I feel that the Newtype concept was handled well enough since it retroactively explains why Amuro was such a competent pilot when simply having the better machine was not enough. Newtypes are not only thematically appropriate since they represent humankind evolved to the space age, it is also deliciously ironic since the Federation called the Newtype theory Zeon propaganda.
Well I haven't watched the show, but whenever I hear of a concept like this I contrast it with the reveal of Nen in HunterXHunter. You always have the sense of something going on; some supernatural force but you think they'll never explain it cause the show doesn't take itself super seriously. But the series foreshadows that something is still incomplete with the Hunter Exam, directly confronting you with Hisoka in the Tournament (I dunno the actual name) arc. Its one of the best ways I've seen this kind of reveal done.
" since it retroactively explains why Amuro was such a competent pilot " From what I remember it's actually implied Amuro wasn't able to use his Newtype abilities until he fought the tri-stars and they killed Matilda. So until that point it really was mostly just the Gundam carrying him.
For combat purposes I don't like Newtypes since they can't be touched by normal people, effectively making Newtypes Jedi. If you aren't a Newtype, you don't matter unless you're the rival character like Graham Aker or have ridiculous plot armor like Jerid. For story purposes I get it, but the Newtype people will be untouched basically until some plot event comes along. Minor complaint for the overall story stuff though.
One of my favorite "double sided war drama" episodes is when a bunch of Zeon soldiers rig the Gundam with hidden time bombs, then watch from a distance as the White Base crew risk certain death to disarm them all, and only barely make it. The Zekes are so impressed with their badassery that they come meet them in disguises to compliment them as a show of respect. No good guys or bad guys, just normal people, fighting each other for stupid reasons that are out of their control. Works of fiction like Gundam are why I tell military recruiters to fuck off.
Seeing the original story was supposed to be 50 episodes long but got cancelled on episode 39 and the series create had to beg the sponsor for more money to finish the show on episode 43. The newtypes concept being rushed makes sense because he had to take 10 episodes of story and compress it down to 4 episodes. We should be glad that the end was as good as it was.
Well the "Gallant Char" track is still my favorite, and I didn't mind whenever it came up (which was often). I just wish it got to the weird disco part in the middle more frequently!!!
I’m so glad this video exists. I’ve been getting into the Gundam franchise myself this year and I’m happy this little recap on the OG Gundam is here to give me the bases.
Dude, totally check out the movie compilations! I had a lot of the same minor issues you did, and the movie trilogy fixed a lot of them. As for which one is "canon" technically it's the movies. In Char's Counterattack there's a reanimated flashback to the finale of Mobile Suit Gundam and it's based on the movie. Though, it's not a big deal if you choose to not watch the movies since it doesn't alter any plot points, all it really changes is a few mobile suits/mobile armors and it introduces Newtypes much sooner. If you do watch the compilation movies will you do a video on them as well? Like a compare and contrast.
Said they'll watch everything I assumed that meant the movies and ovas as well so they should get to the movie trilogy as well think it'll be later because believe they mentioned they're doing this by release order
Hail Zeon Honestly, the movies really bug me almost entirely because I tend to prefer watching Gundam dubbed rather than subbed (my personal preference, and I really like 0079's TV dub), and while the subbed versions are totally fine, the dubs for the 0079 movies are HORRENDOUS. Those movies really do need to be watched subbed to get anything out of them.
Uhh no, they removed the G-Amour and the G-Fighter for the movies, instead the Core fighter gets upgraded to the Core Booster, which IMO is a less silly design.
The art & animation in this show are underrated by people who don't know what the average 70s anime looked like; given the time and budget what they did is fantastic. If you want "below average by 70s standards" animation look at Tomino's Zambot 3 (though even that one has like 4-5 good looking episodes, even if the rest is mostly crap). People look at 0079 then look at Zeta & think 0079 has to be bad, but the difference in resources is hugely significant. Zeta was made in the 80s "bubble economy" era when Japan had fucktons of money to put into sci-fi shows which were huge back then. 0079 was made in the 70s and was the first show of its type, made in a cold room with an awful schedule. And yet it still looks better than most 70s anime. Ironically the only part Tomino looks back on with a lot of regret, outside of Doan's Island, is the majority of the backgrounds simply because he felt the ones not done by the main background artist were crap in comparison & not movie-worthy. He looks back fondly on most of the key animation work. Also, the compilation movies leave out a lot of great & thematically important stuff and you should absolutely not watch those only; just as a little extra after you're done. The captain's death, the episode where Zeon soldiers help a lady & her son on the Earth Federation side, etc are all gone.
ZZ is super underrated i liked it way more than Z. especially because it fixes Camille character to an unlikable entitled brat to, well, whatever he is in ZZ
Claudio Monteverdi in Kamille's defense, he really did start to straighten up after Wong's discipline. Haven't seen ZZ yet, but it doesn't look as bad as people say it is, just notably different
What i didn't like about ZZ was that it was (imo) a step back in the battles. i remember being bored all the time in Z's fights because there are just too many without any real reason: "Oh Crap, AUEG did something, Titans GO!" repeat every episode (except some really good one like the one in the cities) also Kamille rival was a literal as seen you could've tell it would've live any time making any battle basically a tie with a little margin of favor to the AUEG
Personally ZZ ended up becoming my favorite of the main 3 series. The first 25-30 episodes are hit or miss and the moon moon arc, while interesting idea is handled poorly but the last 20 odd episodes really make up for it and lay down some of the best Gundam narrative.
I feel like Newtypes as a concept read better in Zeta, as one of the show's central conflicts is over humanity's need to evolve. In the original, it just feels like a Sci Fi concept Tomino found interesting, but wasn't sure where to fit.
The original novels that the director wrote go into better detail regarding Newtypes IMO but the novels also don't have to worry about selling toys so the entire thing takes place in space with no Earth arc. But then again, the novels also have their own set of problems as well.
One of the main improvements in the movie trilogy is explaining Newtypes better and introducing the concept earlier on. People talk about the movies as though they remove a ton of stuff from the show, when in reality they keep everything worthwhile as well as adding substantial improvements. They really are the best way to watch 0079. It's a shame the Zeta movies were so lackluster, although I would say the third movie is still better than the final third of the show where things really fell apart.
The idea that 0079 was a kid's show to sell toys and the franchise got more serious over time is sort of the exact opposite of what happened, since even before Gundam the creator had already been given the nickname "Kill'em All Tomino." Giving examples could be a type of spoiler though so I'd rather not. However, toy sales are what actually saved the series back in the day. The show got cancelled about 40 episodes in I think but toys sales were enough to bring it back on TV to finish it's run and here we are. I love Gundam, always have with Toonami and G Gundam, which is ironic since Gundam is 99.9% a Real Robot stuff but I got into the series thanks to the Super Robot show. G Gundam is awesome though don't you worry, and the dub is actually pretty good too, better than the subs in some way. I'm surprised to hear you say that the soundtrack took you out of the show. I love 0079's soundtrack, but I played a LOT of Federation vs Zeon as a kid which used music straight from the show so any sort of 0079 music is super nostalgic for me even though it wasn't until I was in High School before I watch the entirety of 0079. Zeta Gundam's soundtrack is even better though, it's Godly.
I gotta say, I was really annoyed when Mirai started swooning over Sleggar, but at the same time he was throwing up some obvious death flags so it wasn't too bad in the end lol
Daniel Perry this is weird to me because I hosted a series of gundam screenings 2 years ago and 0079 had easily the best reception of all of them except maybe 0080 and 8th MS team among the non anime fans there. We even had a number of people cry at it and we retained 4x as much of the audience for the full 3 movies than we did for some of the newer stuff like SEED and 00
I know a few people like that as well it's interesting because as someone who's screened a lot of anime for a mix of otaku, laymen and people with a limited experience with anime I can say that almost everyone I know who's finicky about the age of their shows is the former. That's not to say only otaku are finicky about animation quality but from my experience they're the group most likely to put it over story quality or most egregiously story clarity. A lot of the dudes we had riffing on how 0079 looks couldn't appreciate that unlike most of the franchise's other works 0079 has a simple, concise, clear story with well developed themes. There's little verbosity and a lot of the moral ambiguity is actually ambiguous. The Bright slap scene doesn't portray Bright OR Amuro as heroic they're both out of their depth and Bright's actions save the ship but it's heavily indicated they also put it in more danger as that arc goes along by isolating and estranging Amuro. That's something that lives beyond the animation, that's the script. When you come to scenes with similar meaning in shows like Wing or the impeccably animated, verbose and actually quite intellectually dead 00 you have scenes that try to pull off this trick and instead fall on their face because we get 8 speeches about what's going on to explain what the viewer just saw followed by exploitative fanservice and paper thin ubermensch characters meant to appeal to base power fantasy first and tell a story second. I guess in short a lot of Gundam does look better but the people I noticed that cared weren't really watching it for the story. I think the happy medium in a lot of cases after the UC wound down more would by the UC OVAs and the Origin.
Ladderadder Mcglitternips Absolutely! In Gundam 00 the only people who act like human beings are the villains until they eventually get replaced by just more evil more androgynous versions of the main cast
This is perfect timing! I've just started getting into the Gundam models and I've been thinking about how I should get into the series too, guess nows the perfect time to start from the beginning!
Mobile Suit Gundam is quite possibly my favourite anime of all time but there is no denying that your review is spot on. All of your complaints are completely valid and I'm glad that you saw past its faults to appreciate how great it is and hopefully open more people up to give such an old show a chance.
I personally don't like the implication that Amuro was so effective using the Gundam early on because he was a newtype all along. In the series it's never been implied and him just being really into machines and the Gundam being so powerful was enough of an explanation to me. The Gundam even did some stuff by itself and had a system to analyse the pilot and basically learn, if I'm not mistaken. And early on he regularly got his ass kicked by Char regardless. It felt really natural and it was a nice progession to watch.
I actually really liked how New Types were handled in the original series because there seemed to be a very clear metaphor of people with great talent and potential (especially a new generation, like how most new types were very young) being exploited and wasted by their governments through war. Granted, New Types as a concept got muddier and messier as the U.C. timeline marched on.
except Zeta, ZZ, Chars Counterattack, War in the Pocket, 8th Ms Team, Stardust Memory, Unicorn, Thunderbolt, not to mention a lot of alternate universe story's so I think there is plenty that have surpassed it, especially its direct sequels
Great video! Good insights. I love the original quite a bit and on that note I wanted to share that the Origin manga is absolutely superb - it covers the original storyline ( with changes) and adds so much more development to Char and Newtype stuff. It also explains the Lalah issues and the weirder side of char in a way I found satisfying and believable. It also gave his character another dimension - I really hope they animate the entire thing
I know this came out of year ago but they did hint at amuro being a new type early in the series When Miss Matilda says that he may be a psychic obviously referring to him being a new type and general Revil talks about the existence of new types as well
After you watch it in publication order, try watching it chronological order of all the series in the Universal Century. Its always great to see events happening in order from start to finish.
Hey HBH, remembering this vid randomly made me try Gundam 79 and i finished it in like a week. I dont even have free time these days but that didnt stop me. Man this thing was super compelling. Looking back now, the worst bit of the show was the period in between landing on earth and Odessa Day. Ramba Ral, Hamon and Garma's last stand were the best parts of that but everything else was comparatively tame. The self contained nature of the episodes were a double edged sword because it diminished the perceivable threat of Zeon but it also kept it from getting boring at least for me thanks to fast pacing. It dealt with threats pretty naturally. Like 1 episode they evade the Musai and the next they decide if either stopping their supply ships or running away is the safest move (in universe it being max 1 or 2 hours inbetween).
I like to think that the message they tried to convey most of the time is that humans are often hypocrites and you can't really expect them to behave as expected, that's what I liked to see anyway, what a great start to the serie, and the soundtrack was EPIC! P.S. the kids were awesome, they did far too well for their age, the climax is the moment where the White base is being sabotaged and there's this Random Zion soldier which sees them through the glass and hurries them to move away from danger.
imo, original series is the way to go, doubly so if you're the kind of person that wants the original experience in its entirety, haven't watched the movie series yet, but probably will when I want to revisit 0079 from everything I've heard about it, it condenses things down, more or less into just the right amounts to go into the related series and movies.
If you see how fast the Gundam is in other media, you will get why the Newtype thing makes sense. Him and Char are literally moving 3 times faster than everyone else.
*Tom n Jerry in space. Mostly it is just boring procedural shit, with bad fight coreography, montage, and characters that constantly change their behaviour.
Honestly I was in a bit of apprehension when I saw this pop, up, but it made for good background noise while I built an rg sinanju, I'm glad you liked it. Also about the newtype thing there's a reason it was rushed. MSG was cancelled in its initial run, it was supposed to go for 60~70 episodes but was cut to 43 due to low ratings. Gundam didn't blow up until the gunpla models started selling and the compilation films were released. From there on it just became a huge franchise.
Watch the opening to Jenki; Extend. They recreate an almost frame for frame from the Opening to The First Gundam. The term First Gundam is what is 0079 is called in Japan.
Zeta Gundam is by far my favorite out of the UC timeline due to the characters, Mech designs and the animation. Really felt rewarded watching 0079 with its dated animation to then graduate to Zeta. ZZ is great halfway through. I was really turned off by the goofy beginnings where the Jedau and the rest of the scoundrels didn’t take things seriously to a comical degree where it should have been more serious. Once I got halfway and when Zeta characters get re introduced is where I started to love ZZ. The MC started to see the reality of war and begun to do something about it. After watching ZZ now, I cannot stress how much more of an emotional punch you will receive while watching Gundam Unicorn. In my opinion, Unicorn undoubtedly will reward you for sticking through the UC timeline for your first viewings of Gundam as a whole. Can’t wait to see what you think of Zeta!
It's interesting that you mention 'foreshadowing' of the Newtypes stuff, since in the episodes leading up to the reveal character mention feeling bad about a situation or a 'sixth sense' pretty much every other episode that blends in pretty easily to normal english but is clearly foreshadowing upon retrospect, and as early as about the 20th episode it's mentioned that Mathilde considers Amuro a potential newtype iirc
Actually, Amuro's Newtype abilities didn't manifest until he met Lalah Sune. It's even mentioned by Char in the anime, itself. It's also mentioned by everyone watching Amuro at the battle of Side 6. Amuro displays a superhuman level of intuition that he had yet to do so up until that point and everyone, including the enemy and Amuro himself, were all shocked by it. Up until that point, he was just getting by on the Gundam's abilities as well as his own natural skills that ended up significantly improving to the point where he could take on and defeat Char by himself. In essence, prodigy+newtype powers=God
to be fair, initially Amuro was REALLY full of himself early on and pretty much BRAGGED about piloting the gundam, and it was only once he got to earth and actually realised 'oh shit I'm actually killing PEOPLE who have familes and loved ones' after dealing with the vengeful fiancee of one of the zabi generals (and some other shit with his mom too, I think?) does he start becomign more apprehensive about piloting the robot.
Part of what makes the newtype concept feel rushed is because it was. The series was supposed to be longer but got cut back due to poor ratings at the time. Presumably at the original length the concept would have had a bit more time to naturally develop.
Kojima must've deliberately asked Sunrise to make the OVA, the anime is so popular in Japan the similarity is extremely obvious.. (Also "Char" is pronounced as "Shar" in the original)
0079 is pretty great and while it can be hard to watch for newer fans due to its dated animation and reuses of animation, it is still something that I recommend everyone should watch since it is basically one of the cornerstones of mecha anime. Since the themes this show has basically laid out the whole UC universe and how future shows in that timeline use this anime and build upon the lore of the world and about the Newtype phenomenon in general. 0079 Kiwami should be a thing though ;)
I agree with you completely I almost skipped this one bcuz of the opening is figured it was going to be one of those early cheesy animes but man I'm soooo glad I decided to watch it cuz after ep1 I was hooked
Hmm... from the summary, it looks like you'll enjoy *Legend of Galactic Heroes.* This is one of the few shows that kept me engaged throughout the 70 eps out of 110. I normally grown to fall off long animes in recent years because how long they are. I stopped watching HunterxHunter (2011) after 40 episodes, but that's mainly because of Shounen fatigue. For LoGH, I had to actively stop myself and take a break to get a sense of what is happening. Each episode, even the slowest ones, are filled with events after events that matter in the story in small and big way. And it rarely falls into the trappings of tropes, handling it's plot with maturity. And some of the best writing in anime, hands down. No surprise, since this is a novel adaptation. Only fault for me were mainly for the dated production and some of the direction. Given your tastes in anime and VGs, you'll enjoy it as well.
Is it a meme? Maybe it's just me, but things like this shouldn't deter anyone from experiencing something. Also using words like "elitist" really doesn't help, and only instigates in dividing the fans to create conflict, rather than fostering togetherness.
My dude, you NEED to pick up Hunter x Hunter again. The chimaera ant arc alone is worth the 110 episode investment. I don't like to use the word "masterpiece," but this show comes damn close to that.
Kyo I'd love to, but I've mismanaged my intake of story based mediums (which was actually hurting my experience) so I have limited myself into two. Current two are Ace Attorney Investigations 2 (game) and LoGH (anime). I do take some light stuff in between, like an episode or two of a comedy show. After I've cleared one of those, I'll retry HxH. That is, if I'm still over my Shounen fatigue :P
Possibly missed the best parts of Hunter x Hunter I thought it was long before I started watching it but afterwards I was like that's it no more episodes?
The new type concept was better handled and explained in the compilation movies. I suggest watching those, I think the movies have a better flow. I love Gundam and I love these kind of analysis videos. Keep it up!
Charlia Bull was the other overt newtype, but some others had little moments of newtype awareness, such as Katz, Letz and Kikka guiding Amuro at the end and I can't remember if it's in the anime, but in The Origin, once they get back to space, Sayla instinctively knows that they're being pursued by Char.
I just got into Gundam with 0079 as well, but with compilation trilogy, so hearing your thoughts on this was interesting. I'd say they're good for an introduction to Gundam, but only with this little bit of context. They are summaries of the show and not the story. When they focus on the plot, the movies fucking blaze trail's with the pacing. But when they start introducing the "villain of the week" bits, the pacing takes a nose dive and devotes large amounts of time to them. But the thing that really sucks is that because of this, actual plot critical bits start lacking proper build up or context, or at least I assume thats the reason as I did not watch the show. For example, I had no idea what lahlah and amuro were on about with their newtype mumbo jumbo. But then again the mirai and sleggar bit seems just as..._ weird in the movies and the show. Regardless Iwas shocked by jow on board I was with 0079 and it made me excited for everything that came after it.
What I wonder is how much of the non-anime stuff is canon. There is hand-drawn animation of scenes in games like Char swearing revenge on earth for Kamille's mind-wipe in _Zeta_ and Girhen actually shocked Revil escaped at the start of the OYW when the common theory is he helped Revil escape to continue the war. Are these scenes canon or what?
The way media works in Japan is that there is no such concept as "canon". As long as a work is officially licensed it's considered part of the franchise regardless of how much its story contradicts the other official works, you could say that things like Gundam 0079 and Gundam Origin are very different takes on the same story but both are equally canon.
I recently finished watching everything Gundam last month (rewatched HD remasters of SEED and SEED Destiny), looking forward to seeing what you think of the rest of the franchise.
0079 is cool, but I wouldn't call it my favourite 70s anime. My picks for great shows from that era are Future Boy Conan, Rose of Versailles, Ie Naki Ko, Takarajima and Lupin III Part 1. The 70s was such a good era for the medium, with many directors like Dezaki, Takahata and Rintaro doing some incredible work.
Interestingly, Gundam introduced two types of Artificial Intelligences on the small screen. One is weak A.I. in the form of the Gundam's learning computer and the other is Strong A.I. in the form of Haro. Both serve as two aspects of Amuro Ray in my view. The former is Amuro's loss of innocence, objectified into a tool for the Federation, and being forced to grow-up; while the latter forming Amuro's innocence, creativity and youth.
Interesting that you thought that this series was too long as this show was originally cancelled due to low ratings so they had to wrap things up pretty quickly. If it had more episodes, the Newtype concept could have been explored a bit better. As far as that, wait until Zeta where it gets a TON of info. Then again, I can see places where it could have been cut down but I say "product of its time". Also, it's interesting that you thought this would be a kids toy commercial at all. Maybe it's just me, but I knew that the show would be the way it was. 70s mecha shows that aren't full on super robot/Mazinger/what have you tend to be pretty grim. Orguss comes to mind on that one, but hey expectations were blown. I didn't expect to like the original Gundam at all, but I binged through it since someone uploaded all the episodes in English on youtube. The Universal Century timeline is definitely my favorite. There's so much room for storytelling. Aside from Double Zeta and 0083, I haven't had any bad experiences with it and my all time favorite Gundam show is Victory.
I never understood why animes "for children" were always so thoughtful in their planning. Here there's classism, horrors of war, and whatever else but most of the U.S. creatives marched to the drum of Hannah Barbara and Disney. Would love to find a documentary on the history and use of animation in Japanese culture.
The message they were trying to convey in regards to slapping is that women like bad boys, not some limp coward. Its a facet that is widely seen through out history in which women would shame men into going to war and if not they wouldn't love them.
The reason the new type concept seems rushed is because it was, the series was originally canceled I think about halfway through so a lot of the latter part of the series has some odd elements
I feel that the Newtype concept was handled well enough since it retroactively explains why Amuro was such a competent pilot when simply having the better machine was not enough. Newtypes are not only thematically appropriate since they represent humankind evolved to the space age, it is also deliciously ironic since the Federation called the Newtype theory Zeon propaganda.
Well I haven't watched the show, but whenever I hear of a concept like this I contrast it with the reveal of Nen in HunterXHunter. You always have the sense of something going on; some supernatural force but you think they'll never explain it cause the show doesn't take itself super seriously. But the series foreshadows that something is still incomplete with the Hunter Exam, directly confronting you with Hisoka in the Tournament (I dunno the actual name) arc. Its one of the best ways I've seen this kind of reveal done.
" since it retroactively explains why Amuro was such a competent pilot " From what I remember it's actually implied Amuro wasn't able to use his Newtype abilities until he fought the tri-stars and they killed Matilda. So until that point it really was mostly just the Gundam carrying him.
For combat purposes I don't like Newtypes since they can't be touched by normal people, effectively making Newtypes Jedi. If you aren't a Newtype, you don't matter unless you're the rival character like Graham Aker or have ridiculous plot armor like Jerid. For story purposes I get it, but the Newtype people will be untouched basically until some plot event comes along. Minor complaint for the overall story stuff though.
The Accursed Hunter01 but in the good shows old types do see: 8th MS and Zeta
...also x does that a lot too. I'd kind of rather them call a spade a spade like in the UC than IBO/Wing/00 sexy boy-ness = power level malarkey
Bright Slaps: Turning boys into Men of Destiny since 1979!
"This happy kid-friendly mecha intro is really misleading"
You should see Tomino's other show Space Runaway Ideon lol.
ImmaCornflakes
I don't know, the lyrics of that show is mostly "this robot's gonna fuck shit up"
But I get what you mean.
welp, most of 70's series did something the same like science ninja team Gatchaman, Neo-Human Casshan, Ashita no-joe etc
What about Victory Gundam?
One of my favorite "double sided war drama" episodes is when a bunch of Zeon soldiers rig the Gundam with hidden time bombs, then watch from a distance as the White Base crew risk certain death to disarm them all, and only barely make it. The Zekes are so impressed with their badassery that they come meet them in disguises to compliment them as a show of respect. No good guys or bad guys, just normal people, fighting each other for stupid reasons that are out of their control. Works of fiction like Gundam are why I tell military recruiters to fuck off.
oh my god yes literally my favorite episode from the original series
Nice. Hope this gets more people into Gundam. Gundam is the fucking best.
I know it can be daunting, just take it easy and stick to the UC timeline and go chronologically.
Seeing the original story was supposed to be 50 episodes long but got cancelled on episode 39 and the series create had to beg the sponsor for more money to finish the show on episode 43. The newtypes concept being rushed makes sense because he had to take 10 episodes of story and compress it down to 4 episodes. We should be glad that the end was as good as it was.
i can't with the pimp slapping lmao
Kamiles a man's name and I'm a man!!
Well the "Gallant Char" track is still my favorite, and I didn't mind whenever it came up (which was often). I just wish it got to the weird disco part in the middle more frequently!!!
I’m so glad this video exists. I’ve been getting into the Gundam franchise myself this year and I’m happy this little recap on the OG Gundam is here to give me the bases.
also salt, we need all the salt in the future!
kyle hague Muh salt man..
If you rewatch Gundam, you'll find that the Newtype phenomenon is foreshadowed a lot.
Dude, totally check out the movie compilations! I had a lot of the same minor issues you did, and the movie trilogy fixed a lot of them. As for which one is "canon" technically it's the movies. In Char's Counterattack there's a reanimated flashback to the finale of Mobile Suit Gundam and it's based on the movie. Though, it's not a big deal if you choose to not watch the movies since it doesn't alter any plot points, all it really changes is a few mobile suits/mobile armors and it introduces Newtypes much sooner.
If you do watch the compilation movies will you do a video on them as well? Like a compare and contrast.
Said they'll watch everything I assumed that meant the movies and ovas as well so they should get to the movie trilogy as well think it'll be later because believe they mentioned they're doing this by release order
Hail Zeon Honestly, the movies really bug me almost entirely because I tend to prefer watching Gundam dubbed rather than subbed (my personal preference, and I really like 0079's TV dub), and while the subbed versions are totally fine, the dubs for the 0079 movies are HORRENDOUS. Those movies really do need to be watched subbed to get anything out of them.
The only thing I liked about the dub for the compilation moves, is that Char is voiced by Steve Blum, aka Wolverine and a bajillion other roles.
They removed the Core Fighter from the movies
Uhh no, they removed the G-Amour and the G-Fighter for the movies, instead the Core fighter gets upgraded to the Core Booster, which IMO is a less silly design.
The art & animation in this show are underrated by people who don't know what the average 70s anime looked like; given the time and budget what they did is fantastic. If you want "below average by 70s standards" animation look at Tomino's Zambot 3 (though even that one has like 4-5 good looking episodes, even if the rest is mostly crap). People look at 0079 then look at Zeta & think 0079 has to be bad, but the difference in resources is hugely significant. Zeta was made in the 80s "bubble economy" era when Japan had fucktons of money to put into sci-fi shows which were huge back then. 0079 was made in the 70s and was the first show of its type, made in a cold room with an awful schedule. And yet it still looks better than most 70s anime.
Ironically the only part Tomino looks back on with a lot of regret, outside of Doan's Island, is the majority of the backgrounds simply because he felt the ones not done by the main background artist were crap in comparison & not movie-worthy. He looks back fondly on most of the key animation work.
Also, the compilation movies leave out a lot of great & thematically important stuff and you should absolutely not watch those only; just as a little extra after you're done. The captain's death, the episode where Zeon soldiers help a lady & her son on the Earth Federation side, etc are all gone.
This video was great, can't wait to hear your opinion on later Gundam animes, especially Gundam ZZ I'm loving that one so far.
ZZ is super underrated i liked it way more than Z. especially because it fixes Camille character to an unlikable entitled brat to, well, whatever he is in ZZ
Claudio Monteverdi in Kamille's defense, he really did start to straighten up after Wong's discipline. Haven't seen ZZ yet, but it doesn't look as bad as people say it is, just notably different
What i didn't like about ZZ was that it was (imo) a step back in the battles. i remember being bored all the time in Z's fights because there are just too many without any real reason: "Oh Crap, AUEG did something, Titans GO!" repeat every episode (except some really good one like the one in the cities) also Kamille rival was a literal as seen you could've tell it would've live any time making any battle basically a tie with a little margin of favor to the AUEG
Personally ZZ ended up becoming my favorite of the main 3 series. The first 25-30 episodes are hit or miss and the moon moon arc, while interesting idea is handled poorly but the last 20 odd episodes really make up for it and lay down some of the best Gundam narrative.
How far are you I especially love the 2nd opening although anime ja nai is a favorite as well
I feel like Newtypes as a concept read better in Zeta, as one of the show's central conflicts is over humanity's need to evolve. In the original, it just feels like a Sci Fi concept Tomino found interesting, but wasn't sure where to fit.
Yeah, it feels like the concept of NT really didn't get developed until Zeta.
The original novels that the director wrote go into better detail regarding Newtypes IMO but the novels also don't have to worry about selling toys so the entire thing takes place in space with no Earth arc.
But then again, the novels also have their own set of problems as well.
Pubic hair bracelets...
wingedswordslayer but in the novel amuro is dead in the end
Pubic Hair Bracelets?
Get in the fucking robot, Amuro
Yeah I was confused with the Slegger/Mirai ship as well. Great vid!
Pretty sure new types were illuded to when the crew was on earth. Primarily around the time operation Odessa was being built up.
i can never accept the fact that the gundam moves so quickly that there is no way it can be controlled by a human sitting inside it
One of the main improvements in the movie trilogy is explaining Newtypes better and introducing the concept earlier on. People talk about the movies as though they remove a ton of stuff from the show, when in reality they keep everything worthwhile as well as adding substantial improvements. They really are the best way to watch 0079.
It's a shame the Zeta movies were so lackluster, although I would say the third movie is still better than the final third of the show where things really fell apart.
Well I was planning to watch it but I guess this is the push I needed.
The idea that 0079 was a kid's show to sell toys and the franchise got more serious over time is sort of the exact opposite of what happened, since even before Gundam the creator had already been given the nickname "Kill'em All Tomino." Giving examples could be a type of spoiler though so I'd rather not. However, toy sales are what actually saved the series back in the day. The show got cancelled about 40 episodes in I think but toys sales were enough to bring it back on TV to finish it's run and here we are. I love Gundam, always have with Toonami and G Gundam, which is ironic since Gundam is 99.9% a Real Robot stuff but I got into the series thanks to the Super Robot show. G Gundam is awesome though don't you worry, and the dub is actually pretty good too, better than the subs in some way.
I'm surprised to hear you say that the soundtrack took you out of the show. I love 0079's soundtrack, but I played a LOT of Federation vs Zeon as a kid which used music straight from the show so any sort of 0079 music is super nostalgic for me even though it wasn't until I was in High School before I watch the entirety of 0079. Zeta Gundam's soundtrack is even better though, it's Godly.
We're jumping onto White Base!
AHHHHHHH
5:01That punch caught me off guard lmao
I wonder if he didn't like any of the other gundams lol
War in the pocket 👌🏻
Hamburgers ;_;
It's hamburger meat at least hamburgers are good but hamburger meat will make you sick by itself much like that ending did to me
Fire up the grill and call Bernie!
I gotta say, I was really annoyed when Mirai started swooning over Sleggar, but at the same time he was throwing up some obvious death flags so it wasn't too bad in the end lol
Ironically I just tried convincing a friend to watch this last night. 0079 was an amazing series, but I can see why it's hard for new comers
Daniel Perry this is weird to me because I hosted a series of gundam screenings 2 years ago and 0079 had easily the best reception of all of them except maybe 0080 and 8th MS team among the non anime fans there. We even had a number of people cry at it and we retained 4x as much of the audience for the full 3 movies than we did for some of the newer stuff like SEED and 00
Ladderadder Mcglitternips Its sad, because some of these older shows were amazing.
Daniel Perry the compilation movies represent the OG Gundam better in my opinion. The story flows better and explain the new type concept early on.
I know a few people like that as well it's interesting because as someone who's screened a lot of anime for a mix of otaku, laymen and people with a limited experience with anime I can say that almost everyone I know who's finicky about the age of their shows is the former. That's not to say only otaku are finicky about animation quality but from my experience they're the group most likely to put it over story quality or most egregiously story clarity.
A lot of the dudes we had riffing on how 0079 looks couldn't appreciate that unlike most of the franchise's other works 0079 has a simple, concise, clear story with well developed themes. There's little verbosity and a lot of the moral ambiguity is actually ambiguous. The Bright slap scene doesn't portray Bright OR Amuro as heroic they're both out of their depth and Bright's actions save the ship but it's heavily indicated they also put it in more danger as that arc goes along by isolating and estranging Amuro. That's something that lives beyond the animation, that's the script. When you come to scenes with similar meaning in shows like Wing or the impeccably animated, verbose and actually quite intellectually dead 00 you have scenes that try to pull off this trick and instead fall on their face because we get 8 speeches about what's going on to explain what the viewer just saw followed by exploitative fanservice and paper thin ubermensch characters meant to appeal to base power fantasy first and tell a story second.
I guess in short a lot of Gundam does look better but the people I noticed that cared weren't really watching it for the story. I think the happy medium in a lot of cases after the UC wound down more would by the UC OVAs and the Origin.
Ladderadder Mcglitternips Absolutely! In Gundam 00 the only people who act like human beings are the villains until they eventually get replaced by just more evil more androgynous versions of the main cast
Holy shit I was literally navigating my HDD to start the first episode when the video notification popped up. That was way too surreal.
Woah, Is Bit a Newtype?
Will you ever come back to Gundam?
This is perfect timing! I've just started getting into the Gundam models and I've been thinking about how I should get into the series too, guess nows the perfect time to start from the beginning!
Kinda sad you never really continued this series.
HOLY FUCKING SHIT SOMEONE I KNOW WHO IS SEMI-POPULAR TALKS ABOUT MY FAVORITE FRANCHISE
*Get in the Gundam Shinji
Mobile Suit Gundam is quite possibly my favourite anime of all time but there is no denying that your review is spot on. All of your complaints are completely valid and I'm glad that you saw past its faults to appreciate how great it is and hopefully open more people up to give such an old show a chance.
Sounds cool. A freshman from my college told me about 79. Want to check it out now.
It's implied that Amuro gains his newtype abilities because he met Lalah.
It came out of nowhere but felt like those abilities awakened.
I personally don't like the implication that Amuro was so effective using the Gundam early on because he was a newtype all along.
In the series it's never been implied and him just being really into machines and the Gundam being so powerful was enough of an explanation to me.
The Gundam even did some stuff by itself and had a system to analyse the pilot and basically learn, if I'm not mistaken.
And early on he regularly got his ass kicked by Char regardless.
It felt really natural and it was a nice progession to watch.
You have no idea how convoluted the story of 0079 is going to get, HBH.
I actually really liked how New Types were handled in the original series because there seemed to be a very clear metaphor of people with great talent and potential (especially a new generation, like how most new types were very young) being exploited and wasted by their governments through war. Granted, New Types as a concept got muddier and messier as the U.C. timeline marched on.
I came here to laugh at you
But 0079 is still the best Gundam I can't say anything has surpassed it
Char's Counterattack is my favourite of the entire series. Also, Origin.
Zetaaaa
except Zeta, ZZ, Chars Counterattack, War in the Pocket, 8th Ms Team, Stardust Memory, Unicorn, Thunderbolt, not to mention a lot of alternate universe story's
so I think there is plenty that have surpassed it, especially its direct sequels
@Zetra7
Why do you consider it the best one (or considered it the best one at one point idk)
I agree 100%. It’ll always be my favorite. I don’t think anything will ever top it.
Great video! Good insights. I love the original quite a bit and on that note I wanted to share that the Origin manga is absolutely superb - it covers the original storyline ( with changes) and adds so much more development to Char and Newtype stuff. It also explains the Lalah issues and the weirder side of char in a way I found satisfying and believable. It also gave his character another dimension - I really hope they animate the entire thing
Great video, as always!
Can't wait to see your opinion on Zeta and ZZ since they're two of my favorites.
its been 3 years, 0081~83 review any time now
I know this came out of year ago but they did hint at amuro being a new type early in the series When Miss Matilda says that he may be a psychic obviously referring to him being a new type and general Revil talks about the existence of new types as well
Holy shit Z gundam is gonna blow your mind so damn hard, can't wait to see your video about it
Sleggar Law was all man. Mirai stood no chance against his unrelenting machismo
After you watch it in publication order, try watching it chronological order of all the series in the Universal Century. Its always great to see events happening in order from start to finish.
Hey HBH, remembering this vid randomly made me try Gundam 79 and i finished it in like a week. I dont even have free time these days but that didnt stop me. Man this thing was super compelling. Looking back now, the worst bit of the show was the period in between landing on earth and Odessa Day. Ramba Ral, Hamon and Garma's last stand were the best parts of that but everything else was comparatively tame.
The self contained nature of the episodes were a double edged sword because it diminished the perceivable threat of Zeon but it also kept it from getting boring at least for me thanks to fast pacing. It dealt with threats pretty naturally. Like 1 episode they evade the Musai and the next they decide if either stopping their supply ships or running away is the safest move (in universe it being max 1 or 2 hours inbetween).
I like to think that the message they tried to convey most of the time is that humans are often hypocrites and you can't really expect them to behave as expected, that's what I liked to see anyway, what a great start to the serie, and the soundtrack was EPIC!
P.S. the kids were awesome, they did far too well for their age, the climax is the moment where the White base is being sabotaged and there's this Random Zion soldier which sees them through the glass and hurries them to move away from danger.
imo, original series is the way to go, doubly so if you're the kind of person that wants the original experience in its entirety, haven't watched the movie series yet, but probably will when I want to revisit 0079 from everything I've heard about it, it condenses things down, more or less into just the right amounts to go into the related series and movies.
If you see how fast the Gundam is in other media, you will get why the Newtype thing makes sense. Him and Char are literally moving 3 times faster than everyone else.
Zeta Gundam's my favorite. It's practically Game of Thrones in space.
*Tom n Jerry in space. Mostly it is just boring procedural shit, with bad fight coreography, montage, and characters that constantly change their behaviour.
I know what message the show was trying to convey;
T H O T S B E G O N E
Honestly I was in a bit of apprehension when I saw this pop, up, but it made for good background noise while I built an rg sinanju, I'm glad you liked it.
Also about the newtype thing there's a reason it was rushed.
MSG was cancelled in its initial run, it was supposed to go for 60~70 episodes but was cut to 43 due to low ratings.
Gundam didn't blow up until the gunpla models started selling and the compilation films were released.
From there on it just became a huge franchise.
I subscribed because of this.
Watch the opening to Jenki; Extend. They recreate an almost frame for frame from the Opening to The First Gundam. The term First Gundam is what is 0079 is called in Japan.
holy shit, I watched it. That's amazing.
Zeta Gundam is by far my favorite out of the UC timeline due to the characters, Mech designs and the animation. Really felt rewarded watching 0079 with its dated animation to then graduate to Zeta. ZZ is great halfway through. I was really turned off by the goofy beginnings where the Jedau and the rest of the scoundrels didn’t take things seriously to a comical degree where it should have been more serious. Once I got halfway and when Zeta characters get re introduced is where I started to love ZZ. The MC started to see the reality of war and begun to do something about it.
After watching ZZ now, I cannot stress how much more of an emotional punch you will receive while watching Gundam Unicorn. In my opinion, Unicorn undoubtedly will reward you for sticking through the UC timeline for your first viewings of Gundam as a whole.
Can’t wait to see what you think of Zeta!
I've not seen many Gundam shows, but I loved 8th MS Team and G Gundam. It's a really varied franchise for sure.
It's interesting that you mention 'foreshadowing' of the Newtypes stuff, since in the episodes leading up to the reveal character mention feeling bad about a situation or a 'sixth sense' pretty much every other episode that blends in pretty easily to normal english but is clearly foreshadowing upon retrospect, and as early as about the 20th episode it's mentioned that Mathilde considers Amuro a potential newtype iirc
Actually, Amuro's Newtype abilities didn't manifest until he met Lalah Sune. It's even mentioned by Char in the anime, itself. It's also mentioned by everyone watching Amuro at the battle of Side 6. Amuro displays a superhuman level of intuition that he had yet to do so up until that point and everyone, including the enemy and Amuro himself, were all shocked by it. Up until that point, he was just getting by on the Gundam's abilities as well as his own natural skills that ended up significantly improving to the point where he could take on and defeat Char by himself.
In essence, prodigy+newtype powers=God
A hyperBitHero and GamingBritShow video on the same day :O
You should watch Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team. It's only twelve episodes long, and it takes place around the same time as MS Gundam 0079.
I watched the movie trilogy recently and i really liked it
do give the original TV series a watch since the films omit quite a bit.
Mobile Suit Gundam 0079 is one of my all-time favorite Gundam anime, and will be my favorite Anime
DAMN IT AMURO! GET IN THE GOD DAMN FUCKING GUNDAM!
Reminder to watch the Unicorn OVA and not the tv version.
Also before Zeta Gundam you still have War in the Pocket, 08Th MS Team and Stardust
to be fair, initially Amuro was REALLY full of himself early on and pretty much BRAGGED about piloting the gundam, and it was only once he got to earth and actually realised 'oh shit I'm actually killing PEOPLE who have familes and loved ones' after dealing with the vengeful fiancee of one of the zabi generals (and some other shit with his mom too, I think?) does he start becomign more apprehensive about piloting the robot.
yeah, pretty much.
Part of what makes the newtype concept feel rushed is because it was. The series was supposed to be longer but got cut back due to poor ratings at the time. Presumably at the original length the concept would have had a bit more time to naturally develop.
well this series sure didnt have any legs
Kojima must've deliberately asked Sunrise to make the OVA, the anime is so popular in Japan the similarity is extremely obvious..
(Also "Char" is pronounced as "Shar" in the original)
0079 is pretty great and while it can be hard to watch for newer fans due to its dated animation and reuses of animation, it is still something that I recommend everyone should watch since it is basically one of the cornerstones of mecha anime. Since the themes this show has basically laid out the whole UC universe and how future shows in that timeline use this anime and build upon the lore of the world and about the Newtype phenomenon in general.
0079 Kiwami should be a thing though ;)
i actually started doing this a while back but i got stuck halfway through the zeta series. maybe this'll actually motivate me to finish it.
I agree with you completely I almost skipped this one bcuz of the opening is figured it was going to be one of those early cheesy animes but man I'm soooo glad I decided to watch it cuz after ep1 I was hooked
yeah, the opening is a bit of a let down if you expected something epic, but it grows on you still. The intro narration is great, though.
Hmm... from the summary, it looks like you'll enjoy *Legend of Galactic Heroes.*
This is one of the few shows that kept me engaged throughout the 70 eps out of 110.
I normally grown to fall off long animes in recent years because how long they are. I stopped watching HunterxHunter (2011) after 40 episodes, but that's mainly because of Shounen fatigue.
For LoGH, I had to actively stop myself and take a break to get a sense of what is happening. Each episode, even the slowest ones, are filled with events after events that matter in the story in small and big way.
And it rarely falls into the trappings of tropes, handling it's plot with maturity.
And some of the best writing in anime, hands down. No surprise, since this is a novel adaptation.
Only fault for me were mainly for the dated production and some of the direction. Given your tastes in anime and VGs, you'll enjoy it as well.
Hemang Chauhan Unfortunately I feel like people avoid it because the series has a elitist meme status. But its so damn good.
Is it a meme?
Maybe it's just me, but things like this shouldn't deter anyone from experiencing something.
Also using words like "elitist" really doesn't help, and only instigates in dividing the fans to create conflict, rather than fostering togetherness.
My dude, you NEED to pick up Hunter x Hunter again. The chimaera ant arc alone is worth the 110 episode investment. I don't like to use the word "masterpiece," but this show comes damn close to that.
Kyo I'd love to, but I've mismanaged my intake of story based mediums (which was actually hurting my experience) so I have limited myself into two.
Current two are Ace Attorney Investigations 2 (game) and LoGH (anime).
I do take some light stuff in between, like an episode or two of a comedy show.
After I've cleared one of those, I'll retry HxH.
That is, if I'm still over my Shounen fatigue :P
Possibly missed the best parts of Hunter x Hunter I thought it was long before I started watching it but afterwards I was like that's it no more episodes?
The new type concept was better handled and explained in the compilation movies. I suggest watching those, I think the movies have a better flow. I love Gundam and I love these kind of analysis videos. Keep it up!
Gundam is cool. I hope you have a good time going through it all.
Cant wait to hear how much you enjoyed zeta if this is your reaction to og Gundam, the beginnings of the Gundam franchise are fantastic!
The entire show is about new types
Was literally just shopping for Gundam Side Story 0079 on ebay for Dreamcast cause I was bored. Sometimes coincidences just blow my mind
I have a feeling HBH is gonna *love* The Origin.
Weren't Amuro, Char and Lalah the only newtypes at that point? Doesn't really seem like half the cast...
Charlia Bull was the other overt newtype, but some others had little moments of newtype awareness, such as Katz, Letz and Kikka guiding Amuro at the end and I can't remember if it's in the anime, but in The Origin, once they get back to space, Sayla instinctively knows that they're being pursued by Char.
Sayla, Miriai, Katz, Letz, and Kikka are all revealed as Newtypes by the end of the show as well.
You're right, my mistake. It's been about 10 years since I last watched Gundam 79.
Finished the first 3 trilogy movies.
It was a really great experience.
I just got into Gundam with 0079 as well, but with compilation trilogy, so hearing your thoughts on this was interesting. I'd say they're good for an introduction to Gundam, but only with this little bit of context. They are summaries of the show and not the story. When they focus on the plot, the movies fucking blaze trail's with the pacing. But when they start introducing the "villain of the week" bits, the pacing takes a nose dive and devotes large amounts of time to them.
But the thing that really sucks is that because of this, actual plot critical bits start lacking proper build up or context, or at least I assume thats the reason as I did not watch the show. For example, I had no idea what lahlah and amuro were on about with their newtype mumbo jumbo.
But then again the mirai and sleggar bit seems just as..._ weird in the movies and the show. Regardless Iwas shocked by jow on board I was with 0079 and it made me excited for everything that came after it.
Good video, You bring up good points. Me personally though I prefer the compilation film version over the actual series.
What I wonder is how much of the non-anime stuff is canon. There is hand-drawn animation of scenes in games like Char swearing revenge on earth for Kamille's mind-wipe in _Zeta_ and Girhen actually shocked Revil escaped at the start of the OYW when the common theory is he helped Revil escape to continue the war. Are these scenes canon or what?
The way media works in Japan is that there is no such concept as "canon". As long as a work is officially licensed it's considered part of the franchise regardless of how much its story contradicts the other official works, you could say that things like Gundam 0079 and Gundam Origin are very different takes on the same story but both are equally canon.
Ever watch Big O? Now that was a mecha show I could get into despite its formulaic problems.
I recently finished watching everything Gundam last month (rewatched HD remasters of SEED and SEED Destiny), looking forward to seeing what you think of the rest of the franchise.
The idea is that people become newtypes, watch the movies for sure they're a more concise version of the same story
i'll be waiting for that Turn A Gundam video
and Char Aznable | Devious Intent
0079 is cool, but I wouldn't call it my favourite 70s anime. My picks for great shows from that era are Future Boy Conan, Rose of Versailles, Ie Naki Ko, Takarajima and Lupin III Part 1. The 70s was such a good era for the medium, with many directors like Dezaki, Takahata and Rintaro doing some incredible work.
Interestingly, Gundam introduced two types of Artificial Intelligences on the small screen. One is weak A.I. in the form of the Gundam's learning computer and the other is Strong A.I. in the form of Haro. Both serve as two aspects of Amuro Ray in my view. The former is Amuro's loss of innocence, objectified into a tool for the Federation, and being forced to grow-up; while the latter forming Amuro's innocence, creativity and youth.
Interesting that you thought that this series was too long as this show was originally cancelled due to low ratings so they had to wrap things up pretty quickly. If it had more episodes, the Newtype concept could have been explored a bit better. As far as that, wait until Zeta where it gets a TON of info. Then again, I can see places where it could have been cut down but I say "product of its time".
Also, it's interesting that you thought this would be a kids toy commercial at all. Maybe it's just me, but I knew that the show would be the way it was. 70s mecha shows that aren't full on super robot/Mazinger/what have you tend to be pretty grim. Orguss comes to mind on that one, but hey expectations were blown. I didn't expect to like the original Gundam at all, but I binged through it since someone uploaded all the episodes in English on youtube.
The Universal Century timeline is definitely my favorite. There's so much room for storytelling. Aside from Double Zeta and 0083, I haven't had any bad experiences with it and my all time favorite Gundam show is Victory.
I never understood why animes "for children" were always so thoughtful in their planning. Here there's classism, horrors of war, and whatever else but most of the U.S. creatives marched to the drum of Hannah Barbara and Disney. Would love to find a documentary on the history and use of animation in Japanese culture.
Good luck the gundam journey is a long one indeed......
DID SHE SERIOUSLY JUST MIDDLE FINGER HIM
The message they were trying to convey in regards to slapping is that women like bad boys, not some limp coward. Its a facet that is widely seen through out history in which women would shame men into going to war and if not they wouldn't love them.
The reason the new type concept seems rushed is because it was, the series was originally canceled I think about halfway through so a lot of the latter part of the series has some odd elements
5:48 wtf, did she flip him off?
It certainly looks that way, but she's supposed to be waving.
lmao