The War for Eldora has reached a breaking point. As Alus grows more and more deluded and
deranged, he sets his sights on conquering his enemies right at the source:
Gunpla Battle Nexus Online itself.
Hiroto and the others find themselves facing a final battle on two
fronts with two worlds now at risk for destruction. For all their improvements individually and
as a team, even the new Build Divers are going to need help to finish this
fight. Good thing GBN has plenty of
defenders as two generations of Build Divers unite to protect that what they
most hold dear.
Since the first few episodes, my expectations for Gundam
Build Divers Re:Rise have become increasingly low.
The story frustrates me, the characters
irritate me and it just feels like such huge potential was squandered in favor
of trying something radically different that didn’t pay off in the end.
So it’s no surprise that in these final five
episodes of the series, anything that had to do with the current cast left
about as unsatisfied as I expected.
However, there was an actual light in this dismal series, moments where
I did enjoy watching the show for once…and they all came from catching up with
some old friends.
Is it enough to save
this series from a low score, Hell no.
But I’m never gonna pass up a chance to watch Riku and the OG Build
Divers cast in action once again.
But before we get to me gushing over seeing characters
that actually made me smile again, let’s rant about everything else.
There have been moments in this series back
half that have seen Re:Rise trying to go full hard into classic tragic Gundam
tropes that feel so out of place with this little universe.
It’s made Re:Rise a depressing watch when
really I was just looking for another feel good romp around GBN.
Last time, it was Eve begging Hiroto to end
her existence so she wouldn’t wipe out GBN days before Koichi and Tsukasa found
a fix for the El Diver dilemma.
This
time, it’s poor Char Clone Masaki begging even harder for Caudron and the Build
Divers to kill him because of all the damage he’d done to Eldora, even if he
was being forced to against his will.
After Par has a heartfelt chat with Caudron about the power of the Human
Spirit…Caudrons just like “Ok Masaki if that’s what you want.”
NO!!!
I have issues with forced redemption arcs in this show, more on that
later, but Masaki is someone who didn’t need redemption, he needed to be saved
and reassured.
We didn’t need another
senseless mercy killing here and I was so disappointed Cuadron went right to
that rather than listening to Par’s wisdom and trying to free his old friend.
Having Masaki back to his normal self showcases more
wasted potential from Re:Rise.
He seems
like a chill and cool guy, riding motorcycles and teaching little kids how to
build Gunpla while he’s recovering in the hospital.
We spent so much time watching him wail under
mind control but I wish we could spend more time with him as an official member
of Team Build Divers.
Sure he seems to
work through his trauma of being Alus’ puppet pretty quickly but cudos that he
doesn’t wait half a series to try and get his crap together.
Barely a few scenes with him and Masaki could
already be my second favorite new character after Par.
As for Alus, ugh.
This thing was so far past the point of no
return it wasn’t even amusing.
And yet
May thought that Alus could still be redeemed.
Yeah I’m gonna call a hard stop on that.
Masaki had an excuse.
He was
being mind controlled and forced to do terrible things he didn’t want to.
Alus was damn well aware of what he was doing
and yet refused to see otherwise, right up til the very end.
He even went so far as to actually invade GBN
because he saw “the people of the Gunpla” as his true enemy.
Alus is a sore loser if there ever was one
and I laughed when his fleet showed up in GBN only to see the Third Coalition
and basically say, “Hi there.
Welcome to
GBN…get off our lawn.”
Look I’m all for
second chances and its one of Build Divers driving themes.
Alus doesn’t fit the criteria though.
Once you start a path of pure fanatical level
genocide, that’s the point of no return.
With all of this in mind, it’s little wonder I didn’t
care a single bit about the final stretch for Build Divers 2.0.
Hiroto, May and Kazami might be some of my
least favorite characters in the franchise.
While Par grew into his role as a leader and the heart of the team
pretty quickly, everyone else was either stagnant or stubborn.
Even if Hiroto, May and Kazami did finally
show proper character growth (and in Kazami’s case actual maturity), I just
cant bring myself to like them.
They
just weren’t the characters I wanted to see in this forced space age adventure.
If anything, this should could have been a
spin off for Team Avalon, aka Hiroto’s former team.
We already knew Kyoya pretty well and his two
subordinates, Emilia and Karuna, and it would have been great to get to know
them even better.
This goes double for
Karuna, who seemed to have a special soft spot for Hiroto, I cant imagine how
he felt when Hiroto just ditched Avalon after Eve’s death.
Still have Par around but have Hiroto and
Avalon discover Freddie’s SOS together, get rid of May and Kazami, and let the
show continue from there.
I doubt it
would make the premise any better but at least I’d care more about the cast.
Ok, let’s talk about the actual good stuff.
Magee did exactly what I’ve wanted for the
entire series: he got the band back together.
Not only did we get to see older Riku, Sarah and Yuki along with Koichi
and Ayame but all of the old Build Divers favorites were back too: Shary,
Tigerwolf, Ogre, Doji and Rommel to name a few.
I wont lie, it did put a smile on my face seeing these well oiled vets
school the new Build Divers during the practice run.
Just seeing them all in action again reminded
me why the original Build Divers worked out so well.
Yes they had their own characters journeys to
travel and their own issues to work through but they did and they did so in
less than half the time of Hiroto and his team.
So it makes sense that any really awesome moments in the finale came
from seeing the Third Coalition of vertrans taking on Alus’ forces and doing a
surprisingly good job against them, way better than Hiroto’s crew for most of
the season.
There are also the little
moments like seeing Ruki and Orge are still friendly rivals or seeing Shary
share a brotherly wink with Par or seeing Rommel is a fan of Captain Zeon (who
also shows up for the final battle, WHERES HIS SPIN OFF!!!???).
Also the scene where Riku and Hiroto meet and
talk about the death of Eve and how Riku felt responsible was nice.
Like I said last time, Hiroto couldve gone
full Shinn Asuka and blamed Riku for Eve’s death in some way and never forgive
him, maybe even become a more dangerous rival for him.
But they didn’t take that route and seeing
these two shake hands made more sense and felt more earned than seeing Shinn
shake Kira Yamato’s hand at the end of Gundam SEED Destiny.
Before I get into final thoughts, sigh, theres one more
major rant I need to get through.
So you
know how I said a few reviews ago that I hoped they wouldn’t try and retcon the
creation of El Divers and tie it back to Eldora?
Well for a moment I was relieved thinking
that the show was almost done and that hadn’t come up.
That is until we see Kyoya at lunch IRL with
the Game Master and Miss Tori…and Tori reveals that some of Alus’ scattered
remnant code matches something similar to an anomaly that is the missing key to
Sarah’s creation and thus the creation of El Divers as a
whole….noooooOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
Are you
kidding me?
Why retcon that?
Why not just have El Divers be a natural
occurrence in GBN?
What was wrong with
that?
There was something wonderful
about life finding a way (to cite Jeff Goldblum’s popular line from Jurassic
Park).
But no we have to make this
excursion into deep space and encounters with aliens mean something in the long
run.
This wasn’t needed, it feels wrong
and I freaking hate it.
Ok, final thoughts.
Gundam Build Divers Re:Rise is one of the most disappointing Gundam
entries I’ve ever watched.
It always
felt like it was meant to be another Mecha Anime altogether.
Hell I think it could even make for a decent
Macross Anime (especially since Macross has Aliens in it).
Except for Par and Masaki, I didn’t like the
characters.
Some Eldorans like Freddie
and Maiya were fine but they weren’t the reason I wanted to watch a series
about friends having fun with Gunpla online.
The tone leaned continuously into darker territory to the point where
the show wasn’t fun and their chances to add humor right after just felt
tasteless.
The best moments of Re:Rise
were when Riku and the rest of the OGs came back to kick some fake Gunpla ass
and remind me why they should have taken the lead reigns from the start.
Re:Rise tried to do some very different
things with Gundam, the kind that had only been tested once in one other
divisive movie (The Gundam 00 Movie).
I
really wanted this “Story Mode” to feature interactions with events and
characters from across the Gundam franchise with new and old fans and Gunpla
flying alongside legends like Amuro Ray or Setsuna F. Seiei.
Instead, we got a needlessly depressing and
frustrating space adventure with drama that wanted to hit hard but only made me
angry.
Much like Gundam Build Fighters
Try, Gundam Build Divers Re:Rise took a cool and awe inspiring concept and
turned it into the more depressing freaking thing ever…screw that noise
Gundam Build Divers Re:Rise gets a 2/10
(only because of seeing Riku and the others again and the
show not deserving Par’s awesomeness)
And with that travesty finally done, OTAKON
AWAITS!!!!!
No review Next Monday cause
of the Con and to give myself a short series break. But I’ve got a couple of movie reviews on
deck, starting August 4th with something I should have looked at months ago
but…Here we GOOOOO.
It’s
The Super
Mario Bros’ Movie, Next Friday right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.
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