Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury - Episode Twelve: Keep Marching On Instead of Running Off
Written by: Ichirō Ōkouchi
Directed by: Shinnosuke Itō, Akihiro Saitō, Akira Toba and Ryō Andō
Storyboarded by: Tomoki Kyoda, Ryō Andō and Hiroshi Kobayashi
Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury - Episode Twelve: Keep Marching On Instead of Running Off (逃げ出すよりも進むことを, Nigedasu Yori mo Susumu Koto wo) is the twelfth episode of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury.
Realizing that Suletta cannot hear her introduction, Sophie opens fire on the area surrounding the hallway she's in to spur her towards Aerial; in the hangar, Prospera continues to prepare Aerial despite Belmeria's pleas to evacuate.
Onboard their ship, Earth House panic as the alarms sound while Dawn of Fold begin destroying ships to prevent escape. On their own ships, Vim orders a mobilization of Dilanzas, declaring he'll sortie in one himself, while Rajan rallies his men to rescue Delling. Miorine crosses paths with her father while Dawn of Fold begins to fight Plant Quetta's defensive forces. Intercepting four Beguir-Pente's, Sophie is able to destroy them all despite their use of the Anti-GUND-Format Antidote, revealing it cannot disable the system at a Permet Score higher than three.
Recovering from Sophie's attack, Suletta crawls into a vent to reach the hangar where Prospera and Aerial are, meanwhile Miorine discovers that her father saved her from a piece of errant shrapnel during the attack, critically wounding him. As a disoriented Delling begins to mutter about her mother, Miorine panics to try and dress his wound. Infiltrating the facility, Dawn of Fold deploy foot soldiers to track down and kill Delling.
As ships continue to be destroyed, Earth House decides to evacuate before the same can happen to theirs. Left alone on the bridge when Norea finds their ship, Nika hurriedly flashes a Morse code signal after realizing who they are due to their use of physical ammunition. While Norea leaves them alive, Martin had returned, discovering Nika had somehow warded off their attacker.
Launching in a Dilanza Sol, Vim begins to attack the ship Dawn of Fold commandeered to make their attack, a stray shot causing the door to the room the original crew were imprisoned in to open. While most of the crew remain inside rather than risk fighting the terrorists, Guel escapes after hearing guards talking about Aerial and Suletta being in Plant Quetta. Stealing one of the Desultors, he tries to reach the Plant, only to be attacked by his father. Despite fears over a real fight to the death, Guel ultimately strikes back in self-defense, impaling the Dilanza Sol's cockpit. It is only then that he is able to open communications with it, a dying Vim dazedly telling him he'd been searching for him before the Dilanza Sol explodes.
Arriving at the hangar, Suletta finds several Dawn of Fold troops preparing to seize Aerial. They almost discover her, only to be shot dead by Prospera. At first horrified by the killing, Suletta is encouraged by her mother who recites her motto, and resolves to fight to save them and Miorine. Launching in the refitted Aerial, Suletta is able to easily overpower Sophie's Lfrith Ur, keeping her and Norea at bay until reinforcements from Dominicus arrive, forcing Dawn of Fold to flee. Despite the failure of the operation, Shaddiq doesn't seem particularly upset or surprised, while Elan #5 receives a message from the Peil CEOs informing him they may have him investigate the Earthian Gundams, which he thinks they'd be better off not becoming involved with. Using GUND to scan for Miorine, Suletta finds her and declares she's on her way.
In an empty chamber of the plant, Miorine pushes her injured father along on a stretcher when a terrorist, intending to terminate him, corners her. Suddenly, Aerial and Suletta break into the area, and when the terrorist tries to shoot Miorine and her father, promptly slams the Gundam's palm down on the attacker, squashing him into a red paste. Suletta emerges from Aerial, cheerily giggling over her clumsiness as she falls out of the cockpit, seemingly oblivious to landing in the puddle of blood she'd created. Saying she came to rescue her bride, she extends a hand caked in her victim's blood. Miorine only stares in horror at the violent scene she had just witnessed, calling her groom a murderer.
Lin Xuanwen's (end card illustrator)'s official Twitter
Keep Marching On Instead of Running Off provides examples of:
- Accidental Murder: Guel goes into space in a Desultor mobile suit, only to run into a Dilanza. He fights and defeats said Dilanza, only to learn that his father was in there after he impales it through its cockpit.
- Ambiguous Innocence: Suletta ends up violently killing a terrorist to protect Miorine, then walks across the blood and gore splatter like it was nothing. However, it's implied that Prospera has done something to her that makes her dissociate from the violence she just committed.
- BFG: Aerial's upgrade includes one, which her bits can further augment similar to the 00 Qan[T]. Despite still being tuned at minimum output, it's powerful enough to melt an enemy suit with an indirect hit.
- Big Damn Heroes:
- Four Dawn of Fold troopers are scanning the area Suletta is in for anyone to shoot. Suletta unintentionally gives her position away and the terrorists move in to corner her... Cue Lady Prospera and Godoy suddenly gunning them down quickly.
- Miorine is wheeling her injured father away from the carnage when a terrorist suddenly corners her. Before he can attack, Aerial and Suletta barge in and slap the terrorist into red paste.
- Bloodier and Gorier: There's plenty of bloodshed here, and it surpasses the amount of blood spilt in the prologue. Cases include Delling getting wounded shielding Miorine from debris, a team of terrorists getting shot by Prospera and Godoy and one terrorist getting flattened into red paste by Aerial's palm landing on top of him.
- Blood-Splattered Innocents: Miorine ends up splattered in the blood of a terrorist Suletta just killed, and is understandably disturbed by it.
- Blood-Splattered Warrior: Suletta ends up soaked in blood of a man she kills to save Miorine. It reflects that there is something deeply wrong with her since she doesn't even seem to notice it.
- Book Ends:
- Episode 1 and 12 both end with the Aerial knelt down with Suletta and Miorine's side. However, while the first episode ends with a bright and hopeful ending, this episode ends on a dark and foreboding note.
- Episode 1 also had Suletta raising her hand to slap someone (Guel) who was threatening Miorine. Episode 12 has her again raising her (or Aerial's) hand to slap (or more specifically crush) someone who was threatening Miorine.
- Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Delling tells his daughter to put on a "normal suit" when at risk of exposure to vacuum, showing Ad Stella shares Universal Century's term for "space suit".
- Call-Back:
- Like Elnora in the Prologue, Miorine can only stare in horror after Suletta kills a terrorist right before her eyes. Suletta herself is disturbingly cheerful about it, seemingly failing to grasp the horror of what she's done, just like Ericht Samaya.
- How the terrorists raid Plant Quetta is similar to the soldier's raid of Fólkvangr from the Prologue, just with the roles reversed: now Earthians are invading a Spacian outpost, killing everyone they see.
- Suletta asks Sophie that her actions would not be approved by the latter's mother, just like the redhead calling out Guel in the first episode.
- Remember the duel in episode 9 where six Grassley mobile suits went up against a Gundam? Some Grassley mobile suits use the Antidote protocol against Sophie and her Gundam Lfrith Ur, disabling the machine until it pushes its Permet Score to 4.
- One internal to this episode: as Lady Prospera comforts Suletta after killing several terrorists, she reaches a hand out to her. At the end of the episode, as Suletta attempts to comfort Miorine after killing a terrorist, she reaches a hand out to her, framed in almost exactly the same way.
- Cerebus Call-Back:
- Prospera repeats her usual mantra to Suletta to let her know they need her to fight, even if she'll end up killing people. Rather than just steeling her resolve, Suletta instantly becomes completely numb to the lives of her opponents, not even reacting to walking over a mangled corpse. It gives one the impression Prospera has some unnatural control over her daughter's behavior.
- Suletta's love of Miorine's tomatoes is invoked in grisly fashion when she crushes a Dawn of Fold grunt in Aerial's hand like an overripe fruit.
- Suletta once again trips and apologizes for her clumsiness to Miorine, not caring at all that she ended up covered in blood.
- Children Are Innocent: Suletta is horrified to see her mother gun down living human beings, even though she knows they were terrorists who would have killed her. After Lady Prospera convinces her it's fine to kill people if it's to save others, her upbeat attitude returns, even after squashing a terrorist into paste with her Gundam.
- Dark Reprise: The Leitmotif of Lfrith Ur and Lfrith Thorn is a grimmer and more menacing rendition of the original Lfrith's theme from the prologue.
- Death Wail: Even if he didn't like his dad, Guel still screams in grief for him after he unknowingly kills him in self-defense.
- Dissonant Serenity: Suletta is positively cheery when greeting Miorine after saving her from a terrorist, laughing over how clumsy she is... completely ignoring that she'd just stumbled into the red paste she'd reduced the man to, and is totally soaked in his blood.
- Fictional Geneva Conventions: Referenced. Apparently, there's a treaty that forbids the use of physical ordnance in space due to concerns over "pollution"note , which is why We Will Use Lasers in the Future. The Dawn of Fold, being an Earth-based terrorist organization, couldn't care less, with Norea even pointing out that the Spacians had no problem polluting the Earth before leaving it to rot.
- In Love with Your Carnage: Sophie acts almost smitten after her fight with Suletta and witnessing Aerial's immense destructive power:Sophie: You've pierced right through my heart!
- It Can Think: We get to see Aerial actively talking to Suletta twice; once to tell Suletta that the Earth House ship was safe, and once to tell her that the battle is over. Both times, lines flash across Aerial's side screens and a noise is heard, to which Suletta responds. Aerial is becoming more active as an AI. This may be a result of two other Gundams being present in the area, as it was previously mentioned Gundams resonate with each other (and the last time Suletta heard Aerial's "voice" was during the duel against Elan's Pharact.)
- Killing in Self-Defense: Guel had no choice but to defend himself. It was unfortunate for him that the person he was forced to fight was his own father.
- Mid-Season Upgrade: Or "End of the First Cour Upgrade" in this case. Aerial doesn't just get a new look after being repaired, but also new armaments with new capabilities and a brand new backpack.
- Mythology Gag:
- Aerial's new rifle firing a beam with the bits on it is eerily reminiscent of the Wing Gundam Zero's twin Buster Rifles, except that the beam is slimmer, Aerial has only one extendable gun in hand, and the Wing Gundam Zero had two guns and no attack drones.
- Aerial opens fire with her BFG and it passes some of Dawn of Fold's mobile suits, including two near its firing trajectory, just like the Unicorn Gundam's Beam Magnum. Thankfully, the beam only melts off the legs of one hapless mobile suit, unlike the one which explodes after the Beam Magnum's laser passes it.
- Just like the Unicorn Gundam, Aerial emerges from the smoke to push an enemy mobile suit out of a space facility.
- Guel lets out a Death Wail after accidentally killing his father. Shinn Asuka did likewise after his whole family died. Bonus points for both getting caught in the chaos of a mobile suit invasion.
- Aerial's new upgrade gives it a new backpack and the entire unit ends up having a silhouette similar to the Gundam "Zephyranthes" Full Burnern, the Gundam X Divider, the Lightning Gundam Full Burnern, and the Core Gundam with the Juptive Armor on.
- Like Setsuna's 00 Qan[T], Aerial's new rifle can extend and have all eleven bits combine with the weapon to form a bigger, deadlier weapon, though it can only enhance the gun instead of the 00 Qan[T] being able to form a gun or a sword with its bits and normal weapons. Bonus points for Aerial's head bearing design similarities to the 00 Qan[T].
- Aerial's posture when firing her new BFG is reminiscent of the Hyaku-Shiki using the Mega Bazooka Launcher.
- Not Enough to Bury: Aerial sending her palm on top of the terrorist cornering Miorine flattens him such that he instantly dies and the only solid thing left of him is one of his unflattened arms floating in zero gravity.
- Oh, Crap!: Norea's reaction upon seeing Aerial's BFG is to actually shiver in fear and rapidly order Olcott to retreat before he's caught in its line of fire. As was demonstrated moments later, this fear wasn't exactly unfounded, as even with a low power output Aerial's GUND-Bit cannon is able to completely melt through another mobile suit's legs.
- Power Nullifier: The Antidote system returns, and it's revealed it only works on Permet scores up to 3, explaining how Aerial was able to overpower it. After Sophie bumps hers up to 4, she quickly turns the tables on her attackers, but doing so obviously takes a toll on her body.
- Rule of Symbolism:
- Guel's mobile suit loses its head moments before he kills Vim. Under Asticassia's standard dueling rules, the destruction of a mobile suit's head antennae signifies its defeat. Guel may have won, but his victory becomes a horrible loss as he realizes too late that he just killed his own father. Furthermore, it also symbolizes that the rules that have protected pilots since Episode 1 no longer apply. Battles between mobile suits are no longer safe and formalized, but matters of life and death — as further demonstrated by Suletta brutally mashing a terrorist flat with Aerial.
- When Prospera is twisting her and Suletta's philosophy into justifying murder, there's a shot of Suletta stepping out of the clean hallway she was hiding in and out onto the bloodied floor where Prospera just killed four terrorists. Suletta is leaving her innocence behind and stepping into a world of violence and blood. It's reflected even stronger when Suletta and Aerial end the episode with literal and figurative blood on their hands.
- Self-Made Orphan: Unable to communicate with him until it's too late, Guel is forced to kill the pilot of a Dilanza Sol in self-defense. It is only after he strikes the death blow that he learns the pilot was his own father.
- The Stinger: Miorine, trying to get her badly wounded father to safety, is ambushed by a terrorist discovering them both. Suletta and Aerial then burst into the chamber, flattening the terrorist with the Gundam's palm when he tries to shoot them. Suletta emerges from her newly upgraded Gundam Aerial, declaring she's there to save Miorine... who can only stare in horror at the completely dissonant smile on her blood-soaked groom's face.Miorine: How... How can you smile like that?
Suletta: [almost nonchalantly] Huh?
Miorine: Murderer...! - Trauma Conga Line: Poor Miorine gets put through the ringer. First, she's separated from her groom and hears gunshots on the other side of the wall where Suletta is. She's then reunited with her emotionally abusive father, only for him to take a shard of debris to protect her, leading her to try to get his dying and bleeding out unconscious body to safety. Then she has a gun pointed at her by a terrorist who fully intends to kill her and her father, but is saved just in time by her fiancée... who violently smashes the terrorist with her giant robot, leaving Miorine splattered in his blood, which is only made worse when said fiancée approaches her covered in blood with Dissonant Serenity.
- Villain Respect: Despite being on the receiving end of Aerial's curb-stomp battle, Sophie expresses admiration of Suletta and her Gundam's capabilities, even as her team retreats.Sophie: I'll come visit you again... Big Sister Suletta.
- Well-Trained, but Inexperienced: Guel was once Asticassia's top duelist, but when he fights a real battle for the first time with his life on the line, he's utterly terrified. He wins nonetheless, but symbolically, he loses the head of his mobile suit doing so.
- Wham Episode: Similar to Gundam Build Divers Re:RISE at the end of its first cour, this episode significantly changes the stakes of the series and alters the paths of numerous characters, such as Martin witnessing Nika ward off her comrades from Dawn of Fold and Suletta using violence to save Miorine without being disturbed by the bloodshed she caused, to the latter's horror.
- What the Hell, Hero?: The last words of the episode and cour has Miorine calling out Suletta's Dissonant Serenity.
