I am so glad modern Gundam has moved beyond UNDERSTANDING.
Critical support for the Dawn of Fold in their efforts to resist Spacian oppression.
(Shaddiq being a closet Maoist was a twist I wasn't expecting.)
The greatest anime betrayal of all would be if the writers did some sort of Enlightened Centrist thing by the final episode where the people wanting to improve society somewhat go too far and having understanding with the oppressors is the only way forward.
Shit, I hope I didn't hear a lathe humming. :lathe-of-heaven:
That's the plot of all the mid 90's -2000's Gundam. :deeper-sadness:
That said, I have a good feeling about this one. We had a character paraphrase "political power flows from the barrel of a gun".
Mobile Suit Hathaway felt like it had heavy anti imperialist themes, so maybe someone in the studio is pushing it. Hard to say where that's going either because I believe it's also intended to be a series of films
I'm holding my breath until the smoke clears and "revolution is necessary and good, actually" is dared to be the message of the finale. Or not. :lenin-sleeping:
That's the thing, Gundam used to have that message.
OG Gundam (0079) is just good ol' Nazi punching, and most UC timeline stuff is "Imperialism breeds fascism".
Gundam had it's lib moment in the 90's, but OG Gundam was written by a communist, and it seems we've finally come full circle.
i mean, gjallerhorn in ibo was incredibly obviously a standin for :amerikkka: so gundam's been getting back to based-ics for a bit
I guess Hathaway was written like 30 years ago so technically could dig up a synopsis on that to see where it goes. Dunno, maybe some of these Japanese animators are going based mode in the face of the degrading west. I sure hope so.
Tomino (OG creator of Gundam) was a student activist and card carrying commie. Most of the stuff he wrote was pretty based, minus the unexamined misogyny. I think Hathaway is an adaptation of one of his sequel novels
The movies have diverged from the novel by being a sequel to Char's Counterattack. The Hathaway's Flash novel is a sequel to Beltorchica's Children, which is roughly the same story as CCA but different enough to be its own continuity.
Most of the stuff he wrote was pretty based, minus the unexamined misogyny.
I think he started going to therapy in the late 90s and, surprise, Turn A and G-Reco are missing a lot of the shitty misogyny!
He also got married and had a daughter, that had to have helped a lot. (It's very sad that so often it's only that kind of lived experience that gets men to stop being misogynistic though... but yeah.)
Yeah, he had a lot of positive influence from women in his life (his therapist, his wife, his two daughters) led him to clear up the toxic attitudes. Really ridiculous if you think about it, but at least it worked out.
Moon's Cacoon has some great articles about his life in the 90s - there are lots of Turn A spoilers throughout the site, though.
at the very least dawn of fold is being treated with respect and sympathy. getting an entire episode where you root for them with no real caveats is more than most antagonistic gundam factions get
To be fair most antagonist factions in Gundam are unequivocal Nazi's sooo....
the fact that we get this whole episode still seems like a really good sign, since it seems like guel was at least a little convinced they weren't too bad despite his treatment
Guel's character arc of him being the ultimate failson, who failsons so hard into becoming a class traitor is amazing lol
Never thought I'd see Fanonposting on r/Gundam of all places. And it took a space tanuki installment of Gundam for it to happen.
I'm looking through the comments, seeing some favorable comparisons with older Gundam stuff which is good, but I gotta ask: what are we talking as far as 3D animation? I tend to hate 3D mixed with 2D because it always looks "floaty" to me, and I know recent Gundam series have made use of 3D for the actual mechs.
G-Witch is all handdrawn 2d minus special effects heavy shots. Mainline tv anime Gundam is usually all 2d animated, I think they've only moved to 3d for OVAs and movies.
This one's a standalone and is probably one of the best jumping in points right now!
Just echoing that this one's standalone and it's pretty safe to just jump in.
The most critical support, since I'm sorry, I don't trust shaddiq (and rn DoF feels like it's just run by shaddiq). His plan seems more like a neoliberal than a real liberator. I'm ready to be proven wrong, but right now it feels more like opening a new market rather than ending spacian capitalism.
I just feel like DoF is going to end up as a tool for consolidating spacian power. Chuchu's original plan for GundARM - only making weapons for earthians - seems more radical than shaddiqs plan.
However the good end would be Olcott eventually throws shaddiq under the bus for some true earthian revolution.
Shaddiq says he wants to seize the Bennerit Groups assets (which I assume includes weapons) and redistribute them to Earth to put Earth on an even footing, because as things stand Earth is powerless to resist oppression. When he says he'll "sell the assets to Earth" I'm assuming it'll be at a steep discount, since his speech to his dad was basically paraphrasing Mao's "Political power flows from the barrel of a gun". I don't think his plan is to overthrow capitalism, just a much more modest goal of arming the proletariat.
I think my main suspicion with Shaddiq is it still seems fundamentally rooted in profiteering. While we still don't know what the "war partitioning" exactly is (so this is somewhat speculative, I could be totally wrong!), if it's some structure where war profiteering has been standardized through defense conglomerates each getting a share of the pie, then it feels closer to opening a new revenue stream by arming Earth. I mean, my read is this is far closer to some neoliberal company being like "there's a whole new market in under-developed country we can get into!", at least in terms of what he's actually doing.
I mean, if Shaddiq is actually a class traitor then that's good, but it's not like he is going to Earth to fight (or sending his harem to go do praxis. Remember, Sabina and Renee both had to job to Norea). I'm going to remain very suspicious until we see Shaddiq actually fighting for Earthians directly. His vibe still feels way more like the CIA funding some random group hoping to sell more guns than an actual revolutionary. I'll eat crow if I'm wrong, but I don't trust the dude, especially after how he got owned by BEST EARTH GIRL CHUCHU in the duel in S1. Guy is always looking out for himself- his trust is a one way street, so DoF needs to trust him as far as they can throw him.
Ultimately, I feel like the fact that DoF has had to involve themselves in an internal Benerit Group power struggle feels like the most obvious tell that something isn't right. When do we see real revolutionaries going over to decide who wins between Lockheed and Raytheon? I just think that if this is the vanguard, it's going about things ass-backwards. Ochs Earth was the actual possible solution (Earthian-made arms), but they got fucked. So while obviously DoF has to get guns where they can, I just don't trust the executives from the equivalent of Raytheon to keep their word for the proletariat, even if one of them is half Earthian. I doubt he wants power for Earthians, just himself.
Yeah, that's a fair read. That said, DoF is less the Bolsheviks and more the IRA, and in those kind of colonial struggles the options available get really limited- in the fictional example, from the DoF's perspective if all Shaddiq does is come thru with some new mecha it'll already be a lot better than what the DoF have (had, rip everyone besides Olcott) available and even if Shaddiq betrays them the operations would still have been worthwhile for striking a blow against their oppressors with Delling injured, the head of Geturk killed and the head of Grassley captured. And maybe in the big picture all that's accomplished is just invite retaliation, but that brings us back to Nika and Norea's respective perspectives on the issue.
Man, I love Gundam and getting to have these kinds of discussions. :gaddafi-happy:
