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Why do I like the Mobile Suit Gundam series? Not because it has flashy action sequences and giant mechanical warriors piloted by a human fighting in them. What I love about Gundam is that it's one of the shows that can show the darkness of war.
The original series Mobile Suit Gundam or Gundam 0079 was a great start to the amazing franchise. It portrayed teenagers going into war and confronted by the horrors of war. It also introduced two amazing characters Char and Amuro and their intense rivalry. The entire series also reflects on many social issues and themes as well such as warring of political ideological differences so prevalent in human history.
Zeta really showed Tomino's dark side and it is regarded by me and many fans of the franchise to be the greatest series ever. It is extremely dark and depressing, despite all of that it is great because of the characterization of many characters and how they interact with each other. It really makes you realize through out the series that there is a war going on and these people are living in it.
Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam
The last of the Universal Century's core, Char's Counterattack.
When Gundam Wing came out the series was dead to me. Wing, by far, was not the worst Gundam, but they really tried to make it too teenager friendly and sacrificed many things I said earlier of what makes Gundam great. Anything after Wing feels really bland and copy pasted.
However Gundam Wing is credited to bringing the franchise from Japan to North America. For many of you Wing might be your first Gundam ever and I can understand that. However, I strongly advise you to watch the old Universal Century Gundams -The 3 movies of Gundam 0079, Zeta Gundam the series, Char's Counterattack.
A new series picked up the old Universal Century time line: Gundam Unicorn.
When I saw the first episode, I knew the old Gundam is back. Gone with the treenage girls appeal of Wing and SEED with plenty of badly written teenage angst and bad character developement. Unicorn brings back the high level of character development that was so prevalent in the original Gundams and each character is developed just right in the short 3 episodes released so far.
This is a more "mature" Gundam and is true to the original creator (Yoshiyuki Tomino’s) vision of the horrors of war and the ideological/political and philosophical differences that is prevalent throughout human history. It makes for a far more realistic and believable story. For a great example of this watch the Original Gundam Movies I, II, and III (Gundam 0079 I mentioned earlier).
If Gundam Wing was your first Gundam, watch the three shows I mentioned earlier in the bolded text, and watch the 3 episodes of Unicorn that has been released so far and you will see what you have been missing out.
Gundam Unicorn is an OVA that has 3 more planned episodes released this year and next year making it a total of 6 episodes.
To state again my recommended watch order:
Gundam 0079 -> Zeta Gundam -> Char's Counterattack -> Gundam Unicorn
Edit: I forgot the mention in the Universal Century time line there are more series than the list I provided above, the first 3 are considered the core of the Universal Century. Those are the most sees, if you like those three you can try tracking down the other shows.
Edit #2: It is a plus to know about the plot of Gundam ZZ or at least know Glemy and Puru to understand Marida's part in Unicorn episode 3. It is not really a must but it's just nice to know. ZZ wasn't that great of a series but I didn't find it that bad, it's the direct sequel to Zeta.
Edit #3: The entire Zeta Gundam series is available on Youtube in dubbed voice overs what are you waiting for??
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for some reason I never got into gundam. I loved saber rider, I loved transformers, I love flashy action sequences and I love humans in robot suits. But I never got into Gundam. Similarly, I never got into Power Rangers either. It never appealed to me even though PR debuted in Canada just as I turned 12 years old so I should have been into it at that age.
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50637 Posts
how much I miss Zeta Gundam....T_T.
hey do you remember the thing the narrator says at the end of an episode after they show the preview of the next one?
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On March 15 2011 02:03 BLinD-RawR wrote:
how much I miss Zeta Gundam....T_T.
hey do you remember the thing the narrator says at the end of an episode after they show the preview of the next one?
That I'm not sure of because the Zeta I got is the re-release DVD edition. The opening and ending themes are changed I think. The original intro songs are not there in the DVD collection I got.
I absolute love the second Zeta opening though, intense synth action matches so well with 80s mech action.
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Borrowing the words from another person:
The thing that stands out most here are the characters, because they act like idiots, make stupid and irrational decisions and interact like no normal human would. The (romantic) relationships come out of left field, which incidentally is a tradition they're keeping alive even today with 00.
Also, most of the pretentious stuff the characters utter makes no sense whatsoever (I'm looking at you, Amuro & Char). I guess proper dialogue wasn't important back then.
I'll likely stir up a hornets' nest with this comment. But seriously, if your script and direction are so bad that it makes the characters look like complete fools, it doesn't matter how important the anime is to the genre. It will still be.. umm.. below average.
That's a comment about the original Gundam and it's exactly how I see it. Gundam Wing is the only exception so far and regarding UC, I'm at episode 37 of Zeta Gundam.
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Alternate universes for the Gundam franchises are terrible, anything that wasn't from UC are gundam in name only, they're just random mech shows that has the gundam names and similar mecha designs. AC FC CE and 00 are as Gundam as Robotech is to Macross.
(I loved G Gundam though, that show was fantastic)
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This should be about the player 
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Hyrule19193 Posts
At first I though this blog was going to be about Gundams and Unicorns. Not being very acquainted with the show myself (I'm only about half way through Mobile Suit atm), I was a bit surprised to see that there was actually an OVA named Unicorn.
Nice read though.
And G Gundam is awesome regardless.
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I haven't seen much Gundam, but I did burn through both 00 series' in the span of a couple days each, it was amazing and I cried! 
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I was sucker for the gundam wing hiro yui/relena peacecraft romance back in the day
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Do these story lines are continue off of one another?
Gundam 0079 -> Zeta Gundam -> Char's Counterattack -> Gundam Unicorn
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Yes they are all in the same time line and each series is a continuation of the previous one.
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My first Gundam experience was actually 00.
After watching the first episode of that as it aired, I just had to find more Gundam, and I had a vague memory of SEED beeing relatively new also, so I started watching that.
Story wise, SEED did a decent job of portraying the 2 sides of war, but on the small scale, the love and friendship drama felt a bit predictable, and the action scenes after a while ended up as "count the ammount of re-used action scenes". Other than that, watching the 2nd season of SEED was probably the 3rd dumbest gundam related thing I've done...
After that, Gundam 00 still going on, I decided to pick up Gundam Wing, since I had played the endless duel game and loved that... my 2nd dumbest gundam decision I've done so far... I could somewhat follow the big plot, but alot of plots just felt too wierd and random... (Fight your enemy, end up in a draw, decide that the 2 of them should switch mechs.. WTF?).
Then I found some kind of a side story to the UC universe. I can't remember the name of the show, but in each episode (3 long episodes only, sadly) you follow a regular army guy fighting against the alien Zakus. There wasn't really a big story to follow here, only a small skirmish explained very detailed. This show really added back quite a bit of realistic feel that I lost with Wing...
Gundam 00 is by this time over, and awaiting the movie to finish off the story for over 2 years... Gunadm Unicorn catches my interest and I'd say it's so far probably the best of the gundams I've experienced so far...
... snce I've watched the Gundam 00 movie... Holy crap was that a complete failure in every way... 00 started out great, season 2 not as good, and the movie just completely ruined both Season 1 and 2 somehow... Better of never watching the 00 movie...
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Unicorn is so amazing, I thought it was going to be filled with the silliness of the newer gundam series, but I was so wrong.
Thank you for reminding me to watch the third episode.
:::: )
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One thing I forgot to mention that I will edit in right now is that YOU NEED TO KNOW A BIT ABOUT GUNDAM ZZ to understand Marida's bit in Unicorn #3
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thanks for sharing. I never quite got into Gundam or anime in general but it really does sound like fun. I think I'll actually give it a shot and see how I like it.
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Gundam 00 is not Gundam 0079.
Gundam 0079 is also known as Mobile Suit Gundam it's the first Gundam ever made. I really think it's not on youtube because of its age, it's better to buy the DVD or torrent it. I mentioned in my original post that the movie version of Gundam 0079 is better because Tomino cut out a lot of garbage sequences in the series and condensed the juicy parts into 3 movies.
The Zeta you found is correct.
I can't see the Char's Counterattack link, but I don't think a 2 hour long movie is going to be on youtube. Try to torrent or buy the DVD. Unicorn is fairly new so I don't expect it to be on a stream site or anything. Each unicorn episode is like 1 hour long again try to buy the DVD/BLURAY or torrent it.
Edit: That cover is correct
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yeah i found the unicorn series on that site animefreak.tv or something along those lines, got the 0079 series DL'ing and the Char's counterattack from demonoid xD just gotta finish watching the wing series then i can move to these.
Gundam 0079 -> Zeta Gundam -> Char's Counterattack -> Gundam Unicorn
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On March 15 2011 03:16 wishbones wrote:
yeah i found the unicorn series on that site animefreak.tv or something along those lines, got the 0079 series DL'ing and the Char's counterattack from demonoid xD just gotta finish watching the wing series then i can move to these.
Make sure the 0079 series you find is the 3 movie version and you are set to go! Remember all of those shows were made in the 80s, so try not to mind the wacky 80s view on what future tech would be :p
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I was gonna make a blog about Gundam Zeta, I absolutely love 0079 and Zeta.
I would stay up 4am in the morning trying to squeeze as much Gundam in my head.
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haha no i dont mind old school. but shoot i have the entire season i believe let me confirm.
+ Show Spoiler +hmm yeah i have the 40+ episodes of 0079, but it comes packed with char's counterattack i just noticed. let me refind the movie ones.
edit: just found the movie one i think, there are 6 parts, 2 per episode, 3 episodes total.
for the movies you speak of regarding 0079 its three movies right?
got the right one, thanks for heads up.
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On March 15 2011 03:11 G3CKO wrote:
I mentioned in my original post that the movie version of Gundam 0079 is better because Tomino cut out a lot of garbage sequences in the series and condensed the juicy parts into 3 movies.
Well, as long as one hasn't watched the series, he won't notice that the movies are pretty messed up -.-
Already pointed out several things in the anime discussion thread, so I won't bother to repeat it.
In the end, it doesn't matter which one you watch because both, the movies and the series, are bad.
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Damn. I have to watch 0079 -> Zeta -> Char's before watching Unicorn? No wonder why I had so much difficulty watching this set of OVAs
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Just read up the ZZ story(it happens directly after Z) on wikipedia, its not worth watching =]. Also, I read the Zeta book interpretation last year and it was so good! So I tried to rewatch the original series and...+ Show Spoiler + The animation and story pacing sucked so so so hard D: kind of ruined my image of how good it was when I was small ='[
Aside from the series, I found these to be very good "background sidestories"
In chronological order to the best of my abilities:
War in the Pocket (1989 OVA)
The 08th MS Team (1996 OVA)
MS IGLOO (2004 OVA)
0083: Stardust Memory (1991 OVA)
Future ( Post Unicorn)
Gundam F91 (1991 film)
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On March 15 2011 03:43 Sufficiency wrote:Damn. I have to watch 0079 -> Zeta -> Char's before watching Unicorn? No wonder why I had so much difficulty watching this set of OVAs
You need a somewhat understanding of the UC timeline to be able to understand what's going on in Unicorn. So yes it's nice to watch those 3 before unicorn to be able to understand the lot of it.
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I like this site: http://www.mahq.net/animation/gundam/gundam.htm
Although they did not order it in UC chronological order, it tells you when the series are produced. It is very comprehensive (the fact they even include G-Savior is a telling). Clicking on it also give you a good description without spoiling too much. They are got a review for each episode.
On March 15 2011 05:37 G3CKO wrote:Show nested quote +On March 15 2011 03:43 Sufficiency wrote:Damn. I have to watch 0079 -> Zeta -> Char's before watching Unicorn? No wonder why I had so much difficulty watching this set of OVAs You need a somewhat understanding of the UC timeline to be able to understand what's going on in Unicorn. So yes it's nice to watch those 3 before unicorn to be able to understand the lot of it.
Yes. Char played heavy part in 0079, Zeta, and CCA. This is important in the debate rather Full Frontal is very the real Char or not. I believe the term psyco-frame was first introduce in CCA and I remember hearing the term a lot in Unicorn.
Also, you need to learn that a red mobile suit is 3 times as powerful. LOL.
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What does Char appearing before has anything to do with Full Frontal
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I agree with everything here, except you didn't mention the Zeta movies. All three were amazing. The lack of a complete budget for reanimating the entire movies actually helped. They are in sequential order, Heirs to the Stars, Lovers and Love is the Pulse of the Stars. Some of the immortal scenes from the original were preserved and we were treated with some beautiful shots of Emma and the cast.
I like to think that CCA was the last of UC. After seeing V Gundam, it was too disappointing to continue with UC. I can't stomach the fragmented release of Unicorn, which is quite the sell out by Bandai. I think the only true successor to CCA would be Hathaway's Flash, but without Bright's original voice actor, I don't think it would be the same.
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My first Gundam was the 08th ms team, then after that Wing. I thought wing was great because as a kid I loved explosions. I enjoyed seed quite a bit as well but not as much as the Astray series.
But the quality of Unicorn is astounding.
P.S. If you like Gundam, you might wanna check out Break Blade as well.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_XFGuSZ6n1LY/SLC4N5A67eI/AAAAAAAABKs/EgC77nPM-CU/s400/gundam_toprated_6.jpg)
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![[image loading]](http://srtnews.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/gundam_unicorn_01.jpg)
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