Wow cool, I actually found this episode to be pretty enjoyable, not because the writing suddenly took a turn for the better or anything (it didn’t), but because it’s just hilariously entertaining.
Now I may sound like I’m being sarcastic as usual, but I seriously enjoyed the sheer campiness of this episode. It’s kind of hard to describe, but at the risk of over-simplication: the episode’s so bad that it’s good. LOL.
Summary
The Trinity siblings come aboard Ptolemaios and some awkward pleasantries follow. The facade quickly disappears though, as it soon becomes clear to the crew of Ptolemaios that the three of them are a bunch of secretive jerk wads with some serious mental health issues.
I mean, they claim to be siblings related by blood. Seriously?
“We really are siblings. I’m just really tanned, that’s all.”
Nena apparently has a thing for Setsuna. This is subtlety conveyed to the audience by having her perform a mouth-to-mouth on him within five seconds of meeting him for the first time. Girls are sure liberal in the future.
“I love rebellious guys.”
Chuuuu~
Classy. This serves as a timely reminder for the audience that, yes, Setsuna is still the main character by virtue of the fact that he gets the chicks. (Even the crazy ones.)
We discover the shocking truth that evil Haro is actually Haro’s brother! This is unexpected because a father-son relationship is the industry standard for such a situation, but more so because toy spherical robots shouldn’t have siblings! Also, we learn from a scene at the start of this episode that purple Haro is actually over eighty years old! Good lord! This means that Haro’s little harem is probably more like a grandma bridge club!
Niiiisan!
That aside, evil Haro appears to have had its memories wiped when it was reprogrammed for evil because it doesn’t recognize our poor Haro, its long-lost mechanical sibling, at all. It should also be noted that big brother Haro swears like a 7th grade Halo 3 player and has eyes that blink with a glow of +3 evil. Jeez, Sunrise is sure going all out to ensure that the audience is not confused by any traces of ambiguity in the plot, huh?
Back to the main story: The trio refuses to answer any question about themselves and, every five seconds or so, Michal threatens to massacre everyone and his/her pet dog. Their real intention soon becomes clear when Nena slips off to secretly access Veda’s terminal unit, which in the eyes of Tieria is probably tantamount to having his wife raped by a stranger. The Trinitys leave after accomplishing their goal of defiling Tieria’s precioussssss, to carry out their next mission.
The rest of the episode is basically the trio spectacularly blowing up a MSWAD base and killing two recurring characters who will no doubt soon be replaced by identical personality stereotypes.
Wow, is that a Sputnik model behind him?
It is revealed that Gundam’s power generation mechanism depends on a certain mathematical theory, topological defect, and somehow this means that the devices have to be manufactured on Mars Jupiter! The logic overwhelms. So Jupiter is in some way related to 1) evil Haro, 2) GN drives and 3) Aeolia Schenberg’s real objective. Just don’t ask me how exactly.
By the way, those Haros need to talk less. A whole lot less.
Screencaps
Trinitys’ ship has four solar furnaces on board
Eviiiiiiilll
Travel in style
Posing
Many thanks to Sunrise for the helpful gender stereotyping
Sumeragi is not fooled!
Why aren’t all Gundams black considering they can only be tracked visually in space?
*wink*
Setsuna is not amused. *tsuntsun*
“Don’t piss me off! It’s that time of the month.”
Nena inside Veda
You know Howard’s going to die because he gets more dialogue lines than usual
Eins and Drei can combine, with Eins firing GN particles produced by Drei
So who said G00 wasn’t a super robot anime again?
Howard heroically charges at Throne Zwei…
…and receives multiple penetrations
Louise sets herself up for death in the near future
From episode preview: Okay not really, but close enough
This episode calls for a Futurama quotation from good old Bender: “Bender knows when to use finesse.” And so does Sunrise. (Wonder if anyone will get the reference.) Real-life would be a whole lot more straightforward if everyone behaved like a G00 character.
P.S. Mendoi-Conclave releases are getting delayed because we are having a hard time finding our preferred HD raw. I suspect it may have something to do with this…
Ah, thanks a lot. I’m having problems with Random Curiosity wanting to load so I needed my fix from somewhere. Always a joy to read your bloggings on 00.
>>>…which in the eyes of Tieria is probably tantamount to having his wife raped by a stranger.
“…which in the eyes of Tieria is probably tantamount to having his husband raped by a stranger.”
Fixed that for ya’.
“Bender knows when to use finesse.†And so does Sunrise.
LMAO. Your right you know. Soooo from the screen caps it looks like the Thrones really are overpowered. Great, I wonder if it’ll take another 15 episodes for the three world powers to come with a plan to match thm too.
Wow, you really are just completely incapable of enjoying any part of this series aren’t you? No matter what angle the series takes you will still find a way to bash it.
The show took a bad turn. Deal with it fanboy.
is it mars? or jupiter?
ok episode … but I was really pissed Eiffman died, he was cool and I hoped he’d play a bigger role later when the two gundam teams fight but meh :)
Well with that the Big Three have lost what little hope they had for achieving any sort of parity with CB. In one swift stroke the Thrones have made them utterly useless. One would think that since there is a Gundam detection method that the major powers would start using to provide early warning for major installations, but no…
While the series remains campy and funny for all the wrong reasons including the irrelevance of logic, I can’t help but feel that now the the Mighty 8th is useless, and the rest of the cast out side of CB have no real role left to play but to get consistently beat even by the narrowest of margins by the almighty Thrones or get ever so close to capturing a Gundam only to be shit upon in the end by some new “development”. Barring a major upgrade to the major powers’ mobile suit inventories the only way they can compete is to throw their lot in with the hateful Sumeragi and her gaggle of idiots.
It was a forgone conclusion that Nena was going to get lovey dovey with a miester, but Setsuna?! One would have hoped that the two bit bitch would have the sense to choose Lock-on instead, but alas her stupidity was sealed with a kiss.
I hope that Ali, Soma, Sergei, Aker, Daryl, Katie, and Patrick still have some role to play, but other than being Gundam fodder I simply don’t see any hope for them to win even a single engagement now…
Theres one thing that’s obvious. Sumeragi will find out that the new gundams killed Elfman…
I think the GN-drive has to be made in Jupiter not Mars…
And so the pimping begins. Thank the great harem gods and their protagonist laws.
Judging from Louise’s condition in the coming episodes (too much bitching?), I think that Saji and Louise are going to become eventually more important… unfortunately. I might prefer that they stay minor, useless characters for unfunny comedic relief. It’ll be amusing to watch them get their asses thrown back and forth in the middle of a battlefield though.
I couldnt stop laughing after I read this blog post. Hahaha keep it up!
o_O at LOTR/Gollum reference…
I thought that it is Jupiter that relates to the construction of Gundams and the evil Haro’s existance. Too bad he met the “Blue Screen of Death” by the time he has somehow managed to reveal some of the secrets.
How is it possible to review an episode that doesn’t appear to be out anywhere?
Please correct me if I’m wrong and plus this was a pre comment before actually seeing the ep.
Okay Neina is like those flirty cheery girls in other anime (I just guessing) and has a dark side really dark side badder than that Indian (not trying to be offensive)guy oh yah thats Johann. Michael realllly pisses me off even in that 10 minute clip show last ep. Johann is like bomber man black yay!!! I like zwei the best cause of that blade and does fangs (rawwrrr) PLEASE die louise and saji
DM, it’s actually jupiter not mars.
go jupiter but it makes it more stupider (pun intended) cause jupiter is a gas planet right??
Its Jupiter not Mars.
Yeap Jupiter is a gas planet.
Sigh… I should stop blogging at 3am in the morning. Yes it’s Jupiter not Mars. orz
And I did enjoy the episode, perhaps not for the intended reason. But if G00 expects me to take it seriously, then it needs to go back about 15 episodes and learn how to tell a story without relying on soulless stereotypes and convenient plot devices, like PLANETES… But I guess that wasn’t Sunrise’s original creation. I just rewatched PLANETES and it keeps reminding me of how awesome G00 could’ve been with its setting.
Anyway, what’s wrong with enjoying G00’s campiness? Is there some law against enjoying crappy shows because they are crappy? Must you really pretend that G00 is a good show in order to justify your enjoyment?
@Guner: Said the troll to the fan. And believe me, you haven’t even seen a fanboy yet, if you want I’ll show you one, but I doubt it, so pipe down over there or offer some reasons before hurling insults. I have every right to defend a show with my own thoughts from what I perceive as unwarranted attacks without people who think they are absolutely right coming in and offering jack all in terms of good reasons why they think a show took a “bad turn”.
As for Jupiter, obviously few or none saw any U.C Gundam as that was where the Jupiter Empire assembled it’s Mobile Suits and mined H3, the key ingredient used in the Minovsky Fusion Reactor. There is absoluely nothing incredible or outrageous about it as Jupiter has been a relevant part of Gundam history since Zeta Gundam.
I also have to laugh at DM bashing away at the episode to such an extent that he forgot the planet was Jupiter and not Mars. It sort of relieves the tension from it all when there’s a glaring mistake in the article. Gotta relax a bit there man.
The articles are amusing when you are poking fun at some of the scenes with the captions, but you’re really starting to seem like your making a vendetta or agenda of it. If the show is so abysmally awful to you, I don’t know why you agree to keep subbing and blogging it.
The same reason why you keep reading my blog.
And also, as I said, the campiness makes it funny. I enjoy the show as a comedy. I wish I didn’t have to, but we all live in an imperfect world.
I must admit I do enjoy the verbal sparring a bit. It would be a bit boring if we both thought exactly the same.
Still though you seem almost compelled down the path to finding the show poor rather than it forcing you to find a way to like it. I can’t think of anyone else who was expecting the series to be like PlantES. If that’s true then right from the get go you were looking at a miss. I personally expected the series to focus a bit less on Gundams then the last one, but I mean, I’m willing to see where it goes with this.
Maybe I’ve been playing to much Super Robot Wars and thus I don’t care so much about the things that seem to bother you intensely, but still you’re essentially blaming Sunrise for you not being the target audience of the show. And it REALLY seems like you are not the target audience.
What’s PLANETES? to DM
One of the greatest sci-fi story every told through animation. Try googling.
Finally you have something good to say about the anime after the previous weeks of rant since Episode 7.
Well it seems that the Japanese government and companies are pretty stone broke, considering they have to resort to such tactics to earn money.
Neena is so cute!!! <3
Funny post, thanks for the review, etc, etc.
The Professor mentioned Jupiter and not Mars.
Oh well DM you’re not alone; I’ve only just finished blogging in dawn. Should have done it much earlier… Nevermind it’s done.
@Peter: Have just started watching PLANETES very recently. It’s originally a manga, so it isn’t Sunrise’s own creation completely. Settings and background’s quite different from other sci-fi as it tends to be more ‘realistic’ (i.e. still quite similar to real life situation compared to settings in G00 despite being in the same universe). Do give it a shot, I think it’s worth watching.
I just got finshed watching the episode, finally, and there is one thing I have to note. I don’t think that Nena snuck into Vade to steal information, at least not direcctly. I think she hacked into it and placed something like a Trojan. I think Sumeragi also thaought this which is why she asked that mrchanic guy to place his report on an independent computer, so that the Throne Meisters wouldn’t know just how much they knew. Also DM i agree that episode was pretty funny, but it was also rather disturbing how much Micheal enjoyed killing people, even if they wer enemy soldiers, getting enjoyment out of that is just sick. Also, it was a bit brutal of Johann to completely dstroy the entire base when the target was Aifman, and it as obvious they knew where he was. Anyway that part with Nena kissing Setsuna was hilarious, especially Setsuna’s reaction to it.
I really enjoy your bloggings dude. Bad or not, it never fails to entertain me. After watching this episode… I’m expecting:
-A 20-min Battle scene between the Thrones and the Original Meisters
-Power Blocs “somehow” got their hands on a Gundam, got their Tech and starts building GN Units.
-Gundams get pwned… Endo’ story.
And with the death of Eifman the likely hood of the major powers building their own gundams has died. Unless somehow in a later conflict between the original 4 and the Thrones, someone leaks the data on the solar furnace to the Union (if its Sumeragi), similar to how Rau gave the Alliance the Njammer canceler data in Seed.
P.S. Mendoi-Conclave releases are getting delayed because we are having a hard time finding our preferred HD raw. I suspect it may have something to do with this…
I do understand what you mean about this DM. But why has it been that Menclave provided a RAW link (for the latest episode at this moment) but still appear to be looking for a good one? Correct me if I’m wrong, I just got the news this afternoon.
its actually jupiter in the begining of the anime g00 17
>Planetes
The sheer annoyance of Tanabe forced me to stop seeing that thing after 6 episodes.
And I’m sorry to ruin your parade, but Planetes is filled with “soulless stereotypes”.
We have a astronaut with a cocky attitude, a annoying girl who screams “love” and “peace” every chance she gets, a devorced black mother as a motherly figure, a bunch of middle aged men concerned with their job and some other unimportant guys like thar Russian dude.
I found them completely uninteresting.
While gundam 00 is no holy grail of robot anime, it’s billion times better and interesting than those abomination SEED and SEED Destiny(and as for that matter more interesting than Planetes).
I’m actually quite surprised at how the show turned, since I was expecting it to be on the same level of SEED Destiny.
Sure it has plot holes(so as your beloved Planetes such as astronauts picking up debris moving at several km every second by HAND in space) but I found it to be the best anime in 2007.
I cant believe you are bringing SEED to the same level as Gundam 00! SEED was much more enjoyable that Gundam 00. Gundam 00 had its chance and it blew it a bit. The start of the show was awesome and how it introduced us to the gundam meisters and their backgrounds was really cool. But so far I have not found anything in Gundam 00 that says it is better than SEED. SEED imho is the best Gundam cuz it had everything in it and in the right proportions. That said I am not trying to say Gundam 00 sucks. I just tend to agree with darkmirage. I always watch anime with a very large grain of salt. It is not realistic, it cant be ever realistic. Just enjoy it for what it is. But if we are going to compare SEED is ahead of Gundam 00 so far.
Have to say I disagree. SEED was annoying in my opinion because of the characters, I just couldn’t stand them. At least in G00 the characters, barring Saji and Louise, are bearable, if only just.
ferret:
Do you know what is relative velocity? Do you know that when you catch a ball with your bare hands, it’s actually travelling through the universe at tens of thousands of km/s? Do you know that astronauts and spaceships in orbit move at very high speeds to compensate for the centripetal acceleration, even though it seems like they aren’t moving at all because the background references are very far away?
I think I can see why you found PLANETES to be boring. I guess G00 does provide thought-free entertainment. But I promote critical thinking and this is my blog.
PLANETES is about stereotypes the same way real-life is, it is about the breaking down of the illusion of stereotypes. The show makes the audience come to realize that the superficialities don’t matter and the characters are human. (G00 on the other hand has a bunch of robots, and I don’t mean the Gundams.)
You find the characters to be stereotypes because they happen to fall into your narrow-minded worldview as such. Are you telling me that Yuri is a stereotype just because he is Russian? It’s not like he’s wearing a fur coat and drinking vodka. You do realize that there are other races in this world, right? (Or do you prefer G00 where race is ambiguous and everyone looks the same?) I don’t know why I’m even discussing this, since it should be obvious to anyone that one of the main themes in PLANETES is the common feelings and personal experiences we share as a race in spite of differences in our race, religion and nationality.
PLANETES is a plausible heartfelt story. I can see it happening if commercial space exploration reaches a critical point in the next forty years. It also happens to be the most realistic, well researched and scientifically sound sci-fi anime I’ve see. At least I haven’t seen another that has JAXA consultants on board, an OP consisting of historical achievements in manned space travel, or explosions in space with no sound effects. G00 is impossible, not because of the science, since technology will always appear magical to those who lack the foundations to understand it so I’ll give it the benefit of doubt, but because the characters behave in such unrealistic manners that it will take a global IQ reduction of maybe 60 points to explain most of the decisions being made.
I suggest you finish PLANETES because you are showing your ignorance. If you need explosions to keep you interested, there are some in the later episodes. ;)
gundamnut:
I find it quite difficult to see any differences at all between the two. They both have interesting settings that are overshadowed by uninteresting caricatures and fangirl pandering.
darkdestiny:
The raw we provide for streaming every week is not the HD raw we use for encoding, but rather the one we use for translating and timing. The HD raw is obtained subsequently and used in the final encode.
Back to the gundam 00 story……
I support the celestial being not the 3 powers blocs.
union, AEU and HRL remind me too much of the real world countries
which i want them to be destroyed.
of course having a superior technology will defeat many inferior technology armies.
just like america………understand?
Seems that DM’s love for Planetes have no bounds, lol…
While I do find the show (G00) to have a few loopholes here and there, only people who have an incredible amount of time and energy will go about arguing the finer details (good or bad) of the show.
Cheers to DM, maybe I will try to find the time from my busy schedule to watch Planetes :)
PS. Sometimes thinking too much is bad but then again that’s my own personal opinion bah…
And thus we have in a nutshell why Darkmirage thinks Gundam 00 sucks. It’s not as realistic as PlanetES or as much as he’d like.
@Ferret: It’s best not to talk about PlanetES otherwise you’re just going to give Darkmirage more reasons to bash 00 by using comparison of it and PlanetES as an example.
PlanetES is an outstanding show and the characters aren’t boring, just not over the top (for the most part that is). The purpose of the whole junk collecting lifestyle of the main cast IS that it is supposed to be depicting the mundane along with the characters personal lives and reaction to it all. Too often what we consider the bottom rung of the workforce is overlooked in entertainment for the more boisterous and “heroic” positions. The characters in PlanetES are woefully underepresented in all forms of media outside of perhaps documentaries. Also the character analysis is the meat of the show, whereas for Gundam it’s a lot of things.
That’s where PlanetES can be said to be more narrowly and clearly focused while Gundam 00 is more broadly focused and ominous I guess is the word I’d use. Though I think DM is trying to portray it is more obtuse than broad, which isn’t exactly the case unless you go in wanting PlanetES and the wrong mindset.
Interesting is how the competition seems to have broken down to being between whether Seed or 00 is better rather than measuring them on their own merits. Are these really the only two series vieing for top-billing in the entire history of Gundam?
Bring on Episode 18! In the preview, looks like Graham (or another Overflag) has acquired a GN Beam Sabre!
Kaioshin Sama
That’s a very wrong analysis because, if anything, G00 is one of the most “narrow” sci-fi shows around, topped only by other similar Gundam series.
PLANETES covers more themes in philosophy, politics, the human condition and *gasp* actual science fiction than you can shake two sticks at. It’s genuine story-writing at work.
G00 brought in things like politics in an attempt to appear sophisticated, but subsequently discarded them in favour of simple fangirl baiting. It provides a superficial over-simplified world view that is easy for people like ferret to understand due, but thoroughly wrong and illogical. On the whole, it is closer to Naruto than Asimov.
And realism is not plausibility, so please do not misunderstand me. I am critical of G00 because its story is not plausible, not because it’s not realistic.
I love shows like Seikai no Senki, Evangelion, Nadesico and Juuni Kokki, and they are anything but realistic. As I’ve already mentioned, I’m willing to overlook transgressions of the laws of science because future tech is by nature unpredictable. That is not my issue with G00.
In every show that can reasonably be called “good”, the audience is able to identify the forces driving each character and the multitude of complex reasoning behind the character’s actions which give him/her human-like characteristics: that is what ultimately induces the viewer to feel for the characters and the story.
Characters in G00 are basically puppets that do what their stereotypes call for. They seek to achieve one single objective in life and react to everything that happens to them in the same predictable manner. They are empty, soulless and implausible caricatures masquerading as characters.
Realism, in the sense of authentic “hard science”, has nothing to do with my point of contention, although I did appreciate it when it was present in PLANETES.
Hexlord
It’s never too bad to think too much. You won’t know enough to tell what is “worth” thinking if you try to think about only things you consider to be “worth” thinking about. I don’t believe in “ignorance is bliss”.
Thinking to much can be bad, I agree. I also have a simple solution to that when it comes to this anime. If you don’t like it stop watching it. If You have time to nitpick over every little detail. get a life. Except DM, he provides a place for me to get a laugh at idiots running their mouths. Even if those idots leave it will still be worht coming here just because the nature of this anime can provoke some interesting and decently intelligent conversation.
@DM: The reason I agreed thinkg to much can be bad is simply because if you do you can find sumthing wrong with anything and that will lead to the enjoymeant of nothing. I agree with your stereo type judgment to a degree. I think they overplayed the stereotype by alot, however they did get it right too, at least they got alot of what human nature really is. However this is just my opinion. Lastly, from what I’ve heard that PLANETES show is in a different class of anime than G00, and it’s not right to compare them. Not in that its better or worse, But more like in genre. That show is more sci-fi and focused on people, where as G00 is action and mindless violence. They obviously have completely different focuses, even tho G00 did try to do the whole sociol-political thing at first.
@Kaioshin Sama: DM is entitled to his opinion let him have it. BTW any way you look at SEED it simply sucked. Also I did watch one other gundam series: Wing, it was much better than G00, let alone SEED.
Now I have two more things to say. Firs: I think its still to early to judge this show, Aren’t they making another season? If so its not to late to turn it around. Second: Why don’t we get back to the G00 focus rather than discussing other animes and comparing them, at least animes of different genre.
“You know Howard’s going to die because he gets more dialogue lines than usual”
lol, so true!
Your reviews are always very entertaining, man. This one’s particularly funny! The “posing” screencap looks like they took it straight out of a band or something.
Well, I’ve been watching Gundam since the UC era. No particular preference but I sure do like UC stuff. I thought SEED and Destiny was O-K only. Quite draggy sometimes, don’t you find? Anyone watch Dragonar too?
I was kinda disappointed when they did that flashback thing again. Sometimes makes me wonder, is it really about just rushing for deadlines or doing a quality animation. I don’t fully understand how the Anime industry works but, I don’t mind waiting 1 to 2 weeks so I can get a well-done episode.
Anyway, Thank You for always posting up the fast reviews man. And keep the blogging spirit up!
P.S. – Yes and I agree Planetes rocks!
OK, I get it. Thanks.
DM:
I guess what you said do make sense after all. So why not take a break from being online and stuff… maybe think about the things that you have said so far to the other readers.
Nobody here is championing the idea that “ignorance is bliss”. I personally do not think that “don’t think too much” is an equivalent to that 3-word phrase.
Anyway, its just a show. :)
@DM: Well for most characters I think I have identified the force driving them, and other none major characters I feel I will. I think it can be considered a fault that there is still unrevealed information behind each character at this stage, but I trust it will come around. Well, I hope…….
I also agree that that is what makes for a good series. I get a lot of pleasure out of understanding why a character behaves the way they do, even if it isn’t within normal behavioural patterns because of some experience or belief system they have had.
Also any blogger that says they promote critical thinking is a friend of mine regardless of whether I agree with them on things or not because there are so precious few out there that do. I strive to be one of the ones that do.
Seriously, had I been on almost any other blog I probably would have gotten a face full of meme as responses and turned away by now having not learned or thought of anything. Here, I keep coming back because I’m getting new things to ponder and discuss.
Heh, I agree completely. The discussion may be a bit off topic, but when the the ignorant ones aren’t running their mouths about things they don’t understand the discussions here are pretty intelligent. I know I don’t know eerything but at least I can admit when i dont and try to understand more when i know i don’t.
Btw here’s an interesting saying I once read:
Don’t argue with idiots, they’ll bring you down to their level and then beat you with experience
I think thats true, and it one of the reasons I don’t like argueing with them.