Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Part 6 Episodes 26-30

A storm is coming.  Their stay in Orb over, the Archangel and her crew proceed to Alaska, headquarters of the Earth Alliance.  Determined not to let the Archangel reach enemy territory, Athrun Zala and his team of Gundam Pilots prepare for their biggest operation yet.   But when things go horribly wrong, both sides suffer serious casualties.  The time for peace and talk is over.  Now Kira and Athrun face each other full of rage and sadness in a battle one of them wont be walking away from.

WHOA!!!!...WHOA!!!!  Major revelations, new mysteries and the main event the series had been building towards since Episode 1.  Yes we had to endue 2 back to back clip shows before the good stuff but Gundam Seed fired on all cylinders to kick off its next chapter.  The ship had been rocking a bit but this set proved it might’ve been worth it.

I could easily dock the series points for taking one of the worst ideas from Gundam Wing and doing two separate clip shows from two separate perspectives.  However, the time we did get to spend in Orb regardless was enlightening.  Kira’s friends got to see their folks and Kira got to learn the real reason Orb needs his detailed expertise with the Strike: they’re building their own Mobile Suit force (comprised entirely of girls…nothing wrong with that but I’m sure that’s a shout out to the Shrike Team from Mobile Suit Victory Gundam).  Thankfully, unlike the Earth Alliance or ZAFT, this isn’t for anything nefarious.  Orb will hold fast to its neutrality.  But when the war officially comes to their doorstep in the form of an invasion, it will defend itself, no matter which side comes knocking on its front door.  I can stand by this mindset.  Meanwhile, we also got some actual answers in regards to Cagalli’s timeline.  Were told why she ran away from home in the first place and how she ended up in Africa, meeting up with Kira again.  It’s good to see her taking her fathers advice to heart and seeing the world outside of the peaceful curtain around Orb.  It might’ve made her a little trigger happy and confused as to why that isn’t the best way to fight a war, but experience is experience.

While Kira didn’t get to see his parents like the others, we got another bombshell around our not so happy go lucky Gundam pilot: he and Cagalli might be siblings.  It’s not stated outright but considering how Uzumi was talking to Kira’s parents, it’s pretty obvious and they don’t want Kira and Cagalli to know.  Ok, why is that?  Is Cagalli a Coordinator too and doesn’t even know it (would not knowing even be possible)?  It does make things a bit…icky if Cagalli was kind of crushing on Kira, like we’re talking Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia levels of creepy in Empire Strikes Back before Return of the Jedi.  Regardless of shipping, Kira and Cagalli are a great pair of character who have grown being around one another.  That hug Cagalli gave Kira before he left felt very earned and it even prompted Kira to do the smartest thing he’s done in a very long time…break up with pity party “ITS ALL ABOUT ME” Flay Alster…of course we’ll come back to her later.

But yes, THE MAIN EVENT!!! Kira vs. Athrun.  Best Friend vs Best Friend, Brother vs Brother, the match up you’d all been waiting for and WOW it will easily go down as one of the most intense in the Gundam franchise.  We’d been building to this for a long time but the final strokes were brilliant.  First, the pair had an unexpected and very brief reunion in Orb.  Kira and Athrun said very little but their sadness at their current predicament was more clear than ever before.  Then Kira killed Nicol and Athrun killed Tolle…and all bets were off.  Detouring a bit, I’m surprised Yzak and Dearka were as torn up about Nicol’s death as Athrun.  The two of them have been Grade-A jerks from the get go (Yzak more so, Dearka’s just been his parrot).  I still hate Yzak for slaughtering civilians cause he’s a sore loser but seeing genuine emotion for the loss of a teammate was surprising.  As for Tolle…I feel like out of all the members of Kira’s crew, we spent the least time with him.  Sai and Miriallia have been by Kira’s side a lot more, same with the soft spoken Kuzzey.  What if it had been Sai killed instead?  That would’ve carried more weight considering he and Kira had a major falling out over Flay and we’re trying to work up the courage to make things right.  Nicol’s carried the right amount of emotion because we’d seen him and Athrun together a lot, so we knew they were close.  Plus Nicol’s the first Gundam pilot casualty so that’s pretty big too.  Still, it was the last push Kira needed and he and Athrun went at it in an emotionally charged and vicious brawl, complete with both being able to access a Seed Berserker ability (Seed’s answer to Super Saiyans I guess?).  Now of course, Kira isn’t dead…but considering he took a self destruct to the face…is it possible he’s not just a Coordinator but a direct descendant of Heero Yuy from Gundam Wing?

Back to Flay, she continues to wander around aimlessly like a zombie and finally got the one thing she deserved: Kira coming to some semblance of sense and dumping her ass cause she thought he wasn’t visiting his parents out of pity towards her (cause both her parents are dead).  How freaking self centered can you be and why the hell does Flay still not have a job on this ship?  I swear every moment we spend seeing her wander with a blank stare could be put to much better use elsewhere.  I guess we should just be glad we didn’t get a recap from her perspective.  It would have just been blank stares at a screen before cutting to random action during prior episodes.  Flay, get the hell out of this show cause you’re just taking up space even if no one notices you’re around.

Yikes, we ended things on a bit of a note here.  Tolle and Nicol are dead.  Athrun’s MIA.  Kira is MIA too but I bet everyones going to write him off.  Oh and Yzak’s parrot Dearka has been taken prisoner by the Archangel (maybe he’ll gain an opinion of his own during his stay).  Cliffhangers don’t get much heavier than this and it was one of Gundam Seed’s biggest success stories so far…even if it was a tragic one.  We’ll pick up the pieces next time right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.