Y’know, I’ve been thinking recently, and I’ve come to a bit of a realization. Over the years I’ve built up a bit of a reputation among many of my anime-loving friends and among some of the websites I visit (chiefly Anime News Network) as a bit of a Gundam fanboy. I’ve become “The Expert,” the person everyone runs to when they have a Gundam-related question, and the authority whose opinion is often regarded with the most weight. Like many other Gundam fanboys, I took sides in the whole “UC vs. AU” turf war (for the unfamiliar, the Universal Century timeline—the “main canon”—and the various Alternate Universe timelines), and I absorbed every bit of Gundam lore and “political history” like a Trekkie takes to Klingon. I’ve developed my own stubborn, inflexible opinions and had some pretty epic fights online with other people of similarly stubborn, inflexible opinions, and I’ve jumped on bandwagons because Gudam fans were “expected to.” But y’know, after stepping back and taking a more critical look at the actual Gundam anime themselves over the past few months, comparing them to some of the other anime I’ve seen and especially taking a good hard look at the fanbase surrounding them, I’ve become awfully worn out on the whole thing. Kinda sick of it, really.
Tag Archive for 'Gundam'
It’s been a little more than a week since my last update, and I still haven’t touched Kanon. I have started on Gurren Lagann (lovin’ it), Lucky Star (lovin’ it), and Nanoha StrikerS (grown up Fate-chan~) as promised, but that I’m saving for another entry. I have an excuse for all this, though. As I was making some rounds about town last weekend, my girlfriend and I happened upon a new anime shop just thirty minutes from my house, and we figured we’d check it out. Since I had money to spare, I opened an account, browsed their stock, and rented a couple titles out of curiosity. The results were…poor. About as poor as my opinion on the shop itself.
Wow. It’s been a while. I know I haven’t exactly been the best at updating, but I hope to remedy that starting now. Much like Negs, I plan on doing an update every week or so to just ramble a bit about what I’ve been watching lately, with an occasional topic-oriented post whenever the mood strikes me. So let’s get on with it, shall we? This week I’ve got on tap some Gundam, some twins, some piracy, and a lot of fruit.
2004 was something of an unfortunate year for Gundam, once you think about it. On TV, Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny debuted in October, and despite showing tons of promise and actually putting on a good show for about ten episodes, quickly deteriorated into one of the worst Gundam series of all time. In the theatres, the Zeta Gundam movie trilogy, planned as the pinnacle of Gundam’s 25th anniversary celebration, had its much-anticipated wide release pushed back by way of numerous delays into early 2005. And on the international level, the popularity of the Gundam franchise only continued to slip, prompting many concerns that Bandai might not keep their word on their promise to eventually release every major Gundam anime in some capacity outside of Japan. Despite all of this, however, there remained one good thing (well..more Astray aside) to come out of Gundam’s 25th year. Debuting right as details on Destiny were first going public, the series Mobile Suit Gundam MS IGLOO: The Hidden One Year War began as a special theatrical trilogy screening at the Bandai Museum, before being extended to a six-episode OVA series later on. Animated entirely in some fairly high quality CG, it provides a radically different take on the One Year War (and Gundam in general) than that of its peers.
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