From Losers to Glory-A Gundam Wing Special-Part 12

Previously:
The nameless White Fang arrived and tried to convince Duo and Wufei to join their team.  But Zechs was more than happy to join after wandering the Earth and looking at ruined battlefields.  The Romafeller Foundation is out of the picture and the Barton Foundation is never going to show up like I’d hoped.  And the battlefield is shifting to space for the final battle to come.  Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz-Glory of the Losers still has a couple of minor details to sort out before the all out brawl at Libra.

Vol.12 (Episodes 42-43)

In the Anime:

Heero joins up with Sally Po and the pair return to space carrying the Wing Zero and Trowa’s long abandoned Gundam Heavyarms.  They find Wuefi wandering without purpose in space and convince him to join their fight against Treize and Zechs.  The five Gundam pilots reunite at Peacemillion, an old battleship built and commanded by Howard the Mechanic.  When the last vestiges of OZ hold a Colony hostage against White Fang, Trowa heads out to save it in Wing Zero when he learns his Circus Troupe is among the hostages.  Thanks to the Zero System, Trowa’s fractured memory is restored and the last remnants of OZ are dealt with thanks to him and the other Gundam pilots.  Meanwhile, Zechs demonstrates the power of Libra by firing a blast from the main cannon directly at the Earth.

In the Manga:

• Irea Winner, Quatre’s Sister, Welcomes her brother back to space.  In the Anime, Irea is never seen after the death of her father.
• This Volume centers on the last stand of the old OZ regime, where they takeover a colony where an amnesiac Trowa and his circus troupe, including Catherine Bloom are staying.  There are many differences in events between how this is presented in the Anime and the Manga, first and foremost being that in the Anime this takes place after Trowa has joined up with Quatre, Duo, Noin and Peacemillion.
• Heero and Sally Po make it to the colony with Wing Zero and Trowa’s Gundam Heavyarms, which they do return to Trowa for use in defending the colony.  It’s unclear if Heero and Sally are fully aware of Trowa’s current mental state.
• Quatre defends the colony from the outside from enemy forces with a non space equipped Sandrock, merging the events of two episodes together.
• Alex and Muller make their first appearance as White Fang mercenaries during this battle.  Instead of both being killed by Zechs early on in the Anime, it’s a recently arrived Wufei who shoots them down despite Noin’s pleas.
• A reconstructed Mercurius and Vayete are deployed during the battle for the colony, under the control of the remnant OZ unit and not the White Fang, though they’re both still contain a Mobile Doll system.
• Instead of the two units being destroyed by Duo in the Anime (who’s trying to save Hilde), Mercurius and Vayete are taken out by Heero and Trowa, though Heavyarms suffers catastrophic damage.
•  Events from far earlier in the Anime play out here as well for Trowa.  Out of ammo, he intends to self destruct but is stopped by Catherine and the Ring Master freeing the hostages.  Catherine then punches Trowa in his cockpit and berates him for almost leaving her and his friends behind.  For the moment, this does not restore Trowas full memory, as is what happens in the Anime when he uses Wing Zero for the attack.
• The end of this battle brings all five Gundam pilots, plus Noin and Sally, to Peacemillion, where Howard announces his crew will work on upgrading Sandrock and Heavyarms simultaneously.  In the Anime, everyone had come together just before this battle.
• Relana and Dorothy both arrive at Libra in separate shuttles at the same time.  In the Anime, Dorothy arrives before Relena to join Zechs’ cause.

Here’s where the new storytelling direction and some redirected plotlines from the Anime collide into a pretty decent package.  What really excited me about this volume was we finally got to see the original Heavyarms back in battle one more time.  In the Anime, Trowa’s Gundam just kind of vanishes for a good chunk of the show until it gets its sad excuse for an upgrade in the final episodes.  Here, it is given a proper send off with Trowa using it in the only way that truly matters: protecting the circus he’d come to see as family.  I also like that his punch to the face from Katherine came at this point too, a reminder that he’ll be hurting the ones he loves if he just dies without thinking of the pain it would bring.  Trowa’s overall storyline in Glory of the Losers is still about as lacking in proper structure and I still think he should have died with the Vayete at the halfway mark.  But this is a good idea of a better approach to take with his story, just wish we’d seen more of him with the Circus troupe before and after his amnesia to build that familial bond better.  I also don’t mind that he got to take on the Mercurius and Vayete Mobile Dolls along with Heero in a nice mirror match style showdown.  Only makes sense they take these kills from Duo since Duo got to fight Zechs last week (same goes for Wufei getting to take out Alex and Muller).  New retelling, new match ups, it only makes sense.  Speaking of characters who don’t have a proper storyline: Sally Po.  She hasn’t been around since she let Sandrock go with the Maguanac Corps.  I wish they had decided to use her more as an aid to Relena alongside Noin to both give her more to do and strengthen her partnership with Noin, which whom she’s frequently teamed up with in the Anime and Endless Waltz.  Once again though, she’s just lost in the shuffle with no true definable role compared to everyone else.

When we come back next week, we’re actually gonna wrap things up entirely.  Yes, Volume 13 and Volume 14 of Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz-Glory of the Losers will be covered back to back.  Will the finale be strengthened by the changes that have come about in the last couple of volumes?  Or are we just going to get Char’s Counterattack again because when in doubt…  Anyway, see you next week for the double sized finale of From Losers to Glory: A Gundam Wing Special.