It's a Gundam thread!

It's basically a separate file that contains the subtitles. If the file name and folder are the same as the actual video file, the video player will generally automatically load the subtitle file as well.

Oh, I'm sure the filetype is quite innocuous. I wasn't being terribly serious there.

What's precedent ever done for us?

lol .ass really though there is a 1gig AVI torrent on Toykotosho if you dont want to try the 4gig

anyway the part where Setsuna is going though trying to talk to ELS Tieria sounded so much like Itoshiki-sensei its not even funny.

edited 4th Jan '11 6:09:00 PM by Raso

Sparkling and glittering! Jan-Ken-Pon!

Here something about Gundam that bugs me in general, People like to say it full of Gray-and-Gray Morality, when for the most part it's not. Case in point- In the original 1979 Mobile Suit Gundam series, Amuro and the crew of the White Base are unambiguously portrayed as the good guys and while Zeon is full of sympathetic Anti Villains, It's STILL the Axis Powers in 22th century that wants to dominate their fellow space colonists and is responsible for for the deaths of over three billion people at the very start of the One Year War. How could anyone say that they were in the right? And that just the first series. I think the only Gundam series that fits gray and gray are Gundam0080, Gundam Wing and the first season of Gundam 00.

edited 4th Jan '11 7:12:06 PM by Azxc

Given that most 70s mecha shows had Always Chaotic Evil non-human antagonists, 0079 looked pretty morally ambiguous simply for making its villains actual people. The OVAs retconned the One Year War-era Federation as being worse than they were in the original series, but even in the series their treatment of the White Base and its crew was pretty callous.

Zeta drops most of the ambiguity, though, with the AEUG being pretty much unquestionably in the right. What's weird are people who praise Gundam for its moral complexity and yet name Zeta as their favourite series.

I guess it is.

Well I wouldnt say AEUG was 100% good, all their backers seemed quite shady just rarely showed it in series.

edited 4th Jan '11 7:33:21 PM by Raso

Sparkling and glittering! Jan-Ken-Pon!

@Azxc: Except that Amuro's mother was portrayed as being in the right, most of the Zeon soldiers were portrayed as ordinary human beings, and even relatively nice people (like the guys who plant the bombs on the Gundam), and even Degwin Zabi was humanized to an extent.

There's also the fact that Zeon had every reason to exist given how the colonies were treated by the Federation. They were fighting back to have self-representation. The only problem was they way they did so (especially under Gihren Zabi and Char).

Also, in many of the side stories, you get a glimpse of a lot of awful things the Federation pulled. Like putting a gundam prototype in a neutral colony.

But really, it has nothing to do with them being portrayed as right or wrong. In war, there often is one side who can take the moral high ground, but the thing that gets forgotten most is that the other side is still composed of human beings. That's what I think Gundam did best. It's hard to say 'war is bad' when you portray the other side as being composed entirely of irredeemable monsters.

edited 4th Jan '11 8:38:13 PM by Miijhal

Just finished episode 13 and good god did the voice acting really take a nose dive there. The one offs for the episode just sounded so stilted and pathetic. There was one old person who looked to be cast both as a man and as a woman... The dialogue itself was rather predictable too. Especially this...

"YOU DON'T LOVE ME ANYMORE?!"

Everyone was a dick in this episode too.

edited 4th Jan '11 8:51:44 PM by Aondeug

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

I agree 100%. The thing about Gundam is that it shows good and bad people fighting for both sides (for the most part), but still has the sides themselves be unambigously good and evil (again, for the most part). Gundam has one of the worst cases of Rooting for the Empire that I've ever seen — in short, Zeon has cooler mecha, so that makes them Draco in Leather Pants as far as a large chunk of the fandom is concerned. Gundam was still pretty revolutionary at the time simply for the fact that not every single Zeon soldier was a card-carrying Space Nazi who drinks the blood of their enemies and kicks puppies for fun, though.

Not so much. There's really nothing to suggest that the Federation was abusing the colonies prior to Zeon's secession (Zeon Deikun's deal was more "space is THE FUTURE, so government should be in space instead of on Earth" than "those Earth bastards are being mean to us!"), and the Principality of Zeon established its independence twenty years before the One Year War. The OYW was in no way a rebellion against the Earth Federation — it was a naked power grab by the Zabi family.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

I watched Awakening of the Trailblazer hoping for a 00 equivalent of Astray or Stargazer, but instead I get possibly the worst mecha movie I have ever seen.

So, the 00 Quantha is a Gundam version of that helicopter from Independance Day. It just talks to aliens. I have a feeling that 00 Quantha kits won't be touched and Gunpla builders will buy Strike Freedoms like they are going out of fricking style. and that ending, I Can't believe they came up with a worse ending that Season 2's "Char's Counterattack was awesome! More Peace Dust!" ending.

Maybe 00 just isn't for me. I'll go back to reviewing SEED in the meantime. I'm allmost done with it, thank god.

edited 5th Jan '11 5:39:15 PM by Clawshrimpy

Actually, I quite liked how they used the Quan[T]. In a franchise with such a strong, consistent anti-war vibe, it's always been kind of weird how so many problems are solved by blowing shit up. Having the pinnacle of mecha technology be a device designed to stop conflict without the use of force seemed the natural answer to that, and they even drew dramatic tension from the fact that every piece of spectacular ass-kickery it pulled off directly harmed its chances of properly ending the war - hence Graham's Heroic Sacrifice.

I have my gripes with the movie, but that mech wasn't one of them.

What's precedent ever done for us?

Ah yes, that reminds me of another thing that bugs me about the Gundam fandom. They complain about the "true peace can come through understanding each other and not through more conflict" message that Gundam is all about. Talk about Completely Missing The Point.

edited 6th Jan '11 10:36:42 PM by Azxc

It's an annoying subject to cover when everyone just wants to see giant robot fights.

Fight smart, not fair.

Unfortunately.

It's not a particularly interesting message. Or even one I feel is accurate.

Fight smart, not fair.

The problem is that Gundam has allways been a toy show, and who's gonna buy the toy of the Gundam that solves problems by talking? that's some odd toy marketing there.

The notion of a Gundam movie about alien contact was a pretty stupid premise anyhow. that's Macross's teritory anyway. and singing the bad guys to death is at least more entertaining than.....that. Using plots from Macross didn't work with freaking Lacus Clyne, and it doesn't work here. doesn't help the ELS lack any kind of personality and don't make good villains.

edited 5th Jan '11 9:19:12 PM by Clawshrimpy

Then forgive me for appreciating that they decided to stick to the show's central principle rather than doing something toyetic.

The thing I disliked, though, about them cribbing from Macross was that they didn't really sell the ELS as terribly willing to back off and negotiate, especially not instantaneously. Yeah, I know, aesop = that the willingness to communicate and overcome the barriers between you is the only way to achieve lasting peace, but there is such a thing as setting yourself too much of a challenge. Now, compare the Vajra from Macross Frontier. There, we had good evidence that their overmind was, in fact, the decent, altruistic sort who'd immediately stop with the whole genocide thing once the whole misunderstanding had been cleared up. Indeed, the entire war was started by an altruistic act on its part, seeing as it didn't quite get the concept of individuality and wanted to rescue a fellow Hive Queen (Ranka) from what it thought was a swarm gone haywire. The ELS, meanwhile? Planet Looters fleeing the destruction of their home who already had a highly efficient means of communication that also got them the resources they desperately wanted. There was really nothing stopping them from going "So you want to talk? OK!" and promptly continuing to absorb Setsuna and the rest of humanity. As a result, the rapid conflict-resolution felt less like a natural consequence of the two sides learning to communicate, and more like an enormously lucky break.

What's precedent ever done for us?

Gundam's thing has never been "war is bad and you shouldn't do it", it's always been "war is a necessary evil". The point is that fighting and killing sucks, but it's better than letting the bad guys have their way. The closest they've ever really gotten to "war is always bad forever" is 0080, which was from the point of view of a seven year old whose two best friends were unknowingly fighting to the death for no reason, so that's fairly understandable. There's a few (Wing, 00) about trying to make it so war is no longer necessary, but that in and of itself acknowledges war as a necessary evil

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

See I hate it when people think just because something is merch driven automatically means something is bad. G Gundam was my favorite Gundam show for a reason. Sure, it was a Super Robot show, but the plot got pretty decent later on and it didn't try to hit you over the head with a message.

When a show feels the need to preach something to me, especially something I don't agree with, It doesn't endear itself to me. Such as SEED's need to slap you in face with Fantastic Racism or 00's forced resolution of war.

But I don't think Gundam is a message in the way other shows are. this isn't like Star Trek where each episode had a different message. Sometimes, though, people just want to see giant robots kicking butt, and if you make it more about plotics to the point that conflict doesn't matter anymore, it dissolves the tension.

edited 6th Jan '11 9:31:12 AM by Clawshrimpy

I can't say I really buy it considering war a necessary evil when one considers just how many shows have the central theme of working to end war, and how many others portray it as the sort of bloody, pointless mess that no sane person would ever want to get involved in. In a Gundam series, force only tends to be perceived as good insofar as it can prevent the use of force to solve problems in the long-run, and so a device designed to end conflict through non-violent, non-coercive means, through nothing more than enabling communication, seems to be the natural endpoint for an enlightened civilisation from that perspective.

If you consider war necessary, then there is no point in seeking to end it. If you consider war unnecessary, then you must eventually offer an alternative. That last bit is what 00 tries, if admittedly somewhat haphazardly, to do.

An aesop of the week is not necessary for a show to be message-driven, so long as it has a single, consistent theme throughout its run. Whilst I acknowledge that one should avoid sacrificing too much entertainment value on the altar of your message if at all possible, it seems rather like cowardice to allow a Broken Aesop out of commercial interest when you have set your series out to make a point from episode one. The best solution is to make the delivery of that aesop as entertaining as possible, but that doesn't change the fact that if you want to emphasise that war can only be permanently eliminated through communication and understanding, you'd damn well better either end your story's central conflict through communication and understanding, or show how that would have solved things if your characters hadn't been so bloody pigheaded. If that's not a philosophical standpoint you enjoy, though, then I might suggest that Gundam is possibly not the mecha franchise best suited to your tastes.

Also, I'd say that G Gundam is a poor example to use simply because the creators' rebellion against the merchandise-driven Executive Meddling comprised a good part of what made it so fun and memorable - namely, the excessive, glorious silliness and the gradual departure from a bland tournament fighter.

edited 6th Jan '11 5:06:17 PM by Iaculus

What's precedent ever done for us?

Well the one thing that 00 did right is the fact they were after those who were pursuing Aggressive actions and allowed a military which Wing failed at big time which endless waltz tried to prove right up till the ending...

edited 6th Jan '11 6:33:26 PM by Raso

Sparkling and glittering! Jan-Ken-Pon!

Well, let me explain, the ending of Gundam SEED was inconclusive because we get a few lines of dialogue at the end about ZAFT possibly opening up some negotiations with the earth forces, since Genesis and Patrick Zala are gone, and a trippy last scene with Kira, Athrun, and Cagali that borderlines a Big-Lipped Alligator Moment where 00 on the other hand, did the exact opposite extreme. Namely, Season 2 ended the war via an external plot device, in fact, the same one Char'sCounterattack used. the movie just felt like resolving the tension with an external plot device AGAIN.

Now, what about other Real Robot shows that resolve the tension of war in other ways. like Fang Of The Sun Dougram

Crinn and the Deloyeran rebels are, ultimately put down by the oppresive Earth government, but because of their struggle and their sympathisers in the Feds, Deloyer was liberated from Earth, resulting in a Bittersweet Ending. essentially the more sypathetic Earth characters urged the millitary that opressing Deloyer was not worth fighting a second rebellion.

as for a Gundam example, just look how the conflict was ultimately resolved in Gundam The 08th MS Team. Shiro being able to patch thing up with Aina, and eventually put aside their differences and they happily lived together until the cast of Mobile Suit Gundam brought the One Year War to an end.

@laculus: I think you're missing the point a bit. Something being a necessary evil doesn't mean you like it, approve of it, or accept it — it just means that you can't avoid it. Only Gundam Wing and Gundam 00 really have a theme of trying to end war as a whole — the others are about trying to end a specific war, but always on the protagonist's terms. They could end the war immediately by surrendering, but they choose to fight, because the consequences of fighting (while terrible) are preferable to the consequences of not fighting.

Gundam, at least in UC, explicitly rejects this view. The whole Newtype thing is about enabling communication — two Newtypes are able to understand one another completely due to their powers. But what are the results of this understanding? We only ever see two — either they fall in love (Amuro/Lalah, Kamille/Four), or they earn each other's undying hatred (Amuro/Char, Kamille/Scirocco). The message there is that understanding is good because it allows people to bridge the gaps between them (eg, falling in love with "the enemy"), but communication by itself cannot end conflict, because some people are just evil and need to be stopped.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

I don't think they treat war as an necessary evil, but rather an unavoidable one, at least in light of human nature. This is just as it is in real life. Sure, we could resolve all our conflicts with negotiation, but the problem with negotiation is that both sides have to acknowledge the other as an equal partner as fellow humans (or other sapient species, as the case may be), and therefore when solving a conflict through negotiation both sides must get something. Which means neither side can get everything they want. A national leader, sitting high above the rank and file soldiers, will naturally be tempted to go for the whole pot instead of giving something up to their hated enemies. Through war, they think, they have a chance to win everything. And as for the lives of their soldiers and the civilians who get caught up in it, their leaders will justify it to themselves as being in the best interest of their people as a whole, if they bother justifying it at all beyond desire for greed and glory.

To me, this seems to be the message Gundam has usually sent. Among the soldiers fighting for their homelands, there are some bad apples, but by and large they're good people, who love their country and their families, and who care for their friends and comrades. Maybe they also want to gun down their enemies like dogs, but that doesn't preclude a person from being good overall. It's the self vs others dichotomy. The real problem has always been the people at the top, the Gihren Zabis, Muruta Azraels, and Alejandro Corners. For all the preaching about understanding and compassion, it's very consistent that Gundam wars only end when the monsters at the top are killed or otherwise neutralized. To use the example from SEED, the main characters set out to stop the war, but all they really did was keep both sides from exterminating each other. It didn't end until both militarys were too depleted to continue, and the war's instigators Zala, Creuset and Azrael were shot, nuked, and annihilated, respectively.

So, this may be a teensy bit off topic, but apparently after news of Super Robot Wars Z2 Hakai-hen surfaced, Mitsuo Fukuda (Director of SEED and SEED Destiny) made a series of tweets about how he was unhappy with the handling of the story of Destiny in Super Robot Wars, and that the "canon version was fine and didn't need to be changed".

Hilariously, there were comments made by Shinn Asuka's seiyuu, that "the Super Robot Wars Z version of Shinn is closer to how he envisions how the character should be handled." and goes to to explain how Fukuda and his wife alienated the japanese voice cast of SEED Destiny, and the verbal abuse levied at both Cagali's and Lunamaria's voice actresses. leading to Cagali's Character Derailment and Lunamaria being unable to hit a battleship.

If you want more info, head on over to either the Super Robot Wars or Fix Fic pages to see what got changed in SRW Z specifically that put a bee in Fukuda's bonnet.