titans. At one point, Bright even calls them a reincarnation of Zeon.

* ReassignedToAntarctica: For being the captain of ''White Base'' and his service in the One Year War, Bright found himself granted the "honor" of being the captain of a transport ship for the Earth Federation's high-ranking officials, while his wife and children are forced to live in Jaburo to guarantee his loyalty. In other words, reduced to a glorified chaffeur for the Feddies' elite (and getting beaten close to death by the Titans) until deciding to join the AEUG. Still, his status as a war hero is renowned enough to earn fans, including Kamille.

* {{Retcon}}: The third CompilationMovie gives us a BittersweetEnding instead of the original DownerEnding: [[spoiler: Kamille survives the duel with Scirocco more or less unscatched and is reunited with Fa and the rest of the Argama crew. Also, additional footage includes the reactions of characters like Amuro, Beltochika, Fraw, Retsu, Kikka, Mirai, Sayla and Kai.]] Despite some fans' insistence, WordOfGod is that this does '''not''' retcon ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ Gundam ZZ]] out of existence.

* SpellMyNameWithAThe: Paptimus Scirocco's personal ride, the PMX-003 The O. Yes, those two 'the's were intentional.

* StockholmSyndrome: In the Compilation Films at least, Amuro is shown to have developed this towards the "attendants" at his GildedCage. Though it's downplayed in that he's perfectly aware that they're all Federation minders tasked with keeping an eye on him, he's come to consider them as family.

** Kamille evokes this trope when Sarah tries to make a getaway after failing to disarm the bombs on a moon city. He angrily shouts this trope word for word as he punches her in the stomach to knock her out, but ends up bringing her back to the Argama before they take off safely, presumably to get Sarah to understand the severity of her actions without letting her have a KarmaHoudini.

* TooDumbToLive: Katz, who the AEUG never should have put in uniform. He's a reasonably skilled pilot in the G-Defenser, but he's still a child playing at being a soldier, and ultimately RealityEnsues hits him in the face hard.

** Paptimus Scirocco's Messala is in fact the first transformable mobile suit ever seen in a Gundam series.

* UnfortunateNames: Quattro Bajeena, Jamitov Hymem, and [[TheCasanova Paptimus Scirocco's]] "The O" mobile suit.

* VictoryGuidedAmnesia: In a borderline and probably one of the most sad examples of this trope, [[spoiler:Kamille gets his mind broken by Scirocco in the finale, not only making him forget everything that had ever happened to him, but also diminishing his mental capabilities, making his mental state somewhere between a vegetable and a young child.]]

* WeakButSkilled: Most of the Argama crew, and the AEUG in general, didn't really have too many ace pilots. Most of the pilots were at best, average. Yet, Fa held her own in the Methuss, Roberto actually had some really great kills early on, and Apolly managed to save the day a few times, most notably [[spoiler: sacrificing himself for Fa]] and bringing the Zeta Gundam to Kamille.

* WorfEffect: Char, ultimately. Despite being one of the most experienced pilots, he is usually knocked out or suffers damage. Hell, despite being arguably a better pilot than either Haman or Scirocco, he can't score ANY decisive blows on them. It doesn't help that his mobile suit, the Hyaku Shiki, is a failed prototype (Delta Gundam) that, while a high performance unit, is also plagued with frame defects from being an experimental transforming mobile suit.
** Char has more experience than Haman and Scirocco, but the two of them are both stronger as newtypes, and their respective mobile suits were each superior to Char's Hyaku Shiki. Also, they initially double-teamed him, and by the time Kamille entered the fray Hyaku Shiki was already heavily damaged.

* {{Yandere}}: Just about any woman who encounters Scirocco, but most notably Sarah and Reccoa.

* {{Fanservice}}: There's a bit here and there, such as the brief shot of Lieutenant Lila in the shower, or Fa being in the shower while trying to wash Qum and Shinta, or Four taking a bath, or Rosamia with her shirt off.

During its initial run, Zeta had the highest rating of any Gundam series before and since. The show continues to be extremely popular in Japan, and its model kit sales continually get near the top of the Gundam lists. As a result, the show is also more or less the ''single'' most important production, from a meta-textual perspective, in the entire ''Gundam'' franchise; while ''Mobile Suit Gundam'' kicked the franchise off, it is ''Zeta Gundam'' that established the tone and ideal of what "Gundam" should be in the zeitgeist, and ''every single Gundam show'' that's followed in the decades since ''Zeta'' aired owes something to it. Every single one. Yes, even ''SD Gundam''.

!!Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam has examples of:

* FakeShemp: Sunrise used Creator/YouInoue's voice-over clips for Sayla Mass' appearance in ''A New Translation''.

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: One of the worst offenders in anime history - pick any character on the cast, and you're guaranteed to find at least three different variations on his or her name. Special mention goes to Quattro Bajeena, whose last name has been romanized in a very... [[GettingCrapPastTheRadar ''interesting'']] way on occasion.

Starting April 6, 2017, the series has been streamed publicly through Website/YouTube in [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJV1h9xQ7Hx8BmOF6F1QBoQ--CVxo4WGF the official Gundam.info channel]].[[note]]Subtitled in EN, HK, TW and KR.[[/note]]

* FollowTheLeader: The emphasis on TransformingMecha makes sense when you consider what came out between the original series and ''Zeta''--specifically, ''Anime/SuperDimensionFortressMacross'' and ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'' (along with its predecessor lines Diaclone and Microman). This posed a problem with the model kits for years as some of the mecha designs were nearly impossible to translate to toy form. Zeta's transformation was a particular problem since it involves the abdomen scrunching together and the arms folding in, a feat that was unable to be pulled off reliably until the Master Grade Zeta 2.0 released in 2004. If anything, the ''Zeta'' designs forced model technology to advance rapidly.

* AuthorAppeal: ''Zeta Gundam'' was the first ''Gundam'' anime in which the themes of overpopulation and environmentalism featured in a major way. In real life, Tomino himself is deeply concerned with these issues, and they would appear in every ''Gundam'' anime he writes from this series onwards.

* YourCheatingHeart: Franklin Bidan, Kamille's father, has a mistress named Margarita. ''Everyone'', from Kamille to Bask Om, brings her up in the few episodes before he dies. Of note is that nearly every Titans member that catches wind of it from eavesdropping uses it to put Kamille's father down.