T5W#550-Top 5 WTF Moments in Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans

Save for a fun Monty Python influenced Top 5 on the matter (see here: https://gundamanimeblog.blogspot.com/2025/05/t5w508-top-5-gundam-iron-blooded.html) I never thought to do some kind of celebratory Top 5 for the 10^th Anniversary of Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans last year.  Granted 2025 was mostly spent celebrating the 30^th Birthday of Gundam Wing but that also feels a little unfair to the boys of Tekkadan and their bad ass Mobile Suits.  To say IBO is one of the hardest hitting entries in the Gundam franchise is kind of an understatement.  It’s hits are as emotionally charged as the giant hammers that get whammied into Mobile Suits on an episodic basis.  There are also some truly F’ed up moments that are both shocking and awe inducing.  Since we’ll be covering the 10^th Anniversary Double Feature Special This Friday, on todays Top 5 Wednesday I’ll be counting down my picks for the Top 5 WTF Moments in Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans.

 
#5-Ein Goes Full “Living Dead Unit”

For the entire first season of the series, Ein Dalton is dead set on taking down Tekkadan for the way Mikazuki murdered his commanding officer (more on that later).  He never passes up an opportunity to go after them and his stubborn determination leads to him being close to deaths door near seasons end.  However, Ein accepts an offer from McGillis that proves just how far his thirst for vengeance will go.  As a final boss for Mikazuki in the Season Finale, we see that Ein has basically done what we see with Zeon’s “Living Dead Unit” from Gundam Thunderbolt: having all of his limbs amputated and being placed into the heart of a powers a power prototype Mobile Suit.  Let’s just say it doesn’t go as well for him as some of Thunderbolt’s cast.
 

#4-Mika the Executioner

The one thing you should always do around Mikazuki is consider your words and choices.  As we see in the very first moments of the series and later with Ein’s doomed CO, if Mika’s given the order to kill, he will without hesitation, regret or much emotion about it.  This is solidified in the aftermath of Orga and his comrades breaking free of the CGS.  Holding their former masters hostage, Orga has Mika execute one of them so swiftly and suddenly it’s pretty shocking.  It’s a moment that sets in stone just what kind of a show Iron Blooded Orphans is.  It’s bloody, it’s unrelenting and if you ever get in Tekkadan’s way, beware Orga doesn’t give the kill order to Mika, cause there’s no calling it off afterwards.

 
#3-Lafter’s Death

You’d think in a show full of beefy muscle bound pilots that there wouldn’t be a lot of room for romance.  Yet IBO has plenty of it, both subtle and in your face from Yamagi’s crush on Shino to Atra and Kudelia’s shared feelings for Mikazuki.  But the fan favorite of the bunch is big man Akihiro and Turbines beauty Lafter, who clash early on but grow increasingly closer, especially in Season 2.  Naturally, there’s a 50/50 shot these two will make it work but sadly this is Iron Blooded Orphans and those odds are even less.  Such is the case when poor Lafter, finding the perfect eyebrow bear gift for Akihiro finds herself executed by a member of a rival gang faction to provoke a war with Tekkadan.  It’s such an unfair fate but you know that if IBO is good at one thing: it’s reminding us that payback via Tekkadan is a serious bitch.  Case in point…

 
#2-Chivalry? You’re Kidding Right?

No character in IBO is more pure and loved than Biscuit.  Dude was the heart of Tekkadan and even when he and Orga had their disagreements, they were family first and foremost and never lost sight of that.  Biscuit’s death is one of the hardest in the series and you want those who did the deed to pay.  So when Cartra Issue, aka Biscuit’s killer, shows up demanding to face Tekkadan’s best in a duel, she gives them time for both sides to prepare…only for a Gundam sized Hammer to slam into one of her subordinates followed by Mikazuki charging forth with Barbatos.  Ok. Ok, Cartra couldn’t have known how badly she messed up but WOW the fact that she’s so bewildered and freaked out by the lack of honor of Mikazuki’s actions is hilarious.  Sorry Cartra, you shouldn’t have crushed the best Tekkadan’s ever had. 
 

#1-No Plan B for McG

For the bulk of two seasons, McGillis Fareed played everyone around him like pawns on a chessboard to get to his ultimate goal of taking over Gjallarhorn.  He had the (mistaken) trust of Orga and Tekkadan and a full proof plan to ensure his ascension: obtaining an ancient Gundam Mobile Suit called the Bael.  With it, McGillis felt assured Gjallarhorn would have to follow him by divine right or something like that.  So when the Seven Stars tell McGillis they wont fight him but they have no intention of helping him either, you can see the last piece of the Jenga tower being pulled away so the tower can tumble.  This plan decades in the making undone by a simple “No” is so mind boggling because McGillis has no backup plan.  This guy, so influenced by fantasies and delusions of grandeur, was the guy who was going to lead the world to a new golden age?  It really shows just how ineffective and dumb McGillis is overall as a character (much less a Char Clone, more Char Poser).  And poor Orga.  He’d been making bad calls for a while now in Season Two.  But to see McGillis’ plan suddenly undone so quickly, he had to know, in that moment, he had truly F’ed things up for all of Tekkadan and their futures.