![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkI finished watching Gundam Seed!
I wanted to do a long post about all the things I loved about it (so many!) but now that I actually finished it it's suddenly hard to do. The characters! The plot & background! The pairings, all the pairings that I wanted actually happened in canon I was so surprised & happy.
And then Mu died :(
(I'm spelling the names like I think they look best here, too lazy to look them up.)
First a few things I didn't like as much, so they don't get in the way of the squee later on:
- I'm generally not a big fan of any "chosen one" storyline, but this one was not that bad. It helped that even though Kira had special abilities that enabled him to learn how to fight in the suit quickly, his specialness was never important, only for le Kleuze who's crazy anyway.
- I don't think the Neutron Jammers or their cancellers make sense. If they're hidden on Earth, why can't the Earth Alliance use nukes in space? Oh well.
- I want more mothers. The only character with an even slightly relevant mother figure was Yzak, in the last few episodes. In contrast, Cagalli's and Athrun's and Fray's and Lacus' fathers were extremely important to them.
- Where did the citizens of Orb evacuate to, if every other country had joined the Alliance, especially because Orb had Coordinator citizens? What happened with the desert tribes when the Atlantis Federation increased the pressure on ZAFT and other Earth countries? (Maybe it'll appear in Gundam Seed Destiny.)
- I'm disappointed that we never get a name for the dark-haired Archangel bridge officer.
Stuff that I liked:
The politics of it: War is bad, regardless of who started it, and only leads to more hatred and war. The true evil are the racist fanatics whose goal is genocide, i.e. Azrail, Chairman Zala, and crazy le Kleuze.
I like how it shows that prejudice is ingrained and how it can become stronger or weaker, especially with Fray, but also Miriallia and Dearka, and Lacus, etc.
I like that the "winning" concept is armed neutrality. A contrast to Gundam Wing, where it was total pacifism. But here it's made clear that sometimes it's necessary for people to fight to save something they want to protect. Fighting isn't inherently evil, hatred is.
I also like that it's obvious that this is a future where sexism still exists - Azrail and even well-meaning guys like la Flaga call female soldiers "girls" and sometimes take them less seriously, which is not presented as something that just is - but we still have awesome women in charge of spaceships and on the PLANT council and in some other places.
Last but not least, the Gundams are pretty cool!
And the characters! So many of them, and all so great.
I like Kira, I like that he is shown to have PTSD, that he is hesitant at first but acts once he's decided, that he allows himself to cry and be comforted, and that he values Torii so much.
I like Athrun a lot, it takes a lot of courage to reject your father's (and homeworld's) beliefs and find your own (that scene reminded me of Zuko.) He's also very sweet, building robot companions for the people he likes - I wonder what he'll build Cagalli?
Cagalli is great, impulsive and brave but she learns. They never did much with her being Kira's sister so it felt a bit like a Luke&Leia resolve-the-love-triangle (before it happens) thing, but I don't mind because I want them all close as family. Her scenes with Athrun especially were great, first with the mutual threats and attacks and later comfort.
I like Lacus, she seemed sweet at first and she's compassionate and I was very happy when she was revealed to be part of the resistance. Women who can be strong in other ways without fighting, nice :)
Murrue Ramius is just all around fantastic, and so are her relationships with Natarie Badgiruel and Mu la Flaga. With Natalie I enjoyed their mutual respect despite differences of opinion, with Mu I like how they respect each other and both try to take care of the other, and I was very happy when their relationship actually became canon. It stayed in the background, but then it's revealed she already lost someone once so to experience that twice :(
That's not the only reason why I was sorry Mu died: he's a great character, a fighter but also trying to take care of the kids and not always sure how. He and Ramius were similar in that regard and they fit really well together.
Not in the beginning, but eventually I ended up liking Fray, Dearka & Yzak. Fray I started to like in the moment where she calls out Kira on being self-centered because other people lost someone too and feel helpless too. She's prejudiced, but that's realistic, she's manipulative, but that's how she feels like she can do something. Her "I'm not with Blue Cosmos! ... but it's not like what they're saying is wrong" sounded all too familiar, unfortunately.
Miri has similar prejudices, but she's more open to working through them, even though Tolle dies. Even Dearka, eventually. And Yzak, in the end - how did I end up liking Yzak, anyway? Those moments in-between, with Dearka and Yzak and Yzak and Athrun and then Dearka and Yzak again, were great.
And Sai, and Nicol... Patrick Zala was okay, but I think Azrail was a bit one-dimensional. Otoh, he's a racist asshole, not much more to add. His strange pilots were also very unsympathetic. Le Klueze, hmm... obviously the crazy wildcard, we can guess that he did a lot to support both Blue Cosmos and Zala, I wish that would have been made more explicit in the end. Crazy people are always unpredictable. The clone storyline was a bit random to explain his craziness, but okay.
Atm it doesn't look like I'll be inspired to write fic for it, it's nice and self-contained. Maybe I'll check out Gundam Seed Destiny later: I'm a bit hesitant after how disappointed I was with Endless Waltz, but it seems to have good ratings.
In the meantime I somehow started watching Lost Girl. I enjoyed the first three episodes very much and am looking forward to more. :)
After next week, because I'm doing a sightseeing tour to Linz and Innsbruck with a friend and I'm slowly starting to do some university stuff again. I took another look at a chapter I thought was almost finished and I'll need to rewrite it extensively, and I should have finished it a month ago... Oh well.
I wanted to do a long post about all the things I loved about it (so many!) but now that I actually finished it it's suddenly hard to do. The characters! The plot & background! The pairings, all the pairings that I wanted actually happened in canon I was so surprised & happy.
And then Mu died :(
(I'm spelling the names like I think they look best here, too lazy to look them up.)
First a few things I didn't like as much, so they don't get in the way of the squee later on:
- I'm generally not a big fan of any "chosen one" storyline, but this one was not that bad. It helped that even though Kira had special abilities that enabled him to learn how to fight in the suit quickly, his specialness was never important, only for le Kleuze who's crazy anyway.
- I don't think the Neutron Jammers or their cancellers make sense. If they're hidden on Earth, why can't the Earth Alliance use nukes in space? Oh well.
- I want more mothers. The only character with an even slightly relevant mother figure was Yzak, in the last few episodes. In contrast, Cagalli's and Athrun's and Fray's and Lacus' fathers were extremely important to them.
- Where did the citizens of Orb evacuate to, if every other country had joined the Alliance, especially because Orb had Coordinator citizens? What happened with the desert tribes when the Atlantis Federation increased the pressure on ZAFT and other Earth countries? (Maybe it'll appear in Gundam Seed Destiny.)
- I'm disappointed that we never get a name for the dark-haired Archangel bridge officer.
Stuff that I liked:
The politics of it: War is bad, regardless of who started it, and only leads to more hatred and war. The true evil are the racist fanatics whose goal is genocide, i.e. Azrail, Chairman Zala, and crazy le Kleuze.
I like how it shows that prejudice is ingrained and how it can become stronger or weaker, especially with Fray, but also Miriallia and Dearka, and Lacus, etc.
I like that the "winning" concept is armed neutrality. A contrast to Gundam Wing, where it was total pacifism. But here it's made clear that sometimes it's necessary for people to fight to save something they want to protect. Fighting isn't inherently evil, hatred is.
I also like that it's obvious that this is a future where sexism still exists - Azrail and even well-meaning guys like la Flaga call female soldiers "girls" and sometimes take them less seriously, which is not presented as something that just is - but we still have awesome women in charge of spaceships and on the PLANT council and in some other places.
Last but not least, the Gundams are pretty cool!
And the characters! So many of them, and all so great.
I like Kira, I like that he is shown to have PTSD, that he is hesitant at first but acts once he's decided, that he allows himself to cry and be comforted, and that he values Torii so much.
I like Athrun a lot, it takes a lot of courage to reject your father's (and homeworld's) beliefs and find your own (that scene reminded me of Zuko.) He's also very sweet, building robot companions for the people he likes - I wonder what he'll build Cagalli?
Cagalli is great, impulsive and brave but she learns. They never did much with her being Kira's sister so it felt a bit like a Luke&Leia resolve-the-love-triangle (before it happens) thing, but I don't mind because I want them all close as family. Her scenes with Athrun especially were great, first with the mutual threats and attacks and later comfort.
I like Lacus, she seemed sweet at first and she's compassionate and I was very happy when she was revealed to be part of the resistance. Women who can be strong in other ways without fighting, nice :)
Murrue Ramius is just all around fantastic, and so are her relationships with Natarie Badgiruel and Mu la Flaga. With Natalie I enjoyed their mutual respect despite differences of opinion, with Mu I like how they respect each other and both try to take care of the other, and I was very happy when their relationship actually became canon. It stayed in the background, but then it's revealed she already lost someone once so to experience that twice :(
That's not the only reason why I was sorry Mu died: he's a great character, a fighter but also trying to take care of the kids and not always sure how. He and Ramius were similar in that regard and they fit really well together.
Not in the beginning, but eventually I ended up liking Fray, Dearka & Yzak. Fray I started to like in the moment where she calls out Kira on being self-centered because other people lost someone too and feel helpless too. She's prejudiced, but that's realistic, she's manipulative, but that's how she feels like she can do something. Her "I'm not with Blue Cosmos! ... but it's not like what they're saying is wrong" sounded all too familiar, unfortunately.
Miri has similar prejudices, but she's more open to working through them, even though Tolle dies. Even Dearka, eventually. And Yzak, in the end - how did I end up liking Yzak, anyway? Those moments in-between, with Dearka and Yzak and Yzak and Athrun and then Dearka and Yzak again, were great.
And Sai, and Nicol... Patrick Zala was okay, but I think Azrail was a bit one-dimensional. Otoh, he's a racist asshole, not much more to add. His strange pilots were also very unsympathetic. Le Klueze, hmm... obviously the crazy wildcard, we can guess that he did a lot to support both Blue Cosmos and Zala, I wish that would have been made more explicit in the end. Crazy people are always unpredictable. The clone storyline was a bit random to explain his craziness, but okay.
Atm it doesn't look like I'll be inspired to write fic for it, it's nice and self-contained. Maybe I'll check out Gundam Seed Destiny later: I'm a bit hesitant after how disappointed I was with Endless Waltz, but it seems to have good ratings.
In the meantime I somehow started watching Lost Girl. I enjoyed the first three episodes very much and am looking forward to more. :)
After next week, because I'm doing a sightseeing tour to Linz and Innsbruck with a friend and I'm slowly starting to do some university stuff again. I took another look at a chapter I thought was almost finished and I'll need to rewrite it extensively, and I should have finished it a month ago... Oh well.
