A series of heartbreaking betrayals leaves Suletta
without a Gundam and without Miorine.
All of this plays right into the hands of her mother, Prosepera, who
travels to Earth with the Aerial to begin the Quiet Zero initiative. With the
world on fire and space about to become even more dangerous, Miroine struggles
to repair the damage while Suletta confronts her own identity and everything
she’s lost in order to move forward, with or without Aerial.
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse for
the cast of G Witch, along comes this penultimate set of episodes to say “yeah
hold my beer”.
It wasn’t even the fact
that Suletta found herself at rock bottom.
As the series heads into its finale, the stakes have never felt higher
and all the plans within plans against double crosses, betrayals and secret
agendas are building towards a need for some serious payback for all the death
and damage left in their wake.
Several
moments in this set were hard to watch.
But then again that’s what Gundam does best: showing that war is Hell
and the thirst for power within always leads to tragedy…and how those who stand
against such ambitions give us the most hope.
Let’s start with Suletta.
To paraphrase Wayne’s World, “What the hell is going on? I’ve lost my
position.
I’ve lost my Gundam. I’ve lost
my girl?”
There’s a bit more to that but
language. Point is, Suletta had everything she used to hold dear ripped apart
from her and really, it’s needed to happen for a while now.
It sucks watching Suletta brought to tears
and feeling so low.
That moment where
Prospera abandons her in space with a beacon while Suletta is bawling her eyes
out in a space suit is one of this sets hardest moments to watch.
But after Miorine betrays her to save her and
her digitized older sister…who Suletta is also a clone of btw, she needed the
cry.
What sucks even more is that
Miorine and Aerial had their similar reasons for doing so.
Miroine was to give Suletta the push to start
moving away from Prospera’s control.
And
Aerial is well aware of how far gone Prospera is to her insanity and she
doesn’t want Suletta to be part of it.
It’s tough love but Suletta needed to be shown just how wrong her
Mother’s been about a great many things.
At least it looks like these hard lessons are sticking when Suletta
steels herself to try helping with locating survivors following the Second
Battle of Astacassia.
Oh Shaddiq, you MOTHER*****.
He can go on and on and on about needing to
gain power to help his fellow Earthians but every sentence out of his mouth
sounds like one excuse after another.
No, to me, Shaddiq’s hang up is his obsession with winning Miroine’s
affections and he’ll do whatever it takes to get them.
To this end, he’s kidnapped his father,
manipulated an election, unleashed a terrorist group on the school TWICE, and
has the nerve to blame Guel for what happened on Earth and Miroine taking the
brunt of the backlash against it.
Shaddiq has needed an epic ass kicking since his first appearance in G
Witch and it was mad satisfying to see Guel be the one to dish it out.
Shaddiq can yell all he wants about Spacians
being unfair when in fact some of them have been trying to do good by Earthians
for a while, like Guel, Suletta and Miroine (not to mention all of Earth House,
even Nika in her own way).
Seeing the
impulsive but changed Guel defeat Shaddiq with barely a Mobile Suit left was
awesome.
Now all Shaddiq needs is a
punch to his would be perfect face (from Guel or Miorine preferably).
The Second Battle of Astacassia was even harsher than the
first.
Now free from her multi episode
stay in a room with Elan 5 and Nika, Norea went on a total rampage after
hearing about the news of the Aerial’s attack on Earth.
Living in an age where mass school shootings
are a terrifying reality only makes her tantrum all the more heart
wrenching.
Still, this is the kind of
tragedy Gundam excels at presenting.
Even a safe haven like Astaccassia isnt such when it comes to the
clashing multiple plots between Prospera and Shaddiq (though personally I hold
Shaddiq responsible since he let Norea out to basically create a super bloody
distraction.Amidst the chaos, it was good to see the students coming to each
others aid and Chu Chu suiting up to defend her school regardless of her
feelings towards Spacians.
And there’s
that aforementioned bit where Earth House rallies to help Suletta look for
survivors.
They’ve taken a beating but
they’re not broken yet.
Unfortunately, while the Witch from Mercury is really
nailing the build up to an epic showdown in space, a lot of the Earth based
conflict still isnt landing with me.
Once again, I chalk it up to any semblance of an imbalance between Earth
and Space being a necessary Gundam story trope.
But we haven’t spent much time with factions other than the Dawn of Fold
terrorist group.
Miroine’s negotiations
needed to be with someone with more of an established presence but we don’t
know anyone else at the moment.
Then
again though, sending Miroine down there at all was just an excuse for Prospera
to go down with the Aerial and raise some Hell for her own plans of grand
delusion.
In my opinion though, any of
the stuff on Earth not connected to a main character like Guel is some of the
weakest story aspects of G Witch.
Earth isnt the only failing in this set though.
I’m not really feeling the sympathy for Elan
5 trying to redeem Norea.
First off, he
tried to take Suletta by force until Guel kicked his ass (heck yeah go
Guel).
And he, Norea and Nika spent most
of this set locked in a room together by Shaddiq.
Given how big the cast is, it’s an
interesting way to clear the board a little bit.
But while it was interesting to see Norea’s
wishes about wanting to travel with Sophie on Earth, Elan 5’s sudden tune
change and wanting to be with Norea doesn’t feel earned to me.
G Witch is trying to redeem him and it isnt
working.
Also, there’s the matter of
Secilia.
She’s been around since the
beginning as a super hot student who’s always hanging around the Dueling
Committee Lounge with super tech genius Rouji and his pet Haro (who can be
rather menacing, yikes).
There hasn’t
been much to Secilia’s character other than just being eye candy.
But suddenly she’s all about blackmailing
Martin to paint her nails while trying to get him to fix things with Earth
House and lending a Mobile Suit to Chu Chu during Norea’s attack.
This girl isnt as important as she or the
show want her to be.
In a cast as large
as G Witch’s is sometimes, Secilia could be removed and not much would be
missed (unless you find her hot in which case, sorry about that).
There’s only four episodes left in Mobile Suit Gundam:
The Witch from Mercury but there is a lot of plot that needs to be wrapped
up.
What is Prospera’s endgame with
Quiet Zero?
Will Suletta be able to face
her Mother?
What are the other companies
planning in the wake of everything that’s happened with Shaddiq and
Astacassia?
And, more importantly, can
Suletta and Miorine patch things up when they need each other the most?
All this and more will be waiting for us when
we return Friday for the Series Finale of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from
Mercury, right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.
Side Note: Suletta’s Racoon Girl nickname by the fans got
some much needed love when Suletta was caught going through the fridge for food
and got caught like a Racoon going through the trash, so good.
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