I'm a Gundam fan, so it's not fair that I say this is a BADASS series. But, from the first episode it really diverges from the common plotline. No Gundams are stolen. No Gundams actively go to "war." The characters are not pansies who have no clue about war and don't want to fight.
In a sense, it feels like the characters are already fairly headstrong from prior events, so you don't have to worry about character-evolution (although, I expect we'll see the characters change, but not to the point where you turn from pacifist -> warrior -> pacifist warrior -> crazy murderer -> savior of mankind). I think it'll remove a lot of the drama.
The dialogue is a little dry just yet. But it was the first episode and I'm pretty pleased with it. It has more of a BattleTech kind of feel to it. And despite other claims, I really like the designs of the Gundams themselves. Most of them are based on designs from other series. you have a transforming one that could be something like Aegis/Wing/Wing Zero/Savior/etc. You have the heavy-decked Gundam that looks like it ate too much ala 0083's model and Destroy. You have the Sniper which is pretty reminiscent of Buster from SEED. Then you have the generic hero one that for some reason or another, primarily uses weapons. Basically the middle grade. The Gundams remind me a bit of Turn-A Gundam, mixed with something else.
Will definitely be following this one. May take a few more episodes before it gets addicting. But I can reasonably say that I ENJOY this series without feeling addicted (whereas Gundam SEED/DESTINY it was an OMG! THAT'S IT?! WHAT HAPPENS?!). Either that or I've grown up. I don't know anymore, but I am getting old.
--Terin
Ok so I'll give this a try because of some of the mentioned points here. I was never really a gundam fan. However, I always admired it in some way. Like... It would get me interested, and then I would lose interest again after awhile. The fighting scenes can be incredible too. One of the main reasons why I never like gundam is because I lose interest in it overtime, I find myself getting lost in the plot. Infact, even watching episodes back to back, the plot really got boring to me pretty damn quickly.
Why?
Because generally, there are way too many fucking characters and organizations battling each other. Random characters appear and leave a lot of times. Now I'm not an infant or anything, I can comprehend even the most complex plotlines. It's just that this series, in general, has a horrible way of introducing characters and gives too many minute details. I don't think it makes the story richer, I think it just complicates things.
Anyways I've watched...
Gundam Wing - about 40 episodes? I actually think this was pretty good, I never finished it though. The pacing was alright, probably my favourite out of all of them.
Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: like 4 episodes... It was ok but it seemed a little to old for my taste
After War Gundam X: They weren't taking themselves too serious with this gundam. I kinda like the main character. I don't remember where I stopped in this one.
Gundam Seed: Ok, I watched 49 of th 53 (I think?) episodes and was like quiet. Like, I had no thoughts at all. Then after watching the 50th episode, I quietly told myself I would never watch another gundam series ever again. I have no clue why I watched so many episodes seriously. This emo shit was the worst thing that happen to gundam. The animation was great, and the artwork (which I don't ever want to see again) was ok at the time.
Gundam Destiny: LMAO, after watching the first episode I knew where the rest of the series was going. Right away they stole the same shitty initial plotlines of the other gundams. I couldn't keep track of the characters ONCE AGAIN. The artwork is done by the same fucking group I've seen that did Seed and a lot of NEW series airing around the same time. Did I mention the pacing was horrible? I've watched enough anime to know what I would be interested in before I even watch it. I still give a few series a try here and there but I usually don't bother trying something I know I won't like.
