As we come to the end of another decade of history, ive
been thinking a bit about the Anime that just so happens to inspire this blogs
namesake. In the almost six years ive
been doing this, I haven’t ever taken a look back at the Gundam titles ive
reviewed. In doing so, it’s more spread
out than I thought. True, I’d expect a
blog titled the “Gundam Anime Corner” to contain a crap ton of Gundam
material…and there is. But as we’ve
seen, there’s nothing wrong with giving all Anime a bit of the spotlight. Still, I opted to do a
inventory/retrospective listing of all the Gundam titles ive done full
series/film reviews of from 2014 til now.
So I figured, why not share my findings?
So here we are everyone, The History of Gundam at the Gundam Anime
Corner.
2014
Funny thing, this blog didn’t open with a Gundam
review. My very first review was the
opening of Eden of the East on March 31, 2014. I didn’t actually get to any Gundam titles
until near the end of the year. In
October I did a mini movie marathon month, looking at three Gundam features I
had on hand: the movie edition of Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz;
Mobile Suit Gundam: Char’s Counterattack and it’s theatrical successor
Mobile Suit Gundam F91. Honestly, I
have never planned out when or how I’d go about reviewing Gundam in general,
hence the grab bag approach you’ll see across the years. Still, this trio of flicks showed off the
best and worst of the franchise. So it
wasnt a bad little primer to get things rolling.
2015
2015 marked a couple of firsts for the Gundam Anime
Corner. It was the debut of the yearly
Extended Series Review (in which I did a more accerlated review schedule of a
series longer than 26 episodes). It was
also the year I took on my first Gundam series, a dear favorite. At the time, it was a yearly ritual for me to
watch all of Mobile Suit Gundam 00 prior to Otakon. So why not continue
the tradition but this time offer my own thoughts as a reviewer? Later that year I did a random editorial that
could more or less be a full series review of Gundam Build Fighters,
praising it as a love letter to the franchise.
I had planned to review all of Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn in one
sitting that December. However, there
was a potential chance to review Ghost in the Shell: Arise in full…but
that opportunity never came. With two
reviews written for Arise already, I decided to split Gundam Unicorn’s coverage
into two halves, shared with Arise. The
first half was covered December 2015 and the last three episodes were reviewed
(along with the conclusion of Arise) a few months later in February 2016. As an added bonus for 2015, I acquired the Gundam
00 Movie-A Wakening of the Trailblazer, at Otakon and began yet another
semi yearly tradition as well, a special Christmas Day review (I say Semi
Yearly cause right now I’m not sure I have anything planned for 2019 in that
regard). All in all, not a bad year for
Gundam or the blog itself.
2016
Compared to 2015, 2016 was kind of quiet on the Gundam
front on the blog. Granted, the main title
I did review is a great summer blockbuster of a title: Mobile Suit Gundam:
The 08th MS Team. Since a
variation of another 08th MS Team title aired on Toonami during it’s
original run, I also merged a review of the 08th MS Team movie, Miller’s
Report, into the series review itself.
Other than that, the only other Gundam related title I looked at was the
horrendous Gundam Build Fighters Try-Island Wars and the less I say
about that godawful series in general, the better. This was probably the second quietest year of
Gundam at the Anime Corner.
2017
I didn’t mention this in 2014 but when I reviewed those
three Gundam films, I dubbed the grouping as “Gundam Month”. After encountering some amazing Gundam
experts at Katsucon 2017, I was inspired to tackle two back to back Gundam OVAs
in the same month. April 2017 became Gundam
Month Mark II and featured coverage of Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in
the Pocket & Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory. 2017 was a particularly tough year because it
also marked the first time in seven years I didn’t attend Otakon. This bit of depression made me feel deflated
about reviewing two back to back Fate/Stay Night series (Zero and Unlimited
Blade Works) for my Extended Series Review.
Thankfully, Crunchyroll had me covered and I turned to a very old friend
for comfort. This signaled yet another
first for the Gundam Anime Corner. At
long last, I got a chance to look at the Gundam that got me into Gundam: Mobile
Suit Gundam Wing. In doing so, I
added a sort of unwritten rule to the Extended Series Reviews-every other year,
a Gundam Series is being covered.
2018
I cant believe I almost went an entire year without reviewing
anything Gundam related…or rather more.
It was closer to a year and a half after Gundam Wing that it dawned on
me. I’m not totally complaining. 2018 had a crap ton of good titles for me to
review including Psycho Pass, The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzimiya, One Punch
Man and Full Metal Panic: Invisible Victory (one of the few series I reviewed
within the same year it debuted in Japan).
Still, I couldn’t let a blog named after Mobile Suit Gundam go a year without
a Gundam review. Gundaminfo.com’s
official Youtube page came to my aid late in the year though, delivering the
English dubs of the two Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt compilation
films: December Sky and Bandit Flower, right into my lap. It was a last minute addition, but 2018 had
some Gundam action after all and I promised the blog wouldn’t go this long
without it again.
2019
AND I KEEP MY PROMISES!!!! Holy crap I don’t know if it
was trying to make up for the lack of coverage in 2018 or the fact that 2019
was the 40th Anniversary of the franchise…or both, but this was the
year Gundam took my blog by storm (more so than the Year of The Slayers I
think). Not only did I get to review the
brand new Gundam feature film, Mobile Suit Gundam Narrative, and the CG
anthology, Gundam Evolve, I got to look at two milestone titles of the
franchise. First, in April, Gundam Month
Mark III saw me go back to the very roots of Gundam with Mobile Suit Gundam
and it’s compilation movie trilogy: The Movie, Soldiers of Sorrow and
Encounters in Space. And as the
tradition as become, I reviewed another Gundam series for my Extended Series
Review this summer. It was another
milestone title, the 20th Anniversary celebration that was Turn A
Gundam (along with it’s two compilation films Earth Light and Moonlight
Butterfly cause I had an extra week to fill). There hasn’t been anything else since Turn A
but reviewing over 100 episodes and 7 movies over the span of a year more than
makes up for the lack of Gundam material in 2018…and frankly I think I did a
better job celebrating the franchise than Japan as it only gave us ONE new
Gundam project when we should’ve gotten a lot more.
Looking Ahead-2020…and beyond?
As I have been doing lately, I’ve mapped out and begun
working on my review schedule for 2020 (id estimate it’s a little over half
done actually…damn). I had originally
planned to do a special, two part review project since it was also originally
announced that Gundam Seed would be getting a rerelease in 2019. That has since been pushed to an undetermined
time in 2020. Ergo, I’m scrapping my
original plan to review Mobile Suit Gundam Seed in January 2020 and then
Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Destiny in December 2020. Sure both are available to watch on
Crunchyroll…but if I’m honest, I’ve kind of fallen out of love with that idea
(especially revisiting my old nemesis DESTINY if only for a 50 episode long
rant). Other titles have popped up
recently that Ive really wanted to review instead…and you’ll find out what
those are on January 1, 2020. Actually,
one of those titles that has taken Seeds place just so happens to be another
Gundam series itself, After War Gundam X (I got the entire series thanks
to a solid Black Friday deal from RightStufAnime.com hehehe). And also actually, I was thinking about
adding that to my 2021 schedule (yeesh I am looking super far ahead). But I’ll bring it a bit sooner…with a
tentative review date of December 2020.
I’ll absolutely do at least one Gundam Series in 2021 for my Extended
Series Review in the Summer period. It’s
always about what I can get my hands on.
And trust me, I plan on getting as much Gundam as I can in the
future. And it’s not like you wont see
Gundam get another spot in my Top 5 Wednesday series. I’ve also been working on a new kind of
project that Ive never really done before here on the Anime Corner. Wont say what it is just yet but I’m aiming
to get it worked out and done by April 2020.
And that, whew, is the long history of Gundam at the
Gundam Anime Corner. Any other titles
from the franchise resume I should check out down the line? Zeta Gundam? Iron Blooded Orphans? Should I try and continue with my crazy Seed/Seed
Destiny plan at a later date? Let me
know and I’ll see what I can do. After
all, what good is a blog called the Gundam Anime Corner without a little Gundam
around, eh?
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