Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury - Episode One: The Witch and the bride
English Dub Streaming Airdate: February 5, 2023
Written by: Ichirō Ōkouchi
Directed by: Ryo Ando
Storyboarded by: Hiroshi Kobayashi
Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury - Episode One: The Witch and the bride (魔女と花嫁, Majo to hanayome) is the first episode of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury.
In Ad Stella 122, a red-haired girl, Suletta Mercury, is preparing for her first day at Asticassia School of Technology, having been sent there from her home planet of Mercury. As her transport makes its final approach to the asteroid (Front) which houses the school, she spies a person in a space suit floating away from the facility. Believing that they are in danger, Suletta deploys in her mobile suit -Aerial- to rescue them, only for the girl she saved to chew her out for foiling her escape.
Taking her first steps into Asticassia amidst a regular school day, Suletta wanders into a massive, open enclosure for mobile suit drills, meeting a friendly mechanic named Nika Nanaura. She also recognizes the girl she rescued earlier, Miorine Rembran, who is mocked by other students for her failed escape. Suddenly, two mobile suits storm onto the open field, commencing a duel approved by the school's dueling committee. The emergent victor, piloting a pinkish-magenta mobile suit called a Dilanza, spots Miorine, and forces his opponent towards the onlooking students; amidst the chaos, Suletta is almost crushed by the defeated mobile suit, but is pulled to safety by Miorine. The Dilanza's pilot, a boastful young man named Guel Jeturk, declares his victory and his right to marry Miorine.
Later in the day, Suletta finds Miorine at a greenhouse on school grounds, where she explains the duels and her apparent engagement to Guel. The fights are a school policy crafted by her father, Delling Rembran, the current president of the Benerit Group which oversees mobile suit development across the solar system, as well as funds Asticassia. The system allows students to settle anything, from apologies to marriage arrangements, through duels.
As Suletta and Miorine bond over the tomatoes the latter grows, Guel barges in and states his intent to force Miorine to move into his company dorm. When Miorine rejects him, he begins wrecking her greenhouse until Suletta slaps his backside, timidly telling him off. Infuriated by the intervention, Guel boasts of his status as the Holder, the school's top-ranked duelist, and mockingly insinuates he'd only apologize if defeated in a duel - a challenge which the Suletta nonetheless accepts. Meanwhile, Guel's father, Vim Jeturk, plots to assassinate Delling with a bomb planted on his shuttle. With Guel's status as Holder and Miorine's fiancé, Delling's death would secure Jeturk's status as the new head of the Benerit Group.
Back at the school, Guel, piloting his Dilanza, prepares to battle Suletta, only to be faced by Miorine, who commandeered Aerial to try and settle her own score. However, Miorine is a business student with no piloting experience, and is easily overpowered by Guel. Before he can claim victory, Suletta rushes the field on a motor scooter borrowed from Nika, demanding Miorine return Aerial to her. Offering to "take responsibility" as Miorine had demanded of her when they first met, Suletta activates Aerial's special feature, a swarm of bits which first block a shot from Guel's Dilanza, before unleashing a torrent of beam fire which instantly eviscerates the enemy machine, winning the duel. Hearing of his son's defeat, Vim is forced to call off his assassination attempt. Exiting Aerial's cockpit, Miorine looks over the remains of Guel's Dilanza, acknowledging Suletta's victory. She declares Suletta the new Holder, altering her uniform to the color scheme of the school's top duelist, telling her this also makes Suletta her new fiancée, to Suletta's astonishment.
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The Witch and the bride provides examples of:
- Accidental Proposal: Due to defeating the current Holder and number one mobile suit combatant, Guel Jeturk, Suletta takes the title from the man and ends up in an engagement with Miorine Rembran, thanks to a rule in which whoever is the Holder is Miorine's future spouse and thus the inheritor of the Benerit Group, which owns the school.
- Ace Pilot: In the Asticassia School of Technology, the title of Holder is given to the one whose mobile suit combat prowess is the best among everyone, as explained by Guel Jeturk.
- Speaking of Guel, he is initially lauded as the Holder prior to Suletta's arrival, having 26 wins under his belt with no losses or ties as the cherry on top. Of course, now he does have one loss after losing to Suletta.
- Suletta herself proves to be just as great, if not greater, in less than a minute and with a mobile suit with far greater technology, firepower and combat capabilities and features she alone can access without breaking a sweat. She ends up taking the title of Holder from Guel as a result.
- Break the Haughty: Guel is shown to be an arrogant, smug jerk who's number one in mobile suit duels and feels utterly entitled to his arranged marriage to Miorine, not helped by the fact that he's the current bearer of the Holder title. Over the course of this episode, a new transfer student, Suletta, slaps his rear, accepts his challenge which begins his humiliation, and owns him in a duel. If that's not enough, he loses the title of Holder as well as his engagement to Miorine to that transfer student. His father ends up getting pissed because losing his engagement throws a monkey wrench into his father’s plans to take over Delling's company.
- Brutal Honesty: Both the Japanese and English versions have Suletta give a very honest answer to Guel asking her if she knows who he is. In the original Japanese version, Suletta says she thinks he is a pushy suitor. In the English dub, Suletta says that she thinks Guel is kinda pathetic.
- Curb-Stomp Battle:
- Guel is first seen easily destroying a combatant in another mobile suit with little to no resistance. He also dominates Miorine and her stolen Gundam Aerial, not helped by the fact that the latter was horrible at piloting a mobile suit.
- Suletta reclaims her Gundam and quickly gives Guel a taste of his own medicine, defeating his Dilanza in under a minute.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Guel seems to have a knack for repaying small acts against him with a hefty load of punishment more than the offender can bear, and he does it thrice here.
- His introduction to the story? He's shown utterly destroying another student in a duel for stating he had a runaway bride.
- His response to Miorine announcing that she hates being engaged to him? He wrecks her greenhouse.
- His response to Suletta slapping his butt and demanding an apology? He refuses and forces her to accept a duel, telling her she will be kicked out if she loses.
- Dramatic Irony: By defeating Guel in a duel, Suletta forces his father Vim to call off his assassination attempt on Delling, unwittingly saving the life of the man who orchestrated the destruction of her childhood home and the murder of her father.
- Duels Decide Everything: According to Miorine, Asticassia School of Technology's policies lets students duel with each other to decide anything no matter how petty, from apologies to marriage arrangements. These were all implemented by her father, Delling Rembran. The one featured in this episode is over Miorine's marriage to Guel, something she's trying to avoid. As Guel later summarises:Guel Jeturk: Here at this school, right and wrong are decided though duels.
- Epic Fail: How does Miorine fare piloting the Gundam Aerial? She doesn't know how to pilot the machine, being a business management student, she has no idea of the Gundam's special features, and she tries to fire her Beam Rifle, only to lose it due to its recoil. This causes her to get wrecked by Guel, the school's top mobile suit duelist, and his pinkish-magenta Dilanza in mere seconds.
- First Day of School Episode: This very episode details Suletta's first day at Asticassia, and indeed her first day at any sort of school. It's not clear if she manages to attend any classes before she gets roped into a duel with the school's top duelist, who she defeats almost instantly, conferring on her the title of Holder and an engagement to the heir of a vast corporate empire.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Aerial walks into the arena to face Guel's Dilanza, her walk cycle is noticeably slow and awkward, hinting that the pilot inside is not very good.
- Foreshadowing: After inadvertently ruining her escape, Miorine tells Suletta that she’ll take responsibility for this which Suletta in a confused and reluctant tone accepts. When she tells Miorine in front of other students that she’ll take responsibility, some students who overhear Suletta joke that Suletta is proposing. Suletta ends up becoming Miorine’s fiancé, so Suletta ends up taking responsibility for Miorine.
- Grand Theft Prototype: Miorine steals Suletta's Gundam Aerial to duel with Guel by taking the newcomer's mobile school ID device which she got earlier while trying to install the school's map and sneaking off into the Aerial which had no identity confirmation settings. However, the white-haired student proves to be horrible at piloting this complex machine; she even tried to use the Gundam's Beam Rifle and succeeds only in losing it due to its recoil!
- Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Guel seems to be unable to hit Suletta's powering-up Gundam Aerial, only able to land a shot when it's already powered and able to deploy its shield.
- Laser-Guided Karma: After the crap Guel pulls in the first episode, Suletta literally delivers karmic retribution against Guel in the form of laser blasts which leaves him defeated and humiliated while the entire school is entertained. The lad even loses his honorary title of Holder to Suletta as the icing on the cake for daring to seek retaliation on the redhead!
- Meaningful Echo: At the beginning of the episode Suletta gets headbutted by an angry Miorine after she unintentionally foils her escape attempt from the academy. In the episode's closing moments, an angry Suletta returns the favor to Miorine after she steals Aerial from her.
- Mythology Gag:
- Suletta and her Gundam Aerial go out into space to rescue someone in a space suit, with the machine stretching out its hands to bring the victim onto its palms in a very similar manner to the Unicorn Gundam and Banagher Links rescuing a falling Audrey. The only two differences is that the person being rescued is still in space and tries to wave her arms to dissuade Suletta, unlike Audrey who was falling towards Earth's atmosphere and waiting for Banagher's aid.
- Like Amuro Ray before her, Suletta bites into a tomato. The only difference is that Amuro was eating it in a hurry due to White Base commander Bright Noa calling for him, while Suletta savours the tomato.
- Oh, Crap!: After Guel discards his rifle to get in close, he realizes errors have been made when Aerial's shield disassembles itself into a cloud of beam-equipped bit staves. His mobile suit becomes a pile of parts mere seconds later.Guel Jeturk: Wh-what...what the hell are you?! [Gundam Aerial slashes off his Dilanza's fin]
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Suletta is shown to be a rather timid and quiet girl, easily being startled by everyone around her and intimidated. However, there are a two moments in the episode that show her strength of character despite that.
- The first is when Guel starts destroying Miorine's garden and, despite wanting to avoid conflict, she smacks him on the butt and calls him out on behaving that way to Miorine, and tells him to apologise. When Guel mockingly asks if she intends to challenge him to a duel to force him to apologise, Suletta accepts.
- The second is when she makes her way onto the battlefield after Miorine stole her Aerial. In a reversal of their previous encounter, Suletta headbutts Miorine and is clearly angry that she stole her precious Gundam. She then immediately follows this up by defeating Guel in seconds.
- Spanner in the Works:
- Suletta defeating Guel in a duel completely derails Jeturk Heavy Machinery's plot to assassinate Delling and causes Guel's marriage with Miorine to be rearranged to have Suletta getting engaged to Miorine instead.
- Guel also counts as one due to his mistreatment of Miorine compelling Suletta to be compelled to challenge him to a duel in the first place.
- Starter Villain: Guel ends up being the first opponent who Suletta fights against in the entire series.
- Unwanted Rescue: Suletta tries to rescue an astronaut stuck in space, but upon rescuing her, the astronaut angrily chews her out for foiling her escape from her Arranged Marriage.
- Use Your Head: In the beginning of the episode, after Suletta unintentionally foils Miorine's escape, she gets angrily headbutted (though since they're both wearing spacesuit helmets, they're virtually unaffected). Later, Suletta returns the favor after Miorine steals the Aerial from her.
- What the Hell Are You?: Guel says this word-for-word after Suletta uses her Gundam Aerial to dissemble his Mobile Suit in seconds before securing the match.
- You Kill It, You Bought It: At Asticassia, the top Mobile Suit duelist is called the Holder, and is granted special privileges, including becoming Miorine Rembran's fiancé. No one dies losing the title of Holder to other folks, but when Suletta defeats Guel to force an apology out of him, she is crowned the new Holder, and thus becomes Miorine's new fiancé, and potentially an inheritor of the entire Beneritt Group. Suletta doesn't learn of this information until after her first win.
