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Recommendations
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I'll constantly be adding to this section as I watch more animes. For now It will just be one big pile but eventually I might work up enough anti-lazy to organize them by episode length or something.
-Detroit Metal City
-Cromartie High School
-Kara no Kyoukai
-Neon Genesis Evangelion
-Boogiepop Phantom
-Hayate no Gotoku!
-Serial Experiments Lain
-School Rumble
-Cowboy Bebop
-Samurai Champloo
-Haruhi
-Lucky Star
-Code Geass
-Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
-Miname-ke
-Nausicaä
-Spirited Away
-FLCL
-Golden Boy
-Full Metal Panic? Fomoffu! (Season 1.5)
-Ghost in the Shell (All of them)
-Death Note
-Akira
-Ergo Proxy
-The Place Promised in Our Early Days
-Paprika
-Tekkon Kinkreet
-5 Centimeters Per Second
-Kannagi
Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ (aka Double Zeta) - 47 Episodes
Read the following paragraph before proceeding
Considering this review will be on a Gundam, it will not follow the format of a normal review, as Gundam requires something different. Generally, if you're a fan of the original Gundam formula, it doesn't matter how good or bad each Gundam series of movie is, you'll watch it. If you're looking for a flat number, [5/10] - here it is. It's definitely not something I recommend watching by itself, as its a continuation of the original Gundam storyline. To those who have watched the original and Zeta Gundam, you can get by with reading about watch generally happens, as quite frankly, its not as good as either the original nor Zeta Gundam. THIS WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS, so don't read if you don't want to be spoilered. You already know how I rate the anime, the review will basically be me comparing and explaining why I think it doesn't live up to either the original nor Zeta Gundam.
Now that that's out of the way, on to my main point. I went into this anime with high expectations, as I really enjoyed Zeta Gundam. I was highly disappointed in several aspects, most evident in the first half of the series. The second portion greatly improved, however still lacked much of what I found to be enjoyable in the original MSG, and Zeta Gundam.
For example, what I really found annoying was the more comical tone they employed within the first half of the series. From the fucking gay OP to the incompetence of Yazan despite being an ace pilot the series before, this was terrible decision making in the direction to take the series. Not only was it unfunny, it was terribly annoying, so much so that I hated a majority of the cast for a good portion of the series, very hard for me to get over.
Another aspect that went terribly wrong was the pacing in many aspects of the anime. The beginning developed terribly slow, taking several episodes for the Argama to even leave port, completely unacceptable. I don't fucking care about how incompetent and humorous Mashymere's forces are at the beginning, I want the plot to start. Where they really dropped the ball was in the characters and how they developed.
At least in the Original and Zeta Gundam, the skill level of Armuro and Kamille increased gradually, while it seemed that in one episode, Judau is barely capable of operating the Gundam, while in the next he's better than Fa, who has been piloting shit for like a year on the Argama. The same applies to his little friends. They go from incompetent to fairly skilled with no explanation whatsoever besides the fact that they used the simulator for like 5 minutes, which only explains two of them. Furthermore, Glemmy goes from first battle ever to Commander in like a week. What the fuck. Then he goes from commander to raising a force that rivals Haman Karn? Really shitty job.
The characters were really poorly developed, especially evident in how they chose to use Mashymere and Chara. Early on they have a presence but they get swept aside, only to appear later like they've been there the entire time. Yeah fucking right. Then they get killed, poor usage of the characters, especially Mashymere, who had potential. On this note, the fact that they were cyber-newtypes seems like an afterthought one of the guys had while taking a bathroom break. Another thing left unfleshed was the blue team and Glemmy. He seemed really into avenging Dido or whatever, but it had no closure whatsoever. I guess he was too busy raising a massive fleet of followers from nothing.
A key element I felt was missing largely was the presence of a CONSISTENT rival for Judau. Yes, the rival at the moment at the time may be Mashymere, Glemmy, or Haman, but really there was no everlasting figures like Char in the original, or Jared in Zeta Gundam, both who were present from the very beginning of their respective series. Without one of these key rivals, I felt as though Judau was basically fighting against nothing, the presence of a rival is key in these type of epic boy goes on an adventure type of deals. It just doesn't work too well without it.
Speaking of epic, epic was certainly fucking lacking in the last couple of episodes. When the last couple of episodes roll around in a Gundam anime, I expect large shit to be going down. Yeah, civil war was occurring between two fleets of the Axis, however I never felt the scale or scope of the situation. The most mobile suits I saw at once throughout the entire series couldn't have been more than 12. What the hell is up with that.
The ending itself, scale aside was also a shit job. I felt no closure, both Haman and especially Glemmy die in really anti-climatic ways.
Besides those things, some annoyances was Double Zeta. Dumbest, concept, fucking, ever. Docking sucks. Docking doesn't make sense. Docking should never been ever conceived. Hey I think it would be a really cool idea to extend the content of some episodes if we make this docking concept, because they'll have trouble connecting parts in the middle of space every time! Think up some original shit to kill time. Despite disliking it, I can handle transforming, it makes some sense, but docking is just a really, really, really poor concept to use.
Another annoyance was the magical powers apparently the next generation of cyber-newtypes and newtypes obtain when they get really pissed or something. Again, a dumb concept that shouldn't be present in a Gundam series. If I wanted to defy the insurmountable odds every time a person got angry I'd watch a couple episodes of Dragonball Z. Just because a spirit is protecting you doesn't mean a completely inoperable and separated Double Zeta Gundam is able to magically reform, and proceed to shoot a giant laser out of its head, which again makes no sense and is not explained. If its been there the entire fucking time, WHY DOESN'T HE USE IT MORE OFTEN?
What this series lacked was a solid character base. I found Elle and Roux to be redundant characters. Beecha and Mondo were also redundant. The cast was not diverse, and relatively unlikeable for the most part. While my beloved awesome Captain Bright was present throughout most of the series, where the fuck is Char.
Don't get me wrong, Double Zeta is still an identifiable Gundam series, how it simply doesn't captivate me in its magic as the Original and Zeta Gundam did. Without the failure of the first half and a better ending, I'm sure the series would have been greatly improved, but what can you do about a series made like 15 years ago.
Now that I look back, this is more like a rant than a review but whatever. I look beyond this and go into Char's Counterattack with high hopes.
