Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ Part 8 Episodes 33-37

The threat of Haman Kahn and Neo Zeon has reached a critical state, so much that the Earth Federation seems desperate for forge a quick peace to avoid further conflict.  The AEUG knows a simple treaty wont stop Haman and continue to oppose her.  At last, in the city of Dublin, Haman shows her true ruthless nature and the extent of her resolve.  As the sky begins to fall around the city, Judau Ashta and the crew of the Argama, this is where everything changes.

Well…to quote Bad Boys 2, “S*** just got real”.  I mean that in both the deepest sense and also, s*** just got REALLY GOOD.  Seriously, I can only think of a minor quibble or two in this set of otherwise perfect episodes of Gundam ZZ…crap, I cant believe I just wrote that sentence.  The ante was upped to the nth degree, we got some unexpected but incredible reunions and even saw the loss of a couple of important cast members.  I can say now that Gundam ZZ is now acting like a proper successor to Zeta and Judau has now equally become the successor to Amuro Ray and Kamille Bidan.  There’s a lot to go over, so let’s break it down.
 
There were three central plots going on this time around: the big reunion between Judau and Kamille; Haman’s colony drop on Dublin; and the Argama crew heading back into space.  We’ll go in order.  Judau and Kamille finally meeting again was something I never expected.  Their initial encounter was one of the few good things about the first half of ZZ and im glad it got a follow up.  This also came after Bright and Judau confronted the Earth Federation higher ups hiding in Dublin over the decision to hand Side 3, the original home of Zeon, over to Haman.  Considering what Neo Zeon did later in this set, theyre clearly the more dangerous of two evils.  But the EFF head honchos are just as despicable, desperate to save their own asses that they’ll let a city full of people burn and do nothing to stop it.  How the hell do Bright and Amuro ever come back to fight for them again?  This goes double for Bright, who’s still doing Captain duties in Gundam Unicorn almost a decade after this series?
 
Back to Kamille and Judau, Kamille’s doing a bit better.  He’s moving around and his Newtype powers are compensating for his seldom speaking.  Several times in this set, Kamille acted like a psychic buffer for Judau and the Gundam Team, helping them fend off Glemy’s forces.  It’s not the old Kamille but this is a vast improvement over that traumatizing state we saw him in at the end of Zeta.  One of the biggest surprises of these episodes was a moment where all three generations of early Gundam were sharing the screen together: Bright and Hayato from Mobile Suit Gundam; Kamille and Fa from Zeta Gundam; and Judau and company from Gundam ZZ.  Twenty episodes ago, I never thought id see this or want to see it.  But considering how far Judau and his friends have come, this felt like a big deal, a true passing of the torch as they helped Kamille and Fa escape Dublin so Kamille wouldn’t have a massive breakdown with the forthcoming destruction.  It’s a shame that Kamille wont be back in action.  But it’s an even bigger shame that Amuro Ray is nowhere to be seen and ZZ has now missed an opportunity to have all three premiere Gundam protagonists share the screen together at least once.
 
The Battle of Dublin was classic Gundam goodness.  The raised stakes and race against time was incredible and very well paced.  As if we needed further proof of the evolution of the Gundam Teams character, Judau, Roux, Beecha, Elle and their friends fought tooth and nail to help evacuate the city as much as possible.  And then came that heart stopping and time stopping moment where the colony impacted.  That might very well be ZZ’s best scene so far.  Everything went quiet for a few seconds and we got to glimpse the horror seen in the first big colony drop on Australia during the One Year War.  It was powerful, terrifying and left me a little uneasy that any human being would be capable of ordering that kind of destruction.  Goes to show why Haman is one of Gundams greatest big bads.  Now the EFF has no choice but to give into her demands and they cant do anything to stop her.  My heart especially goes out to Hayato, who was lost in the middle of the chaos.  His brief reunion with Bright was amazing and his sorrow over learning of Katz’s death is the closest ill ever come to feeling sorry for Zeta Gundams worst character.  Still, Hayato’s death means we’ve lost one of the original Gundam heroes.  It sucks but it also raises the danger factor for everyone on this show.
 
BUT as if that weren’t enough, Glemy finally woke up one of his Puru clones, Puru Two, and set her loose on the Argama with a resurrected Psycho Gundam Mark II.  Like I said, we got a couple of major deaths at Dublin.  Hayato was the first.  The second was the OG Puru.  I’ll admit, I never liked how she was “factory reset” at the beginning of every episode.  Puru would spend half an episode whining about not being able to take a bath or play with Judau before becoming an omniscient Newtype bad ass in the second half…and then repeating that same cycle episode after episode.  Puru Two is the exact opposite.  There’s no cheery running around and screaming her last name like a Pokemon.  Puru Two is cold, ruthless and has no qualms about killing her other self.  Puru ends up having one of the most tragic storylines in all of Gundam: A child soldier experiment who was looking for a family and felt she wasn’t worthy only to sacrifice herself for Judau.  Whodve thought an entitled, love struck idiot like Glemy was capable of unleashing something like Puru Two…dude’s gotta go.
 
Finally, we left the now Earth stationed Argama behind and headed back into space so that Judau and company could get a new ship, the Nael Argama.  It took me a second to figure out this was indeed the same Nael Argama we’ll see as part of the Londo Bell unit in Gundam Unicorn.  Even though Judau’s crew has a new ship, the drama was far from over as the AEUG higher ups wanted the kids off of the ship.  I love how Judau and Bright replayed their EFF grievances here.  So far we’ve only seen the Argama doing the bulk of the AEUG’s grunt work on Earth while we have no idea what the rest of the groups been doing in their absence.  Turns out, besides building the Nael Argama, they’ve been just as complacent as the EFF officials on Earth.  They didn’t do squat to try and stop the colony drop (done by a returning Mashymre, complete with a new look and a penchant for mass genocide) and now they want to replace Judau’s team cause theyre kids.  It sucks Bright had to stay behind to make sure they got away, but Judau and his friends are the only real hope of winning this war.  I wonder if Bright going to bat for them will play a role in helping merge the AEUG back into a better(ish) Federation and the formation of Londo Bell by the time Char’s Counterattack rolls around.  Still, look at Judau and Bright giving it to the man.  Bright has taught him well.

Oh and Leina…not dead.  Not only that but she’s with Sayla of all people.  Still not wanting to say anything or do anything of note, Sayla?  Oh, ok.  God how did the franchise handle Sayla so wrong between the original series before bringing her back as a certified bad ass in Gundam: The Origin?  Anyway, that quibble aside, this set of Gundam ZZ was as close to perfect as Gundam gets and im astounded this show was able to pull it off so well.  Drama, character deaths, epic action and true testaments to character growth, we really are watching a whole new series it feels like.  Maybe I’ll have to grade both halves separately to put things in perspective (and average it for a final score maybe?).  Still, there’s just under ten episodes left to go.  I don’t wanna say there’s still a chance ZZ could trip up…but dammit im so invested that the slighted delay might irk me.  Tomorrow, Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ starts its end run.  One way or another, Haman’s gotta pay and Judau’s gotta be the one to do it.  See ya then everyone.