It's a Gundam thread!

Yeah the story is a hit and miss. Basic plot ain't bad and the execution isn't awful.

@Ambar Son Of Deshar: I think we had a failure to communicate here. See, when you said Hathaway should just shoot the 'psychotic little brat' down, I thought you meant doing so in cold blood. As in, just shooting her when she wasn't looking in a complete ordinary, non-battle situation with absolutely no provocation. However, if he were to do so out of self-defense or in battle, I wouldn't have a problem with it.

edited 20th May '15 6:58:21 PM by kkhohoho

08th MS Team does retcon Federation MS into the war earlier than they were seen in MSG, but it does so largely under the guise of experimental data-gathering units (like the GM-E in the first episode, which was supposedly a Luna II design they created based on the combat data they copied from the Gundam during its brief stop there) or prototype stopgap units rushed into service before true mass production could begin (like the RX-79[G]s that the 08th Team uses, which were supposedly built mostly from spare parts original created for the RX-78 project).

And that's actually a pretty good retcon in my books.

The Ball, according to material in the Japanese and on Gundam Official before that went kablooie, actually came in really early; Balls were being deployed before the Project V prototypes were completed, like in June. The Federation was deploying pre-production MS to the front lines in Southeast Asia before the proper test sequence at Side 7 was complete too. Considering it was basically the one area of the world where you weren't going to be able to beat on the Zakus at long range with massed tank fire, I'm not surprised; it's probably the place they really really needed mobile suits to stabilize the front lines.

ep 3

.....Shiro, why did you even open the cockpit?

That aside, I'd say this was a pretty good ep.

ep 4

....I really, really liked this ep. I wonder how the hell the Apsaras works, though I imagine it'll come up in a future episode.

ep 5

....well now. It's not every day you see a pair of soldiers escape POW status by being stupidity.

ep 6

...eh, drama.

_________

Well, that's the first half of the series done. Overall, I'd probably give 3.5 out of ten so far. On the one hand, it's not super-awesome or life-changing and shit. On the other hand, it's a decent way to kill a few hours with here and there, and I haven't really had any major complaints with it yet.

@ Quess' Newtypeness

From what I can recall of my one and only view of CCA, she was a natural Newtype who had her abilities enhanced and that was called Cyber Newtype too. It's kinda confusing and might just be a dub issue - I'm not sure if the terms differ from Zeta to CCA in Japanese - but ostensibly she's a whole different ball game from someone like Four, who was a normal Oldtype until they fucked with her body and brain enough to give her psychic powers.

I guess for the sake of clarity Quess makes more sense as a Cyber Newtype because it implies something like "cyborg" ie. a mix of organic and inorganic. She was a natural Newtype with her abilities further enhanced by technology, hence the "cyber/cyborg."

Four and Rosamia and them would better to be called Artificial Newtypes.

Kaizou Newtype ("Modified Newtype"), huh?

For what it's worth, the term that's translated as "cyber newtype" is more like "enhanced human" in the original Japanese, so the process for creating them (whatever it actually is) doesn't necessarily involve actual cybernetics.

I honestly never imagined that it did. Cyber- prefix just works because Rule of Cool IMO.

I dunno who thought up the Cyber part but I'm glad the dub was clear about what they were supposed to be. "Enhanced human" just doesn't fit since Four and the others were clearly intended to be Newtypes. I even checked once and the scientist lady who escorted Four from the Murasame Labs definitely calls Four a Newtype in Japanese too. She said something like "you were created to be a perfect Newtype" and you can definitely hear "Newtype" in the Japanese audio.

So while it's not strictly accurate translation, it's good localization.

I think some Cyber-Newtypes do actually have cybernetics built in - the Ple series, for instance, have Super-Strength. And then there's the really obvious example, Iron Mask.

I still need to watch F91 and read the mangas that take place in Late UC.... I hear F91 isn't that good because of production problems but it's the only thing left for me to watch at this point.

edited 21st May '15 2:09:50 AM by Nikkolas

Oh, F91 is fucking awesome.

I thought it was okay. The problems are clear as day. The pacing is all over the place. But it's fun.

You know, I have noticed that recent Gundam series (Sans Build Fighters) used beam for vulcan rather than bullets ever since Gundam 00. I guess Beam is cooler than bullets. I mean, I always planned to give my lousy fan made mobile suits Beam Vulcan.

Well you only need a reactor and particle collector for the beam vulcans.

I thought Gundam F91 was pretty forgettable, for the most part. It felt like a badly-done compilation movie, in that the pacing was all over the place and there's some charater development missing (eg, I vaguely recall one random Mauve Shirt pilot dying and the movie obviously expects you to care, but there wasn't much to distinguish that particular character from any other random background pilot). Given F91's development history, that's not surprising — the movie pretty much was a compilation movie for the first third of a TV series that was never made.

Exactly. That said, it was responsible for Crossbone, so I can't be too hard against it.

Also, the animation and mecha design was superb. Especially the designs. Easily some of my favorite Kunio Okawara designs.

It's also Star Wars.

No, if it were Star Wars then the main character would have flown the same thing as everyone else.

edited 22nd May '15 6:09:10 PM by Night

Heck, it even ends with a "do or do not" Yoda-esque speech from Seabook's mom!

Aaaaand after a couple days working my ass off outside and spending my free hours on the '3, it's time to start on the second half of 08th MS Team.

ep 7

...Shiro, you crazy-ass sonuvabitch. Did you do that on purpose?

<ground beneath the Gundam suddenly falls out a few seconds after the catastrophe appears to be over>

I kinda expected something like that to happen.

<flashbackstory>

...o.0

...All in all, I'd probably say that for this show, I prefer the shipping episodes to the rest of it. But even that isn't totally mind-blowing or anything.

_____

ep 8

...well, shit.

Although, I think it's telling that all the Feddie command except for that one dude lol'd when Shiro talked about there being non-scum Zeons. ...fuckin' a-holes. Would've been interested in seeing General Revil's reaction to Shiro's little spiel, though.

_____

ep 9

Man, Karen just got taken out like yesterday's garbage. That was... kind of embarassing to watch, honestly.

Incidentally, who the hell is the dub voice for that Gau captain? The guy who had the back-and-forth with Shiro. That voice is familiar as hell, but I can't place where I last heard it. And honestly, that's the one minor thing that pisses me off about so many dubs, is that they'll list off the cast but not tell you who was voicing whom.

GINEAS YOU TWISTED FUCK

Next ep appears to be the well-reputed Norris Packard fight I've heard so much about.

ep 10

Question. Is "cyclops" a nickname/codename for the Zaku and other Zeon MS of its ilk, or a specific model unto itself?

RYER YOU EVIL DOUCHEBAG

GINEAS YOU EVIL BASTARD

ARGH

JUST ARGH

At least Norris is a bro.

ep 11

...For fuck's sake, Aina should've just pumped her brother full of lead when he pointed a gun at her a few episodes ago.

....yeeeeeaah, okay, it's damn near canon at this point - anyone and EVERYONE in ANY position of military authority, in ANY universe, can safely be assumed to be a complete and utter bastard until the viewers are explicitly shown reason to believe otherwise.

...except maybe for Turn-A, owing to a relatively large number of officers that don't have their heads shoved up their asses.

GINEAS YOU GODDAMN SICK AND EVIL FUCK

although I admit that Aina sorta had that one coming, but even still GOD FUCKING DAMMIT GINEAS

oh wait she's not totally dead. Thank goodness.

I guess Kojima's on the up and up.

Also, there's a part of me that's rather pleased about Aina using the past tense in her parting words to her brother.

Oh boy, the final episode of 08th MS Team...