The Battle of Dakar ends with the AEUG and Karaba
retaking the city but at a personal cost to Judau Ashta. With his sister gone, the young Gundam pilot
begins to shut out all around him.
Leina’s loss affects the rest of the team as well, causing a fracture at
a critical point in the war. Haman isn’t
willing to let the loss of Dakar go unanswered and sends Glemy Toto to lead the
counterstrike against the AEUG. With his
team splintered, Judau will have to find the strength to reunite his friends
and keep fighting…unaware the Neo Zeon still has unexpected allies and deadlier
tactics still up their sleeve.
While it couldn’t quite match the game changing goodness
of the mid series premiere, Gundam ZZ still continued to show great improvements
all across the board.
It did,
unfortunately, fall back into some old habits with a couple of characters.
Plus, the bulk of this set felt like an
unnecessary detour following the Battle of Dakar.
But I think there’s still plenty of
positivity to keep my spirits up.
ZZ is
doing much better, that I wont debate.
So…Leina isn’t dead, right?
After seeing her scurry off from her hiding
place, only to see it blown up by a crashing Mobile Suit, I doubt Gundam would
leave one shoe behind as evidence that a main character has bought it.
This is a franchise that doesn’t shy away
from showing us gruesome character deaths, no matter the age of the
character.
Despite clarification on
Leina’s status, her apparent demise rocked Judau to his core and it was drama
we’ve needed to see from him for a long time.
There was pure dramatic gold for the entire Gundam team onboard the
Argama with the fallout of Leina’s “death” from Roux cold “cost of war”
reasoning to Puru and the others wanting Judau to be alone to the sight of the
Core Fighter console smashed by Judau from pure rage.
There’s nary a joke or Looney Tunes caper to
be found here.
The sight of the Core
Fighters console smashed by Judau in a fit of rage we never saw struck the
deepest cord especially since I never expected to feel bad for him in this
series til a few episodes ago.
Judau working out his grief with the help of Puru and the
others was well handled.
What wasn’t
really was Roux suddenly deciding to abandon the Argama over an argument with
the team and a kind of heartless tactic from Beecha.
Ok yeah, Beecha using Roux as a shield
against Glemy was kind of low but ill be damned, the guy genuinely felt bad
about it and admitted it multiple times.
Still, Roux just up and ditching the Argama felt like something that
should have happened way before now and it seemed very immature of Roux
considering she’s the oldest and most experienced of the team.
Roux’s brief exodus led us to Ghardaia where
we saw more battle involving warring African factions plus Neo Zeon and the
Gundam Team getting involved.
We got
some great desert combat out of this but I’ll admit, this felt like a detour we
didn’t need after Dakar.
Knowing that
big stuff is about to go down in Dublin, wouldn’t it make sense for the Argama
to be out of Africa by now?
The mini arc
had its moments but didn’t have the same impact as the earlier episodes in
Africa.
Btw, the show has spent about a
quarter of its time on this continent alone, crazy.
Beecha and Glemy both seemed to return to their old ways
briefly in this set.
Beecha, wanting to
upstage Judau, stole the ZZ and tried to kick ass but couldn’t, resulting in
near disaster.
Glemy found Roux in
Ghardaia and found himself unable to see past his love for her to avoid her
kicking his ass and embarrassing him again.
This is all first half of ZZ stuff, aka the Dark Times.
I guess I should be surprised that these
misteps were caught and rectified quickly.
Beecha apologized to Judau personally and admitted the ZZ is meant to be
his, something id never see the old Beecha doing.
I was worried about Glemy, who’s apparently
being built up as a rival for Haman over the leadership of Neo Zeon.
Yet during the African Liberaton Front Arc he
was acting like Jerrid, all talk and ambition but little talent.
Well that changed big time when we saw his
secret trump card for dealing with Haman: a ton of Puru clones in cold
storage…FRAKING WHAT?!
To think that the
bumbling Mamma’s boy has been this scheming nutcase all along is mind
boggling.
I wish this had been set up
sooner but Glemy’s been a casualty of the massive shift in tone and approach to
ZZ.
I mean he’s better…his sudden heel
turn just hasn’t been handled properly.
And just what makes him qualified to lead Neo Zeon?
Is secretly related to the Zabis?
Maybe I missed something or I should just
wait and see what else we learn.
Well after about 10 episodes or so, the Argama and the
Gundam Team are departing Africa and headed for Dublin…where I think some major
mess is about to go down.
Misteps aside,
Gundam ZZ is still behaving more like a Gundam series should and I pray it can
keep the momentum going.
Judging from
what lie ahead, this might be the moment where ZZ truly proves itself.
We’ll find out tomorrow as Mobile Suit Gundam
ZZ continues right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.
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