was watching this while extremely sleep deprived. woke up the next day to get back to it and thought i'd have to rewind it a whole hour bc of amnesia, only to find i remembered everything up until 5mins before i fell asleep. this is an extrememly rare occurence, usually I'd have forgotten everything. this is a testament to your storytelling skills.
Thank you for making this! Once or twice a year I'll go on youtube and search "gundam 0079 retrospective" to see if anyone new has been able to put into words/video that I feel when I watch the show. I wish I'd done that earlier this year and seen this sooner, the work you've done here is so incredible! Not only the heaps of research but also how you speak about the emotional aspects in a way that explains them without divorcing them from their impact. The section about newtypes is very powerful, it's exactly what I feel when experiencing the show. And learning how hard Tomino and the entire team worked to tell this story makes me feel even more connected to it and to other fans. Really excited to watch the next video!
I can pretty confidently say this one was made for folks like you. Be sure to check out the Zeta one and ZZ one when i hopefully finish it up at the end of this month.
I was just complaining to my coworker today about yt being flooded with summary "analysis" videos. Glad I stumbled onto this because its a breath of fresh air
This is such an amazing retrospective. Never did I think a show that grew with me as a kid had so much history and complexities behind it. Thank you for making this
I have to say, this is perhaps the most informative video on GUNDAM I've seen. You've really gone the distance looking into the roots of the series--terrific work!
It's a small detail, and one that often gets overlooked by the people who love Getter Robo's over the top machismo, but I also think it might contain one of the first instance of the protagonist being a traumatized and unwilling pilot to the main machine. Admittedly, Getter justifies this with a subplot about amnesia but the idea is totally there.
was that the anime or the manga? i havent watched the anime and its been a while since a read the manga and all i really rember was that they wher a bunch a f-ing psychos lol
@@billassburger6854 Oh they *are* a bunch of psychos, but Both Hayato and Ryoma have their own scenes of not wanting to pilot the robot in the early parts of the manga.
Just a minor correction: The Zeon is exhausted speech was made by General Revil after his rescue from Zeon, that led to the Antarctic Treaty and months of war. Gihren's speech was telling Zeon to rise and fight.
For me part of the magic of this work is that after voraciously consuming everything I possibly could about the show and its historical context nonstop since the turn of the century, I can still click on a video like this and have the narrative completely turned on its head by some newly translated detailed five minutes in. It is a work that continually rewards you in direct proportion to your investment and from the gate it appeals to nearly every kind of obsessive mind in one way or another. I've heard analyses not just from anime critics and the allegedly typical "database mind" otaku that the later marketing focuses so heavily on, but historians, psychologists, physicists, sociologists and musicians. I strongly believe if not for the lingering haze of Orientalism in academia and the enduring stigma surrounding animation, sci fi, and television, all commonly viewed as lesser and more frivolous media outside of we enlightened few's bubbles, that Mobile Suit Gundam would be in discourse with, not just the great classics of anime, but with the capital g Great capital c Classics of the 20th century art and literature. It is flawed but, so is nearly all the celebrated Great Art of the Century. We don't celebrate the later refined works of these artists for their expert mastery, we celebrate their early breakthrough works that struggled in spite of all odds to coherently say something that had never been said before. Every now and then you get an artist like Picasso or Stravinsky who manage to reinvent themselves and capture that lighting more than once, but usually those refined later works are for the fans captured by those bold early works. Gundam is not the work of a singular auteur of course, but if we view the entire franchise as a single collaborative effort it very much fits this mold. Fuck this got away from me, but I just love this show so got dang much
I think you worded this perfectly. And you're absolutely right about how we view animation now. If there wasn't such a stigma in the first place, gundam would likely be an incredible well known and respected work of art and literature.
puting a pin on this one for when I finished watching the show (watched the movie back then wasn't satisfied but it did kickstart the gundam brainrot) . Your entire channel's catalogue feel like a rabit hole I'm gonna really enjoy when working .
Finally got around to sitting down and watching this full video. As always your commentary is in-depth, well researched and incredibly entertaining. Your reviews have a way of making me appreciate things I liked even more so. This video in and of itself is a fine piece of art, an insightful and emotional piece of work. Bravo.
21:21 came here from The Big O video and I do have to say your production value is fantastic, and I really appreciate the context you provide on these along with the research that goes into it
Thank you for dedicating so much time into producing this amazing, and important video on what made Gundam an enormous cultural hit, and why to this day it is still very much relevant.
This is one of the best anime video essays ever made, you did well on making this anime video essay Thank your sharing information about the origins of Gundam and how Gundam was created And thank you for explaining the context
God damn your stuff touches on elements that most people don’t just gloss over but rather are wholly unaware of. I hear things like the influence of the Meji restoration or the impact of Mazinger on the mecha supergenre so rarely that I genuinely forget to take these into account when thinking about Japanese media. You don’t hit people over the head with this stuff and it’s all kept light enough to be interesting, but it is important and is so rarely even considered. I really appreciate this level of detail and care regarding SciFi, Japanese history, and the actual cultural significance of Gundam.
L-Gaim needs more love. I’m still desperately waiting for a blu ray of it. Even though this year is its 40th anniversary, it doesn’t seem that we are getting one.
Gundam has filled up my hyperfocus for years at this point. I have to say brother, this is a FANFUCKINTASTIC video. Knocked its out of the park. Your history lesson over Japan and the world is wonderful.
I really don't think another more complete analysis of Gundam can ever be made at this point. This was definitive in every sense of the word. Well done.
You really are the best channel on YT for discussion on Mecha. You really put the effort in research that most ignore and instead repeat the takes that persist in public discourse, especially about Newtypes, character drama and real life influences for the setting. I love your passion and your ability to channel it, it's moved me to tears before. I wish I could do the same one day, with creative writing but my own experiences with failure in all aspects of life and my pain have discouraged me. But this video reminds me that Gundam 0079 will always be a personal favorite of animation and one of my biggest inspirations.
I am glad it is resonating well with people and they enjoyed it. All I can ask in return help spread it around a bit 😅 making it has worn me out and I don't always have tons of energy to constantly self promote.
Thank you for this, its the culmination of feelings I have felt since first hearing the opening narrative music and "the year is universal century 0079..." scrolling text that immediately grabbed me as a child. Those first few episode runs of the dub on adult swim in the early 00s solidified my love for anime. I searched desperately for the dvds in local Suncoasts at the mall but only ever found one volume, the tragic matilda death up through miharu spy arc. It was precious to me but it added to the mystery of the series that I only had a glimpse of it. I actually first experienced the story more fully in the Journey to Jaburo PS2 game. anyways this was an awesome watch and Ill gladly watch the rest of your content! also Gallant Char is probably my favorite song in all anime OSTs lmao
Only 7:30 in, so interested to see where it lines up, but for me, the reason a series from 1979 still holds up and is still relevant is the writing. Gundam 0079 was for me, and i assume many, the first war story that took time to show the other side as sympathetic to one degree or another. It got me to think about the true nature of humanity and our seemingly predestined propensity for conflict. Yes, Gihren was literally space hitler(Degwin's words, not mine), but Dozle was a devoted father, and Garma a young man trying to make his family proud of him. Those are just three of quite an interesting cast. Need i mention Ramba Ral and Harmon? Or the compelling clusterfuck that is Char Aznable? I'd agree that Clover is a blight on the franchise, and Bandai though better, still fucked up Victory in the beginning and is not blameless in turning a serious story into a toy advert. But if im frank "we come for the robots stay for the interesting setting and characters" the RX-78-2 and the Zaku are cool. Just iconic, but like the MS themselves its the people at the stcks that really drive the plot and keep the audience coming back as they grow up. While 79 wasn't my first--Wing was--79(and the wider OYW story arc) remain my favourite part of the story and what made me the UC stan i am today.
New Gundam fan here (As in only finished 2 shows new) . I watched this literally just after finishing 0078 and this is absolutely FANTASTIC! This honestly had everything I truly wanted. In depth analysis of the overall story, history, Behind the scenes details and clarification. Just all of it. I already liked the series after finishing it but this video has made me respect the show more than ever expected Truly INCREDIBLE!❤❤❤
Easily the best Gundam video on youtube and there's going to be more? Oh boy. Did I understand correctly that you plan to stop at Char's Counterattack?
I'd consider myself a new Gundam fan, and I'm really glad to have been educated by this video. But I'm also kind of wary about all those fans you brought up. Strangely enough they sounded like people I've already heard about. Not meaning to disrespect but sometimes we do extract some behaviors we saw and made them whole 'enemies' in our head, while they probably made those remarks without much thoughts at first. They likely will change their minds if they are informed better down the line (I hope). Granted I have not interacted with Gundam fans or navigate around that space much. So I don't know the scale of these subset of fans. But I do wonder how concrete they hold onto beliefs like "take Newtypes out and focus on war". That extreme sounds ridiculous to me. Thank you for this comprehensive video!
I looked up your channel again to look at Gundam content after finishing the movie trilogy. It felt like it was missing a large amount of content and context. This video perfectly explained why.
This was the perfect companion video to build gunpla to and to that end, it really brought the point home with how Gundam makes you care. Gundam and by extension gunpla has a life to it that makes you think beyond what's immediately in front of you. If a fictional war machine can be cool and extremely destructive, then maybe irl machines are also dualistic like this. I like how it forces you to be honest with yourself.
I haven't finished the video yet, because holy documentary ***man, but it's already one of my favourite essays on mecha anime. If I had to boil Gundam to a specific plotline that I love, that's Char's betrayal of Garma. The notion that Zeon suddenly isn't just the space nazi baddies but a whole political structure and a nest of snakes eating each other - and at that very point just two boys, one nursing a grievance and the other naively trying to prove himself, just made it endlessly endearing to me. Tomino is probably one of my favourite film directors in general but 0079 has the perfect combination of military ruthlessness, human drama and somehow, beneath it all, an endlessly charming and unexpected sense of humor. It's got hardness to match the very best SF but it's also boundless in its humanity.
bringing up Voltes V was really cool to me because my dad grew up on that in the Philippines and he ended up becoming one of the bigger protestors within his provence growing up and was essentailly "wanted" by the govenrnment (I've seen the pictures of him specifically circled in protests and rallies lol) and when he saw that I liked gundam growing up(and even now) he always brings up Voltes V
Watching this whole series was such a treat for me while building the Nu Gundam Ver Ka myself. I loved the storytelling you have done and the whole history lesson behind Gundam's inception as well. Thank you for this great video
Well congrats, this is far above any video about first Gundam I have seen on youtube. I espacially liked how you continually stressed Tomino's commitment to make his works reachable for a large audience. While they are at a somewhat antagonising position, I think the big thing in common with creators like Tomino and toy companies like Clover end Bandai is that they both want to reach a lot of people (though for different reasons). I also liked the jab at sites like ANN or the Gundam wiki. There has been a ton of interviews/articles/analyses about Gundam which have been written/translated, especially in recent years, but they are all scattered in various websites. Centralized way to access Gundam knowledge like the wiki are currently godawful so you have to be "in the know" to get the good stuff. It's good to see a video like this relying on an extensive list of sources.
I completely agree, the majority of the Gundam pages on Wikipedia are greatly lacking information wise, which in comparison to other pages like NGE, shows how umbiased, unbalanced and unreliable Wikipedia can be when given free reign control by subscribed users.
Such a great video/essay. Throughout this retrospective, I was able to understand what I could feel at times during my first watch of the Gundam series, to put words on them. Now I understand a lot more to how and why Gundam is still relevant and that we should care indeed. Thank you for all your immense work and everyone around it !!!
I love the explanation of the context of all this. One thing I can never get over in Gundam is how it starts when humanity has already wiped itself out (or at least half of itself, including New York, err, Yark, Sydney, colonies, etc.). Despite many parallels to WWII, it doesn't exactly play out the same way. Although the Federation is bigger overall, Zeon has managed to blitz its way through the war and capture large amounts of the Earth's resources. Unlike in WWII, there is not really any clear breakthrough. There is no Soviet/US-shaped cavalry coming in to make the inevitable happen. There are no reserves, both sides have already fought each other to exhaustion, and are now looking for game changing weapons. Because otherwise, what will happen when they run out of teenagers too? Make the pre-teens fight as well? First sign of puberty = boom, you're now drafted? With this backdrop, they did something interesting. Because now everyone is fighting over the ruins of space-faring human civilisation, and you have to question if it ever really recovers over the course of the UC. It was interesting to learn the apparent reason behind Char's disappearance in the mid-section. Personally I've always thought that although Char is a very important and enduring character, in 0079, he's more like the original Darth Vader than the prequel one. He's an important lieutenant of the bad guys with a hidden agenda, but he's not some tragic hero or villain that everything revolves around. The rivalry between Amuro and Char develops over the course of the series, but only becomes explicit and personal towards the end, with Char not being immediately aware of who Amuro even is, while Amuro only knows Char because everyone knows who he is, and he uses red suits. Their rivalry doesn't consume everything like it does Char's Counterattack to some extent. In between, we see Char in a hidden identity and struggling to keep up in Zeta, and not seeing him at all in ZZ. This arc in 0079 can be told without him, although now knowing that they may have almost cut him out completely, it sheds a rather different light on his returning with a big shit-eating grin and new suit. But just like how original Star Wars wasn't just "the tragedy of Darth Vader" that Lucas tried to make it into later, 0079 isn't just the tragedy of Char Aznable. It's one of several major things going on.
The only thing you missed was the fictional and real world application of helium-3 fusion being baked into the O'Neil cylinder dynamic. The laws of thermodynamics aside, this is it. This is peak YT. This is good shit. This is the BEST shit I've seen on YT in a long time. Great video.
Despite being "filler" in the slowest arc of the show, I still consider "Time Be Still" to be the single best episode of the show. The way it blurs the two sides of the war is masterful.
Fascinating history lesson! (Just came across this channel, no clue how the newer videos are, tho I do hope the background music will be a bit quieter, it's a tad distracting this early)
Thank you I am you enjoyed it! However I am still going with Tracer Tong's alternative, human's may not be perfect, but what we direly need is good governance, not a chatbot.
This analysis makes me understand the series in a new light! I was told all of the lies told about this series that you debunked. I will definitely check out other Gundam videos on your channel.
Took me.a few days to get this fully watched but it was well worth it, glad there are other people out there who's minds are as consumed by gundam and it's themes as much as mine is lol this was super well done and informative 🖤🔥
I had always assumed that the connection between Tomino and Masao Adachi was anecdotal. Nice to see there's actual documentation between the two. Huge fan of the work of both of them.
3:24 Man. It's depressing to think that in an Alternate Timeline the First Real Robot Show would have been eaten and consumed by the Super Robot Toy Tie in Cycle and never gain relevance again...
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
Holy shit I've finally found it, the good 0079 review video. I've watched dozens of these but their always so fucking basic or even outright wrong every single time. But you actually get it, you get what makes this series so special.
Fantastic work, and the best video essay on Gundam on the internet by several orders of magnitude. I was surprised as to how much misinformation I had absorbed over the years about Tomino and the show's production; the bit about Clover was something I had never heard before. Gigguk always deserves to be dunked on as well; a complete midwit as well as a shill. (If you ever go even more insane at some point, a long-form video on Evangelion is also sorely needed. There's so much misinformation and 80-IQ takes on the net that I just don't get involved in discussion anymore.) (Also, also, if you ever get around to ZZ this decade I'm going to laugh when the names of the cast come up. Lemon People -> Elpeo Ple still makes my laugh a decade after I watched the show.)
Im a Filipino, and the plot twist after that is when the 1987 constitution was built...... PHILIPPINES WAS NEVER A GOOD PLACE TO LIVE ANYMORE, voltes v might have the right message but at what cost. Edit: now for gundam though i was just 15 at the time when i discovered gundam 0079,it was janky, old and very rusty in animation.... But i was so obsessed with till i got to watch it till the compilation movies, it changed me completely, before gundam i was an introvert, lacks communication skills and didn't have a hobby or friends to share such hobbies until the gundam franchise came, i made new friends, i became approachable, i become empowered and ofcourse i had new toys tp collect(gunpla), i also showed this to my old brother and we both got sucked it to the world and chaotic but beautiful the UC timeline was and made sense so much so than Voltes V. My brother and father was a soldier and everytime we would marathon gundam they always tell these grim stories of war, but they always say that "we fought so that the next generation can live and care for the future" this show even though i was not a soldier become personal for me and made me reflect the world we live in today, i cared for the world and aspire to someday help to make it better, gundam can teach us alot of things and it means alot to all of us.
Will this series go all the way through UC/Regild century/Correct century Side note: Gundam Unicorn does give a indication later on which year it actually takes place, it gives some numbers which can be calculated to 0079 be in the year 2127. I think it was Unicorn that tells this.
Yes I laid it all out in the first video "How to watch Gundam" but a lot of people seemed to miss that. Basically the idea is to get around to everything eventually, but i want to review and do other stuff in between gundam series so i don't get burned out.
4:09 and there is why I "press X to doubt" any claims that the G-Armor only existed for toy sales in the original MSG. The Gunpla kit didn't even come out until years later, so there very much isn't a leg to stand on when it comes to saying it only existed for advertising a toy that didn't even exist at the time.
If you bothered to watch on you would know Gunpla didn't become the primary toy sales model for GUndam until after the earlier clover toys were designed, sold and sold poorly at that. The G-Armor would have been marketed for that yes, years before the Gunpla smart guy.
I think this video does a pretty good job on explaining the significance of the original Gundam. The Newtype thing has always been a point of contention in my enjoyment of the UC timeline in general, but that only becomes a problem in Zeta onwards, and mostly in the Tomino handled main series. The original concept is one I grasp, but so often the execution is done so poorly or so similarly, that it truly makes UC a progressively bleak and depressing timeline that struggles to learn from itself (unless that's the point). I'd argue that minimal elements, or the complete absence of Newtypes leads to some good, even great stories in Gundam, but that varies in a franchise as large as it. Unicorn especially is great at showcasing the building blocks of the mishandling of Newtypes, and builds to its illogical extremes, to my enjoyment. But that is neither here nor there, as the original does a great job of humanizing some of Zeon, which is something that isn't shown as much down the line, or as well, anyways. It is a seminal work that deserves to be remembered, if not for the commercialization of the franchise itself now, but for its cultural impact. And to think, I only started my journey as a Gundam watcher because of context for video games...I will be watching the Zeta video, to see if I can be convinced of its worth, as so many others claim. Be proud of the work done here, as there's a lot of information gone unnoticed in other videos on the subject, even if the barrier of entry is high, but that's just like the original concept of Gundam, now, isn't it?
Very glad you enjoyed it and wrote out a nice thoughtful comment. I do hope you enjoy the Zeta vid, as well as uhhh when the ZZ is done. Maybe look more forward to CCA lol.
@@argonbolt No problem. I look forward to these deeper dives into these shows that don't get talked much about beyond surface level topics like the mechs and how cool they look (or how the animation is dated), rather than if the story they are from is anything good to begin with. I will definitely be interested to see where you land on ZZ, as I believe that to be bottom of the barrel, despite the claims that the second half is better. CCA is also something I'm willing to reconsider as well, with how you will handle these concepts of the Newtypes especially, and with how crazy it gets.
I appreciate the use of House main theme. I watched it with my friend a couple days ago and loved it. It fits the video segment really well. Around the same time, I've also learned about Sanrizuka struggle, which impresses me how well youtube's algorithm can match the content to the user (or maybe it's just a dumb luck😅).
![Seungmin "그렇게, 천천히, 우리(As we are)" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kAzmhLHePqU/mqdefault.jpg)
"This is without of doubt one the best Gundam videos ever crafted and posted onto RUclips..." -A diehard Gundam fan.
Completely agree.
Agreed 💯
Yes very good
I came for giant robots, instead I got a whole history lesson *and* giant robots. I see that as an absolute win.
WE’RE JUMPING ON TO WHITE BASE
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
was watching this while extremely sleep deprived. woke up the next day to get back to it and thought i'd have to rewind it a whole hour bc of amnesia, only to find i remembered everything up until 5mins before i fell asleep. this is an extrememly rare occurence, usually I'd have forgotten everything. this is a testament to your storytelling skills.
That's a wonderful compliment thank you!
Thank you for making this! Once or twice a year I'll go on youtube and search "gundam 0079 retrospective" to see if anyone new has been able to put into words/video that I feel when I watch the show. I wish I'd done that earlier this year and seen this sooner, the work you've done here is so incredible! Not only the heaps of research but also how you speak about the emotional aspects in a way that explains them without divorcing them from their impact. The section about newtypes is very powerful, it's exactly what I feel when experiencing the show. And learning how hard Tomino and the entire team worked to tell this story makes me feel even more connected to it and to other fans. Really excited to watch the next video!
I can pretty confidently say this one was made for folks like you. Be sure to check out the Zeta one and ZZ one when i hopefully finish it up at the end of this month.
Thanks for providing proper context when discussing such topics. A lot of other reviews of Gundam seem to leave it out
I was just complaining to my coworker today about yt being flooded with summary "analysis" videos. Glad I stumbled onto this because its a breath of fresh air
Yeah I was so sick of those it drove me to make this ngl.
Put my friend onto the video as well, you've got two new fans. Thanks for your hard work
This is such an amazing retrospective. Never did I think a show that grew with me as a kid had so much history and complexities behind it. Thank you for making this
I have to say, this is perhaps the most informative video on GUNDAM I've seen. You've really gone the distance looking into the roots of the series--terrific work!
It's a small detail, and one that often gets overlooked by the people who love Getter Robo's over the top machismo, but I also think it might contain one of the first instance of the protagonist being a traumatized and unwilling pilot to the main machine. Admittedly, Getter justifies this with a subplot about amnesia but the idea is totally there.
was that the anime or the manga? i havent watched the anime and its been a while since a read the manga and all i really rember was that they wher a bunch a f-ing psychos lol
@@billassburger6854 Oh they *are* a bunch of psychos, but Both Hayato and Ryoma have their own scenes of not wanting to pilot the robot in the early parts of the manga.
Just a minor correction: The Zeon is exhausted speech was made by General Revil after his rescue from Zeon, that led to the Antarctic Treaty and months of war. Gihren's speech was telling Zeon to rise and fight.
Oh whoops confused the two.
For me part of the magic of this work is that after voraciously consuming everything I possibly could about the show and its historical context nonstop since the turn of the century, I can still click on a video like this and have the narrative completely turned on its head by some newly translated detailed five minutes in.
It is a work that continually rewards you in direct proportion to your investment and from the gate it appeals to nearly every kind of obsessive mind in one way or another. I've heard analyses not just from anime critics and the allegedly typical "database mind" otaku that the later marketing focuses so heavily on, but historians, psychologists, physicists, sociologists and musicians.
I strongly believe if not for the lingering haze of Orientalism in academia and the enduring stigma surrounding animation, sci fi, and television, all commonly viewed as lesser and more frivolous media outside of we enlightened few's bubbles, that Mobile Suit Gundam would be in discourse with, not just the great classics of anime, but with the capital g Great capital c Classics of the 20th century art and literature. It is flawed but, so is nearly all the celebrated Great Art of the Century.
We don't celebrate the later refined works of these artists for their expert mastery, we celebrate their early breakthrough works that struggled in spite of all odds to coherently say something that had never been said before. Every now and then you get an artist like Picasso or Stravinsky who manage to reinvent themselves and capture that lighting more than once, but usually those refined later works are for the fans captured by those bold early works.
Gundam is not the work of a singular auteur of course, but if we view the entire franchise as a single collaborative effort it very much fits this mold.
Fuck this got away from me, but I just love this show so got dang much
Yeah it's very much a true blue GOAT.
I think you worded this perfectly. And you're absolutely right about how we view animation now. If there wasn't such a stigma in the first place, gundam would likely be an incredible well known and respected work of art and literature.
puting a pin on this one for when I finished watching the show (watched the movie back then wasn't satisfied but it did kickstart the gundam brainrot) . Your entire channel's catalogue feel like a rabit hole I'm gonna really enjoy when working .
Finally got around to sitting down and watching this full video. As always your commentary is in-depth, well researched and incredibly entertaining. Your reviews have a way of making me appreciate things I liked even more so. This video in and of itself is a fine piece of art, an insightful and emotional piece of work. Bravo.
21:21 came here from The Big O video and I do have to say your production value is fantastic, and I really appreciate the context you provide on these along with the research that goes into it
Thank you for dedicating so much time into producing this amazing, and important video on what made Gundam an enormous cultural hit, and why to this day it is still very much relevant.
This is one of the best anime video essays ever made, you did well on making this anime video essay
Thank your sharing information about the origins of Gundam and how Gundam was created
And thank you for explaining the context
Damn, feels good to discover your channel, I really miss this level of analysis for shows these days and gundam is a great target for it.
Thanks! Zeta is currently wip
@@argonbolt Can't wait, especially after bingeing so much of your videos lol
Spectacular work! I can't even imagine how much work went into this from the research to production.
God damn your stuff touches on elements that most people don’t just gloss over but rather are wholly unaware of. I hear things like the influence of the Meji restoration or the impact of Mazinger on the mecha supergenre so rarely that I genuinely forget to take these into account when thinking about Japanese media. You don’t hit people over the head with this stuff and it’s all kept light enough to be interesting, but it is important and is so rarely even considered. I really appreciate this level of detail and care regarding SciFi, Japanese history, and the actual cultural significance of Gundam.
Glad you enjoyed it!
I hope you can do indepth videos on the rest of Tomino's filmography espcially L-Gaim and Brain Powerd
L-Gaim needs more love. I’m still desperately waiting for a blu ray of it. Even though this year is its 40th anniversary, it doesn’t seem that we are getting one.
This is the greatest retrospective I've ever seen on Gundam 0079 and I learned a ton. Phenomenal work.
Beautiful fucking video, absolute masterwork.
This is one of if not the best gundam video Ive ever seen. The amount of effort and research put into is amazing!!
Did Red Eric and the local jester Gigguk really deserve such a fate....
YES
RUclips community standards prevent me from describing what fate Gigguk deserves
Gundam has filled up my hyperfocus for years at this point. I have to say brother, this is a FANFUCKINTASTIC video. Knocked its out of the park. Your history lesson over Japan and the world is wonderful.
Massive ups for a genuinely complete and contextualized analysis of Tomino's initial Gundam saga; superb work.
Absolutely splendid, I have learned so much of the history of this show, thank you.
I really don't think another more complete analysis of Gundam can ever be made at this point. This was definitive in every sense of the word. Well done.
You really are the best channel on YT for discussion on Mecha. You really put the effort in research that most ignore and instead repeat the takes that persist in public discourse, especially about Newtypes, character drama and real life influences for the setting.
I love your passion and your ability to channel it, it's moved me to tears before. I wish I could do the same one day, with creative writing but my own experiences with failure in all aspects of life and my pain have discouraged me. But this video reminds me that Gundam 0079 will always be a personal favorite of animation and one of my biggest inspirations.
I am glad it is resonating well with people and they enjoyed it. All I can ask in return help spread it around a bit 😅 making it has worn me out and I don't always have tons of energy to constantly self promote.
Thank you for this, its the culmination of feelings I have felt since first hearing the opening narrative music and "the year is universal century 0079..." scrolling text that immediately grabbed me as a child.
Those first few episode runs of the dub on adult swim in the early 00s solidified my love for anime. I searched desperately for the dvds in local Suncoasts at the mall but only ever found one volume, the tragic matilda death up through miharu spy arc. It was precious to me but it added to the mystery of the series that I only had a glimpse of it. I actually first experienced the story more fully in the Journey to Jaburo PS2 game.
anyways this was an awesome watch and Ill gladly watch the rest of your content!
also Gallant Char is probably my favorite song in all anime OSTs lmao
Nice to have someone with a good voiceover. Looking forward to more to come!
Only 7:30 in, so interested to see where it lines up, but for me, the reason a series from 1979 still holds up and is still relevant is the writing. Gundam 0079 was for me, and i assume many, the first war story that took time to show the other side as sympathetic to one degree or another. It got me to think about the true nature of humanity and our seemingly predestined propensity for conflict.
Yes, Gihren was literally space hitler(Degwin's words, not mine), but Dozle was a devoted father, and Garma a young man trying to make his family proud of him. Those are just three of quite an interesting cast. Need i mention Ramba Ral and Harmon? Or the compelling clusterfuck that is Char Aznable?
I'd agree that Clover is a blight on the franchise, and Bandai though better, still fucked up Victory in the beginning and is not blameless in turning a serious story into a toy advert.
But if im frank "we come for the robots stay for the interesting setting and characters" the RX-78-2 and the Zaku are cool. Just iconic, but like the MS themselves its the people at the stcks that really drive the plot and keep the audience coming back as they grow up.
While 79 wasn't my first--Wing was--79(and the wider OYW story arc) remain my favourite part of the story and what made me the UC stan i am today.
How am I only now finding this series
Over 3 hours of discussion of Gundam? Sign me the FUCK UP!
New Gundam fan here (As in only finished 2 shows new) . I watched this literally just after finishing 0078 and this is absolutely FANTASTIC! This honestly had everything I truly wanted. In depth analysis of the overall story, history, Behind the scenes details and clarification. Just all of it. I already liked the series after finishing it but this video has made me respect the show more than ever expected
Truly INCREDIBLE!❤❤❤
I swear to God This will be used for a college thesis some day. It's 2:37am and I'm still listening 3 hours later
AS LONG AS THEY CREDIT ME AND GIVE ME A LOAD OF MONEYYYYYYYYYYYYYY THEY CAN USE IT!
@@argonbolt
The spirit of the pirate will never truly fade.
Documentary?, history?,robots? Love it ❤
Easily the best Gundam video on youtube and there's going to be more? Oh boy. Did I understand correctly that you plan to stop at Char's Counterattack?
For now*
Hopefully we get a later extension just to justify using the line about Unicorn a guy on the discord came ups with
I did not expect this video will be 3hrs… But this video is awesome! great job making this video 👍💯 you earned a Sub!
thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!
I'd consider myself a new Gundam fan, and I'm really glad to have been educated by this video. But I'm also kind of wary about all those fans you brought up. Strangely enough they sounded like people I've already heard about. Not meaning to disrespect but sometimes we do extract some behaviors we saw and made them whole 'enemies' in our head, while they probably made those remarks without much thoughts at first. They likely will change their minds if they are informed better down the line (I hope).
Granted I have not interacted with Gundam fans or navigate around that space much. So I don't know the scale of these subset of fans. But I do wonder how concrete they hold onto beliefs like "take Newtypes out and focus on war". That extreme sounds ridiculous to me. Thank you for this comprehensive video!
You have been fortunately spared
I looked up your channel again to look at Gundam content after finishing the movie trilogy. It felt like it was missing a large amount of content and context.
This video perfectly explained why.
this video took amazing and dedicated work. thank you for posting it, i thoroughly enjoyed myself.
Bro really started the video about Gundam with a history lesson about Japan. He's an official video essayist for sure lop
Thank you very much, man. I haven't had so much fun watching a video in a long time. Totally worth the time!
Very happy you enjoyed it!
This was the perfect companion video to build gunpla to and to that end, it really brought the point home with how Gundam makes you care. Gundam and by extension gunpla has a life to it that makes you think beyond what's immediately in front of you. If a fictional war machine can be cool and extremely destructive, then maybe irl machines are also dualistic like this. I like how it forces you to be honest with yourself.
I haven't finished the video yet, because holy documentary ***man, but it's already one of my favourite essays on mecha anime. If I had to boil Gundam to a specific plotline that I love, that's Char's betrayal of Garma. The notion that Zeon suddenly isn't just the space nazi baddies but a whole political structure and a nest of snakes eating each other - and at that very point just two boys, one nursing a grievance and the other naively trying to prove himself, just made it endlessly endearing to me. Tomino is probably one of my favourite film directors in general but 0079 has the perfect combination of military ruthlessness, human drama and somehow, beneath it all, an endlessly charming and unexpected sense of humor. It's got hardness to match the very best SF but it's also boundless in its humanity.
bringing up Voltes V was really cool to me because my dad grew up on that in the Philippines and he ended up becoming one of the bigger protestors within his provence growing up and was essentailly "wanted" by the govenrnment (I've seen the pictures of him specifically circled in protests and rallies lol) and when he saw that I liked gundam growing up(and even now) he always brings up Voltes V
I have been waiting for this.
Watching this whole series was such a treat for me while building the Nu Gundam Ver Ka myself. I loved the storytelling you have done and the whole history lesson behind Gundam's inception as well. Thank you for this great video
Well congrats, this is far above any video about first Gundam I have seen on youtube. I espacially liked how you continually stressed Tomino's commitment to make his works reachable for a large audience. While they are at a somewhat antagonising position, I think the big thing in common with creators like Tomino and toy companies like Clover end Bandai is that they both want to reach a lot of people (though for different reasons). I also liked the jab at sites like ANN or the Gundam wiki. There has been a ton of interviews/articles/analyses about Gundam which have been written/translated, especially in recent years, but they are all scattered in various websites. Centralized way to access Gundam knowledge like the wiki are currently godawful so you have to be "in the know" to get the good stuff. It's good to see a video like this relying on an extensive list of sources.
Very happy you enjoyed it!
I completely agree, the majority of the Gundam pages on Wikipedia are greatly lacking information wise, which in comparison to other pages like NGE, shows how umbiased, unbalanced and unreliable Wikipedia can be when given free reign control by subscribed users.
Thanks for the video, made my work day better. Entertaining and Educational.
i survived ON GUNDAM and all I got was this lousy comment
Such a great video/essay. Throughout this retrospective, I was able to understand what I could feel at times during my first watch of the Gundam series, to put words on them. Now I understand a lot more to how and why Gundam is still relevant and that we should care indeed. Thank you for all your immense work and everyone around it !!!
I love the explanation of the context of all this. One thing I can never get over in Gundam is how it starts when humanity has already wiped itself out (or at least half of itself, including New York, err, Yark, Sydney, colonies, etc.). Despite many parallels to WWII, it doesn't exactly play out the same way. Although the Federation is bigger overall, Zeon has managed to blitz its way through the war and capture large amounts of the Earth's resources. Unlike in WWII, there is not really any clear breakthrough. There is no Soviet/US-shaped cavalry coming in to make the inevitable happen. There are no reserves, both sides have already fought each other to exhaustion, and are now looking for game changing weapons. Because otherwise, what will happen when they run out of teenagers too? Make the pre-teens fight as well? First sign of puberty = boom, you're now drafted? With this backdrop, they did something interesting. Because now everyone is fighting over the ruins of space-faring human civilisation, and you have to question if it ever really recovers over the course of the UC.
It was interesting to learn the apparent reason behind Char's disappearance in the mid-section. Personally I've always thought that although Char is a very important and enduring character, in 0079, he's more like the original Darth Vader than the prequel one. He's an important lieutenant of the bad guys with a hidden agenda, but he's not some tragic hero or villain that everything revolves around. The rivalry between Amuro and Char develops over the course of the series, but only becomes explicit and personal towards the end, with Char not being immediately aware of who Amuro even is, while Amuro only knows Char because everyone knows who he is, and he uses red suits. Their rivalry doesn't consume everything like it does Char's Counterattack to some extent. In between, we see Char in a hidden identity and struggling to keep up in Zeta, and not seeing him at all in ZZ. This arc in 0079 can be told without him, although now knowing that they may have almost cut him out completely, it sheds a rather different light on his returning with a big shit-eating grin and new suit. But just like how original Star Wars wasn't just "the tragedy of Darth Vader" that Lucas tried to make it into later, 0079 isn't just the tragedy of Char Aznable. It's one of several major things going on.
The only thing you missed was the fictional and real world application of helium-3 fusion being baked into the O'Neil cylinder dynamic.
The laws of thermodynamics aside, this is it. This is peak YT. This is good shit. This is the BEST shit I've seen on YT in a long time.
Great video.
I need another fix. It has been while since Hathaway. Bring it on.
You missed the opportunity to use the g gundam MacArthur that pilots the space Statue of Liberty when you talked about the real life MacArthur
Despite being "filler" in the slowest arc of the show, I still consider "Time Be Still" to be the single best episode of the show. The way it blurs the two sides of the war is masterful.
Fascinating history lesson! (Just came across this channel, no clue how the newer videos are, tho I do hope the background music will be a bit quieter, it's a tad distracting this early)
@ 31:40 the zoom in fade of the foreground characters ive never seen before!
This was a wonderful tribute to Gundam. Well done and well written.
Thank you I am you enjoyed it! However I am still going with Tracer Tong's alternative, human's may not be perfect, but what we direly need is good governance, not a chatbot.
This analysis makes me understand the series in a new light! I was told all of the lies told about this series that you debunked. I will definitely check out other Gundam videos on your channel.
Took me.a few days to get this fully watched but it was well worth it, glad there are other people out there who's minds are as consumed by gundam and it's themes as much as mine is lol this was super well done and informative 🖤🔥
Holy feth....nearly 4 hours in length! This is perfect for Monday lol
I had always assumed that the connection between Tomino and Masao Adachi was anecdotal. Nice to see there's actual documentation between the two. Huge fan of the work of both of them.
3:24 Man. It's depressing to think that in an Alternate Timeline the First Real Robot Show would have been eaten and consumed by the Super Robot Toy Tie in Cycle and never gain relevance again...
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
the "super/real" distinction is horsepiss, and i'm sure gundam would've climbed out of the gutter nontheless, if maybe not as the all-encompassing giant it is in our time.
How the hell did you Triple post this?@@ikariwolv767
Holy shit I've finally found it, the good 0079 review video. I've watched dozens of these but their always so fucking basic or even outright wrong every single time. But you actually get it, you get what makes this series so special.
This was awesome to listen to at work
Such a well created and great video 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Come to find white noise as background but stop what I'm doing and watch the video
I rewatched the OG Gundam a few years ago and was surprised how well it holds up, but I probably shouldn't have been 😅
Fantastic work, and the best video essay on Gundam on the internet by several orders of magnitude. I was surprised as to how much misinformation I had absorbed over the years about Tomino and the show's production; the bit about Clover was something I had never heard before. Gigguk always deserves to be dunked on as well; a complete midwit as well as a shill. (If you ever go even more insane at some point, a long-form video on Evangelion is also sorely needed. There's so much misinformation and 80-IQ takes on the net that I just don't get involved in discussion anymore.) (Also, also, if you ever get around to ZZ this decade I'm going to laugh when the names of the cast come up. Lemon People -> Elpeo Ple still makes my laugh a decade after I watched the show.)
I'm glad you liked it! I certainly have a lot to say about a ton of mecha shows in the future, Eva included
@@argonbolt I saw alot of hour long video about Evangelion on YT but I'm definetly curius about your take on it.
1:21:38 Some types of Federation uniform are actually almost exactly like Japanese Manchurian uniforms... idk what that means.
Great work 😊
Im a Filipino, and the plot twist after that is when the 1987 constitution was built...... PHILIPPINES WAS NEVER A GOOD PLACE TO LIVE ANYMORE, voltes v might have the right message but at what cost.
Edit: now for gundam though i was just 15 at the time when i discovered gundam 0079,it was janky, old and very rusty in animation.... But i was so obsessed with till i got to watch it till the compilation movies, it changed me completely, before gundam i was an introvert, lacks communication skills and didn't have a hobby or friends to share such hobbies until the gundam franchise came, i made new friends, i became approachable, i become empowered and ofcourse i had new toys tp collect(gunpla), i also showed this to my old brother and we both got sucked it to the world and chaotic but beautiful the UC timeline was and made sense so much so than Voltes V. My brother and father was a soldier and everytime we would marathon gundam they always tell these grim stories of war, but they always say that "we fought so that the next generation can live and care for the future" this show even though i was not a soldier become personal for me and made me reflect the world we live in today, i cared for the world and aspire to someday help to make it better, gundam can teach us alot of things and it means alot to all of us.
This has criminally few views! I cannot believe the production quality!
Well worth the wait
Will this series go all the way through UC/Regild century/Correct century
Side note: Gundam Unicorn does give a indication later on which year it actually takes place, it gives some numbers which can be calculated to 0079 be in the year 2127. I think it was Unicorn that tells this.
Yes I laid it all out in the first video "How to watch Gundam" but a lot of people seemed to miss that. Basically the idea is to get around to everything eventually, but i want to review and do other stuff in between gundam series so i don't get burned out.
Gundam touched all of our hearts with the mechs and characters
I shed a tear...
This should have more viewer, all this work and only 4K people see this?
Hey Argonbolt, Thanks for making me care again.
4:09 and there is why I "press X to doubt" any claims that the G-Armor only existed for toy sales in the original MSG.
The Gunpla kit didn't even come out until years later, so there very much isn't a leg to stand on when it comes to saying it only existed for advertising a toy that didn't even exist at the time.
If you bothered to watch on you would know Gunpla didn't become the primary toy sales model for GUndam until after the earlier clover toys were designed, sold and sold poorly at that. The G-Armor would have been marketed for that yes, years before the Gunpla smart guy.
I think this video does a pretty good job on explaining the significance of the original Gundam. The Newtype thing has always been a point of contention in my enjoyment of the UC timeline in general, but that only becomes a problem in Zeta onwards, and mostly in the Tomino handled main series. The original concept is one I grasp, but so often the execution is done so poorly or so similarly, that it truly makes UC a progressively bleak and depressing timeline that struggles to learn from itself (unless that's the point). I'd argue that minimal elements, or the complete absence of Newtypes leads to some good, even great stories in Gundam, but that varies in a franchise as large as it. Unicorn especially is great at showcasing the building blocks of the mishandling of Newtypes, and builds to its illogical extremes, to my enjoyment. But that is neither here nor there, as the original does a great job of humanizing some of Zeon, which is something that isn't shown as much down the line, or as well, anyways. It is a seminal work that deserves to be remembered, if not for the commercialization of the franchise itself now, but for its cultural impact. And to think, I only started my journey as a Gundam watcher because of context for video games...I will be watching the Zeta video, to see if I can be convinced of its worth, as so many others claim. Be proud of the work done here, as there's a lot of information gone unnoticed in other videos on the subject, even if the barrier of entry is high, but that's just like the original concept of Gundam, now, isn't it?
Very glad you enjoyed it and wrote out a nice thoughtful comment. I do hope you enjoy the Zeta vid, as well as uhhh when the ZZ is done. Maybe look more forward to CCA lol.
@@argonbolt No problem. I look forward to these deeper dives into these shows that don't get talked much about beyond surface level topics like the mechs and how cool they look (or how the animation is dated), rather than if the story they are from is anything good to begin with. I will definitely be interested to see where you land on ZZ, as I believe that to be bottom of the barrel, despite the claims that the second half is better. CCA is also something I'm willing to reconsider as well, with how you will handle these concepts of the Newtypes especially, and with how crazy it gets.
Another excellent video
I am digging this Adam Curtis doc about gundam
Wow cool robot
can you add the jpanese titlies for the Japanese sources because when I search the english names for some of them I get nothing
I'll see what I can do
What powered suit video game was shown in at 1:55:01?
Exocorps
Where are the clips with remastered animation from? I can’t seem to find where that comes from.
Not remastered, outright re-animated 0079 scenes from the PS2 games.
What's the song used at @ 24:44?
Where is the footage from/what game appears around 1:55:10 ? Thanks for the video!
ExoCorps on Steam, currently only in early access iirc.
is the music you opened with in the chapter on the history of japan from TW Shogun's OST?
You know it.
@@argonbolt well, looks like i gotta set 6 hours aside to watch some peak essay
a good day for sure
I actually really loved the analysis and history of Japan and th world at large to set the scene for gundam. It was a really nice touch.
@9:50 Beethovens 8th. ZARDOOOZ SPEAKS TO YOU, THE CHOSEN ONES
What is the song around the 2:51:14 mark?
Porno Graffiti Apollo
@@argonbolt I guess that should been obvious. Thank you for replying anyway.
I appreciate the use of House main theme. I watched it with my friend a couple days ago and loved it. It fits the video segment really well. Around the same time, I've also learned about Sanrizuka struggle, which impresses me how well youtube's algorithm can match the content to the user (or maybe it's just a dumb luck😅).
What's that first japenese song ?
time stamp?
@@argonbolt 11:31
@@josephhward3288Yamato OST, Universe Spreading to Infinity
@@argonbolt thank you
Step one: build a false premise
Step two: destroy false premise
Step three: profit