I forgot how good anime could look. This is that Gunpla money at work.
Holy hell this episode looked great. The animation was fantastic while also feeling like it was ripped straight out of history. I can’t put my finger on it, but between the character designs, sound effects, eyecatches I was feeling nostalgic for an era of anime gone by…and I never even watched the series it was trying to evoke nostalgia for.
I enjoyed this episode a lot. I am sure that I am only getting the surface level comprehension of this recap. Even I can tell that it was probably packed full of references to things I have no knowledge of. However, it was good enough. The one big question mark I still have from this sequence of events is what the hell happened to Char that caused him to go rogue? I am sure it is something that will be explored during this show (I am guessing it has something to do with the kira-kira vision that happened in the first episode). Looking forward to meeting Char eventually during this season in the current timeline.
After watching that episode I was really worried that people who haven’t seen the original Mobile Suit Gundam would mostly be confused and disoriented (it flashed through alternate versions of events spanning the whole 50 episode original series), so I’m relieved that that isn’t the case.
Yeah, I have watched enough anime to understand that I probably saw several seasons worth of anime go by in a flash. There are plenty of gaps, but I think I was able to grasp the broad strokes of how things played out. I don’t know some of the characters. Like that Lady they kept talking about (I assume the one with a veil) and then her brother(?). Also several other important figures that seemed to have some kind of factional infighting over the direction of the war strategy. I wasn’t able to really get much more of a picture than “some power struggles took place internally during the war” and then Char saved the moon and went awol, leaving his Mav, the green-haired guy, chasing down the ghost of every rumor of Char’s return.
…or something like that. I am writing this specifically from memory instead of looking anything up to try to convey what stuck in my brain.
Seems like you got the general picture.
Like that Lady they kept talking about (I assume the one with a veil) and then her brother(?)
That lady and her family are the Zabi family. They make up the Zeon leadership. Degwin is the father, and the leader of The Duchy of Zeon. I missed whether anything happened to him in this episode to change that. His kids are Ghiren, Garma (stated in this episode to have quit the military), Dozle (stated to have died in battle), and Kycilia (the lady with the veil).
These were all important characters in the original, so I’m curious to see what happens with them this time 'round.
I’m not sure they’re going to be more than background characters, especially if GQX is only going to be 12 episodes. There’s, like, a LOT they can do with this alternate timeline, and so far that have my total attention. But with a limited runtime, it’s probably better to focus on the new characters (I’m counting Challia as new here) and tell their story.
Oh god I didn’t know it’s only 12 is that confirmed?
I’m just repeating what I’ve heard, I’m not sure what the original source was.
True, it doesn’t feel like enough time to actually do much.
Glad you were able to enjoy despite the lack of background. The GQX movie was all laid out chronologically, so this is how it opened. Straight up nostalgia assault. I didn’t want the “prologue” parts to end, gimme the whole OYW in this alt timeline lol.
Really cool watching all this AU stuff happen, but it’s also a little frustrating that I definitely can’t recommend this show to people who haven’t seen the original Mobile Suit Gundam. This episode would probably be more confusing than cool or interesting to someone who isn’t familiar with how the One Year War was supposed to have happened.
Also I thought it was super cool that they were using the distinct music from the original, or at least a good remake of it.
🔥🦆🔥
Back when I watched the original Gundam, I thought that its story stood the test of time, but the aesthetic side of it did not.
With its modern art style and top notch animation, this episode is my dream remake. 10 / 10 episode.
Banner:
This scene is simply too iconic to pass up.
Done!
I’m going to agree with the exception of the new mech designs. The originals are iconic, and Origin did a fantastic job updating them for modern times. Don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with what they went with for GQX. But I’d want a proper remake to keep the general mech aesthetic.
I really like how the film teaser Beginning showed slightly more of these events.
That said I like this a lot so far. I was wondering if anyone could tell me as a still fairly new fan where Challia Bull comes from? I only watched the movie recaps of the original series for that time frame and don’t recall him.
I suspect the parts missing from Beginning will be flashbacks later in the show, but who knows.
@Walican132 @wjs018 he was in the tv series but he looked like an old man and died pretty much immediatley, but he did have a bigger role in the novels Tomino wrote
That’s cool thanks for sharing. Was he like fan loved is they why they’ve brought him in as a central character here?
@Walican132 no, he was a completely unimportant nobody, which is why it’s very funny they revived him like this! the original challia looked like an 80 yr old man (though he was supposedly only in his late 20s) but they gave him a makeover in gqux
Hilarious. Well he’s clearly going to be popular now so that’s fun.
He was most definitely not a nobody in the OG novels. <3 The movie referenced a lot of the dynamic featured in the book version, gave me chills. I suspect we’ll see more of the flashback stuff from the movie in later episodes for context.
I really love how GQX is pulling from multiple UC sources for this alt timeline. The novel version of Char is by far my favorite, even though it’s non-canon. Seeing glimpses of that in the GQX movie was amazing.
What are the OG novels? Are they available in English?
https://gundam.fandom.com/wiki/Mobile_Suit_Gundam_(Novel)
Looks like it may currently be out of print(?), but yes, there are English editions available.
