Mobile Suit Gundam Narrative

Universal Century 0097.  A year has passed since the Laplace Incident and little has changed in the Earth Sphere.  Though the Unicorn and it’s brother Gundam, the Banshee, were sealed away, a third Unicorn unit appears: The RX03 Phenex.  Pursued by both the Federation and remnant Neo Zeon, the fate of the Phenex is tied to three former friends once known as “The Miracle Children,” whos shared vision of the greatest calamity of The One Year War saved hundreds of lives.  As the “Phoenix Hunt” begins, the age of Newtypes enters a new phase which will determine the very future of the Universal Century.

Ever since it’s conclusion, ive always wanted a follow up to Gundam Unicorn.  The big reveal of Laplace’s Box was huge and I wanted to know the lasting effects it would have on the rest of the Universal Century, especially since we were closing in on UC0100.  So yeah, I was excited to learn that Gundam Narrative would be a direct follow up to Unicorn.  With high expectations, I sat down to watch it at a special screening and was left both impressed but also kind of letdown.  Im happy I saw the film, im always happy to watch (most) Gundam.  But I think I was left wanting more than what I was given.

While we do get to see the brief return of several Unicorn characters like Mineva Zabi, the focus of Narrative shifts to a trio of new characters: Jona, Michele and Rita.  To the films credit, we do spend equal amounts time with their backstory as well as their present ordeals.  Their biggest contribution is the fact that they foresaw the infamous colony drop on Australia by Zeon and thus became the first recognized Newtypes.  Much like Unicorn before it, Narrative is keen to take a look back at the history of the Universal Century, particularly the horrors that have come from it.  Through this we revisit Zeta Gundam in particular and just how far the villainous Titans were willing to go to unlock the secrets of Newtypes, even if they had to make them their own way.  What happens to Jona, Michele and Rita as kids, as a result, is tough to watch and the pain the three of them share as their friendship shatters in various ways is very much felt.  I don’t know if we needed a love triangle included but hey it’s not the worst thing about the movie. 

Seeing as how Gundam Narrative is the first entry of Sunrise’s UC NexT 0100 project, the film takes an even deeper look into the Newtype theory that has dominated the Universal Century so far and set up how it will evolve over the next 100 years of the era.  If you thought some of the Newtype abilities seen in Unicorn were hard to believe, you might find it hard to swallow some of the feats accomplished in Narrative by the core trio.  If you do enjoy anything Gundam and Newtype combined, im curious what others will think about their more elaborated abilities.  There’s a lot of literal soul searching here, some characters even desperate to find light to hold onto when the chaos of war threatens to drown you.  We saw what the cost of forcing Newtype powers upon kids in Zeta Gundam and Gundam ZZ.  Narrative does shine a ray of hope that once proper Newtypes emerge, things are going to change for the better everywhere…eventually.  It’s kind of a leap of faith to be honest but I like those messages in Gundam.

So the new themes and main characters are fine, what about everything else?  Well for a feature film, the first feature length Gundam film that isn’t a compilation feature since Gundam 00: The Movie, Narrative’s production quality is very back and forth.  The mecha designs and the action are really great.  The zig zagging across the screen by the titular Narrative and the Gundam Phenex are dazzling, very Macross but always feeling like this kind of action is Gundam for sure.  The Phenex is a solid successor to one of my favorite Gundam units, the Unicorn.  With it’s long hair like trains and golden armor, it makes me think of a Gundam if it went Super Saiyan 3 from Dragon Ball Z (does that make the Banshee Super Saiyan 2?).  The Gundam Narrative itself is also fascinating, especially when it’s pilot has to wear a ton of gear just to survive riding around in it.  One of the most memorable scenes in the film is the strip down of both the Gundam and the pilots suit gear once a battle is completed.  You’ve never seen such a simple scaled down Gundam before (even more than the OG RX-78-2 Gundam from the original series).  When it comes to character animations, things kind of dip in quality.  It just doesn’t look as polished or pretty as Gundam Unicorn did, granted that OVA set a very high bar for how good anything Gundam should look: TV series, movie or OVA.  Nothing ever look so unappealing that it took me out of the story or action, ive just seen better Gundam Feature Films.

While I enjoyed the main conflict between our three protagonists, the inclusion of an extra Zeon villain feels too much.  This is especially when the bad guy is an over the top whinny “sempai notice me” type who is probably one of the most obnoxious foes ever brought into the Gundam franchise (and that’s saying a lot).  The story was fine with the race to find the Phenex and how it reunited Jona, Michele and Rita and their shared history.  That was enough, that was perfect serviceable.  The need to shoehorn in Zeon was the wrong move.  Or at the very least their presence could have been minimized, even if it was just Mineva setting a small mission in motion for a not so surprise reveal (depending on how you look at it).  On final criticism is that Narrative feels like it wanted to be a stand alone story but it carries on enough of Unicorns themes and leaves the door open for more that it ends up feeling like a second chapter in a trilogy.  I mean, Unicorn’s ending was definitely open ended but it also closed the book on the story it wanted to tell.  Narrative doesn’t feel unfinished, it just feels like a lead in for something bigger to come.  Maybe it’s another chapter of the UC NexT 0100 project but who knows (and we probably wont know more about that til after the next big Gundam project: Mobile Suit Gundam Hathaway’s Flash, gets underway next Fall or Winter.

Mobile Suit Gundam Narrative feels like a decent follow up to Gundam Unicorn but mostly serves as a stage setter for the next age of Gundam now that the franchise has turned 40.  Ideas are debated before being tabled for the moment.  The characters are good additions who might have more to do down the line.  The continued visitation of past Gundam stories is both fun and curious, will humanity ever learn from what’s come before to pave the way for the future?  I wonder if Narrative would have worked better as an OVA series like Unicorn.  Like I said, it’s a tough call.  Im happy I saw the movie and I was entertained at the very least.  It just didn’t have the big game changing reveal of Laplace’s Box or the more polished style of Unicorn.  It was…ok.  Ive seen worse Gundam features, trust me (this is far, far better than Gundam F91).  But it’s clear Narrative has the future in sight as well as the here and now…it just chose to focus on the former more than the latter.  Where does the Universal Century go from here?  Only time will tell. 

7/10