So I was nursing a hangover and decided to give the new Gundam series a try. Following in the proud anime tradition of competing over having the most stupid sequel names possible, this series is named Gundam Unicorn. You know, if you want to delve into mythological creatures for your title why not pick one that isn’t synonymous with homosexuality, like Gundam Dragon or Gundam Cerberus or Gundam dinosaur?
If I hadn’t been in such a fragile state that I was terrified at the sight of alcohol I would have played the “Mecha Anime drinking game.” Try playing it next time you watch one of these, I’ll make the full list of rules some time.
Anyway, this series first episode begins on a space station in space that is hosting a massive ceremony over everyone collectively forgetting what year this is and just deciding to start again from zero rather than try to look it up or something. The space station suddenly explodes in a massive ball of fire, hurling the thousands of guests on board into the vacuum of space… Horrifying violence in a cartoon about giant robots, take a drink.
This scene cuts to the rest of the film which takes place ninety six years later and is never mentioned again. Having seen the original series Mobile Suit Gundam I understood the scene… but a series about giant robots should not require you first do research on a thirty year old cartoon in order to understand what the hell is going on.
This episode is the first of six and it lasts a full hour… of which we get to know our protagonist Banagher Links for all of ten minutes during which he meets a mysterious girl called Audrey Burne when he sees her plummeting to her death, he catches her using a little flying robot bubble machine thing. Demonstrating the protagonist can drive a robot in a civilian setting, take a drink.
It turns out there is more to Audrey than the ability to manage to nearly die of falling in a zero gravity environment. She tells Banagher to take her to some old bloke for them to talk politics about a macguffin called the Laplace Box and how they have to prevent a war. As soon as Banagher opens his mouth both Audrey and the old bloke tell him to piss off and stop trying to play soldiers… and Banagher says something that I personally hope was a case of really bad translation… This is taken verbatim from the subtitles.
“…For the first time I saw where I needed to be. I don’t care who you are! Just tell me you need me!”
Whoa… Slow down there boy! You’ve known this girl for all of five minutes! The protagonist creepily latching on to the first girl he sees. Take a drink.
Thankfully this plays out as it should and they tell him to fuck right off. But a minute or two later the politics of this made up world goes pear shaped and war breaks out between two or three factions that we haven’t seen before and haven’t had adequately explained to us. Innocent civilians being mercilessly slaughtered by giant robots to poignant music, take a drink.
During the chaos and backstabbing between characters we don’t know against other characters we don’t know either, Banagher somehow manages to find he’s accidentally wandered in to a hanger containing a prototype giant robot. ‘Prototype’ robot that is magically better than all the others, take a drink. You’d think that if you were building and testing a superweapon you’d put a lock on the door or something. Banagher finds the old man from before, who explains that he is ‘DUN DUN DUUUUUN’, his father. Estranged father who built a giant robot, take two drinks. The old man puts Banagher’s hand against a fingerprint scanner in the cockpit and tells him that it will only obey his orders now. Giant robot can only be driven by one person for a contrived reason, take a drink. And Banagher finds himself thrown into the cockpit. Main character “accidentally” falls into the cockpit of a machine he’s never driven before and is able to drive it because he’s special, finish the bottle. And then there’s some unimpressive fighting and the episode ends a minute later.
The animation is good and the music is beautiful at times, but for a series that has space travel and giant robots it manages to be massively clichéd, the action scenes lack any emotion because we have no idea who any of the characters are and the characters we do know are only in it for a short period of time that is spent on fantasy politics.
This new series adds absolutely nothing to the Gundam franchise that hasn’t already been done. Hell, rather than pay scriptwriters to make up anything new, the villain of the next episode is just a cut and paste of the villain from the first series!
The only reason you could possibly enjoy Gundam Unicorn is if you enjoy something purely on the basis that it’s Gundam. In which case, shame on you! Grow some bloody standards! They’ll never learn if you let them get away with this kind of shite!
Drinks taken in this episode: Seven, and the rest of your bottle. Good luck.
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