Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam
| Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Original Manga | N/A |
| Director/Artist | Yoshiyuki Tomino |
| Format | Anime (TV) |
| Made By | Sunrise |
| Episode Length | 30 Minutes |
| # of Eps/Volumes | 50 |
Contents
Genre
Mecha, Space Opera, Action, Political Drama
Sum it up in a Sentence
The chronological sequel to Mobile Suit Gundam, this series showcased the political struggle between the A.E.U.G. VS Titans of the EFF VS Axis (Neo-Zeon).
Description
Zeta Gundam (often called Z-Gundam) takes place years after the end of the One-Year War (covered in the original MSGundam.) In the years following the war, the Earth Federation assembled a new division of the military called the Titans, whose job is to squelch any resistance to the Federation. However, the Titans' tactics are as bad and sometimes even worse than the Zeon, and even Federation heroes like Bright Noa (who captained the White Base battleship in MSGundam) are bullied around by the Titans soldiers, who outrank the typical brown-shirted Feddie. Zeta also features the first and only appearance of popular character Quattro Bajeena in the Gundam universe.
Eventually the Anti-Earth Union Group (AEUG) was founded in Von Braun (on the moon) to stop the Titans' brutality.
Movie
Recently a trilogy of movies have been released with many re-animated sequences. Like other gundam movie compilations, it compresses a 50 episode show into three films, but unlike other compilations it also rewrites the conclusion of the show in a way that destroys continuity in Universal Century. Caps-filled arguments have broken out online as to which ending is accurate, but neither side has been able to make a big enough font to convince everyone that they're right.
But all critics can agree that it's nicer to pretend that the lousy Gundam-ZZ never happened.
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Other Universal Century series/OVAs:
Personal Opinions
Craptacular!
No, you don't have to have watched every episode of MS Gundam to like this show. If you know who Amuro and Char are before you start watching, it would certainly help.
The number of grudges going on at any particular time during Zeta Gundam is what makes it more tremendous than a lot of robot war shows. The Earth Federation seems well-suited to the role of playing the villain organization for once, and the politics are all over the place, too. Instead of the usual Gundam storyline (two sides fighting each other until a third wildcard faction enters the fray, splits one side and determines the other side as victor) there's so much treachery and double-crossing that the war compelling. The characters are just developed enough to make you hope they come home alive (or burn in hell) and the technology is a critical evolution in Universal Century, introducing transforming Mobile Suits and, more importantly, the psycommu system that would become critical later on.
Zorak
This series is one of those "classics" of mecha. It was created during Tomino's long (self claimed) stage of severe depression. And by god, does it show. It's not an "emo-tears" anime exactly, but there is as usual a degree of angst in many of the characters, and the one thing the show is undeniably not lacking in is a high death count. It has one of the highest on-screen death counts (often times of main characters) of any of the Gundam series (its beaten by V Gundam, I believe however). It's a complex and interesting military drama that traces the effects of the One Year War and the reprecussions it causes, and the inherent corruption present in both the spacenoids and the eartenoids (and thus humanity in general). It's interesting in that it helps set the tone for the final confrontation between Char and Amuro later on, despite the fact that neither are the main character in this series. We do get to see a different aspect of Char in this then we saw in Mobile Suit Gundam, and we get a glimpse of the true feelings and goals of those who honestly follow Zeon Zum Diekum. Kamille is an interesting character with depth to him, and is well suited to be the protagonist of this series. If you like mecha anime, war anime, or Gundam, you might want to give this series a try.
Links
http://www.gundamofficial.com/worlds/uc/zeta/index.html - Official Site
http://mahq.net/animation/gundam/zeta/zgtoc.htm - MAHQ's episode recaps (SPOILERS)
