Gundam 00 — Episode 18
This post was delayed because I was at three separate Chinese New Year-related social functions over the 24-hour span of period between 8am Saturday and 8am Sunday. I only reached home this morning. But fret not, for this sudden spontaneous generation of what is common known as a “life” is an extremely rare occurrence that will probably not happen again for quite some time.
Anyway this episode was pretty good except for the fact that my brain was functioning like a half-dead zombie’s as I watched it. Or perhaps that was the reason. Either way, it’s a nice evasion from what had seemed like an inevitable descend into Destiny-ville.
Summary
The Trinity trio begins its campaign of merciless annihilation as it wipes out one military base after another without provocation. The Ptolemaios crew, along with almost everyone else, is confused as to whether these violent interventions are supposed to be part of the original plan.
Tax payers’ money
Apparently the creator(s), Aeolia Schenberg or whoever he turns out to be, of this gigantic secret organization didn’t think it through very well when he/they divided the organization into so many secret cells operating independently of one another, without providing any means for them to confirm each others’ identities.
Why must technical briefings always be done in the dark?
Ian, Celestial Being’s chief technician, discovers that the solar furnaces used by the Thrones are actually knock-offs. They lack some kind of implementation which results in them having limited operating time, unlike Exia and the rest which can operate indefinitely. This is pretty damning evidence that the Trinity siblings are evil and their Gundams are probably based on technology stolen from Celestial Being by a spy within the organization.
“Farewell Howard. We barely knew you. For real.”
With the lost of Howard Mason, a previously insignificant character, Senior Captain Graham has gained a renewed determination to beat the Gundams with his Flag and avenge his fallen comrade. Howard should be glad that he is achieving far greater good in his death.
These meetings always take place in bars
Kinue meets up with the Union soldier who claims to have seen a Gundam up close during the Taklamakan exercise. Apparently he was hidding behind some rocks when Nena exited her cockpit in enemy territory so as to give evil Haro instructions at a volume loud enough for everyone in a 100-metre radius around her to eavesdrop.
It’s good practice to stretch regularly if your job involves sitting in front of a monitor all day
The convenient plot hole aside, we learn from this conversation, and a later one, that the Trinity siblings report to an entity called “Ragna”, which sounds like a pirated copy of Veda. (Without Windows Genuine Advantage™) But it could really just be some grumpy old man with a mustache. There’s not enough information to make the call either way.
Weddings are…
On the way to one of their AEU targets, the trio passes through Spanish airspace and happens to fly over a wedding ceremony attended by the Halevy extended family, which includes Louise. Nena, being a psychotic bitch, is unhappy that some people get to have fun while she has to work her tight ass off (massacring people), so she decides to have some fun (massacring people) and fire on the ceremony. Twice.
…dangerous
This wipes out the whole Halevy lineage, except for Louise. Just think of all that inheritance…
My preciousssss
Okay, so I shouldn’t be mean. Louise is completely traumatized by the incident and she also lost her left hand, leaving her unable to accept the ring which Saji spent weeks saving up for.
Guro
Emo emo emo. I am somewhat reminded of Code Geass, in a good way.
Aim for the cockpit dammit!
Finally, Johann Trinity launches an attack against the Iris Corporation’s weapon factory, which is manned by civilians, and gets pwned by Graham in a one-on-one fight over Iowa airspace. Graham is smart because he steals Johann’s GN beam saber and uses it against the Gundam Throne. But he only manages to cut off an arm.
“Exia, exterminating targets.”
And uh, Setsuna decides to take on the Thrones. I’m guessing he’s going to get pwned, so that Exia can get upgraded into Ultra Hyper Exia Excellion Infinity, maybe?
Comments
All in all, it’s an enjoyable episode with nice pacing. It is heavily plot-based, which is a good thing because G00 is really weak when it comes to character substance.
Anyway, Louise lost part of her arm. Gundam Throne lost one of its arms. Am I the only one who thinks that something may come out of this coincidence? (Gundam Louise!)
Okay, that’s probably going too far. (I hope.) But seriously, I can just imagine Louise being abducted by some top secret joint Union-AEU-HRL black project to manufacture cyborg pilots for whatever super weapon they plan to build to counter the Gundams. Maybe some really, really huge mobile armour that shoots missiles from its fingertips and add some giant lasers for good measure. And name it something that invokes a sense of doom and destruction, like “Break”, “Kill”, “Annihilate”, or even “Destroy”. Yeah.
Also, it seems that the parent organization of Celestial Being is being set up by the story for a split-up into two factions, and the worst part: Wang Liu Mei sounds like she’s tempted to join the dark side! Oh no! :O
Screencaps
“Noooooooooo…”
My, what a huge head you have
Colin Powell’s descendant?
Tieria gets cock-blocked by Veda
“Maybe those mass murderers aren’t so bad after all…”
“Why did I volunteer to pilot the cannon fodder unit?”
The purple orb at the front looks like evil Haro
RIP
WTF? Wait… Wait… WTF!?
Graham lost a few internal organs from the acceleration
This is not the “Vader” you are looking for. *Waves hands*
Isn’t that bulge on the bed a little too big?
EMO
omg no guro pls kthxbye
“That ring was frigging expensive.”
I like to play Mahjong.
February 11th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Or alternatively, charge in blindly and get himself killed anyway. (WTB edit button)
February 11th, 2008 at 10:58 am
i just can’t imagine that custom flag of graham could eventually give even a scratch to the gundams…my opinion,at the end of this series the Union and the other factions would have probably come out with some advance suit to challenge the miesters
February 11th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Saji may have the motivation now but he doesn’t have the personality. If he does fight hes either going to be pissed or hesitant, both lead to disaster in one way or another. Most people can’t think clearly if at all when they are pissed, that isn’t something you want when in combat like that. Equally bad and more likely for him is that he’ll hesitate at the wrong moment, any of the other gundam pilots, or the Thrones, would see that and take advantage of that in an instant. Lastly even if he does have some natural talent, it still takes time and experience to develop that. Tama even in GSD don’t forget that Shin did have previous military training in addition to the SEED. A week also isn’t as implausible as the amount of time it would take to have Saji trained and liscensed to be a pilot. That would take months at best, more likely a couple years. Even Setsuna had a good deal of training with CB, he joined when he was 14, hes 16 at the beginning of the series. And the only people that would let him join are CB, the people he’s least likely to be willing to join. The military in all of the nations in this show have an age limit, at 17 I don’t think Saji will meet it. Also like I said before in his current state he’d probably be considered mentally unfit. It’s possible that he could become a pilot, I just think it’s unlikely. Personally if he does have an important role it will be something other than a mobile suit pilot. But who knows, this is Gundam we are talking about here.
February 11th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
How I just love it when sunrise cuts us off at the climax. Exia ftw! Sure hope he cuts at least one of the three into bits Dx
February 11th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Thanks to the wonders of Google, I can now say for sure that Ragna is a ripoff of Veda.
Vedas = knowledge or a fourfold entity rooted in Hinduism
Ragna = advice/counsel or gods/ruling powers; Old Norse etymology, Ragnarok is the best known usage (fate of the gods/gods’ fate)
February 11th, 2008 at 4:03 pm
is it only me or am i the only person who thinks howard graham is the best character so far? Gundams r way too overpowered, but this guy is unbelievable!!! That scene with the flag blew my mind away!! i hope he destroys all of those cocky gundam bastards.
(somehow this is the only gundam series up to date that i really dislike. especially all of those overpowered gundams and emolicious / sadistic gundam pilots @_@.) i believe in u graham!!!
February 11th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
oops i dont know how ‘howard’ got in there
February 11th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
I’m definitely getting that Graham Acre Custom Flag 1/100 Gunpla when it comes out and it’s going to be the centerpiece of my 00 collection.
Graham Acre you are now officially the coolest character in the series.
February 11th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
God, neena’s action disgusted me. I’m in the hate trinity fanclub.
anyway……
[s]CHAR[/s]GRAHAM FTW. I’m only looking forward to his gundam pwnage
February 11th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
to darkdestiny on the GN Drive: just letting u know, they dont use GN particles to produce the energy, it uses a topological defect to power it, or the decay of baryonic matter or something like that.
February 11th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Saji (real name is saji lol):
Wow cool. You can access my blog from 300 years in the future!
February 11th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Graham sure is smart to be able to take Throne Ein’s GN Beam Saber away. I’m pretty sure he will take it back for Union to do research on it.
February 11th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
The Spy in CB is definitely the observer’s assistant! The green hair bastard is Lagna!
Either Graham or Setsuna, make sure you get Nena’s head!!
Also, it would be interesting if Saji finally did a major role. Piloting a Gundam would be very surprising for a person as soft as him though.
February 11th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
I support the fact that Saji will NOT be involved in the war. It will take a couple of years to train him to be a useful mobile suit pilot. As some of you people said (or implied) his too immature to be a pilot, yet.
And there’s a difference between a Coordinator and a real human. (In this case, Shinn and Saji.)
Again, Blake, in case my information on Gundam 00 as of yet is marred by my not seeing the latest 2 episodes, please forgive me. But up to now 2 things are not certain of: where is the last solar furnace, and are the Gundam Throne units really belong to CB.
And Howard is just like Heine Westenfluss from GSD: just comes and goes.
February 11th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
“DarkMirage
February 11th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Saji (real name is saji lol):
Wow cool. You can access my blog from 300 years in the future!”
Haha, unfortunately, I’m not from the future :(. The name is Sajith, and when I was little in Japan (kyoto) they called me Saji-kun in school. And so, when I started watching Gundam 00 and saw a kid named “saji” pop up on the subtitles I almost fell off my chair. haha
-end lame story-
February 11th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
@drastikhate
More like make sure you get head from Nena.
I highly doubt Saji is going to pilot a mobile suit, all the CB pilots SO far seem to have some sort of experience with war I could be wrong and have completely missed something but whatever. I doubt an engineering student can just pilot a gundam. But id see it happening with a time skip.
But if it time skips i am TOTALLY dropping this show.
February 12th, 2008 at 12:27 am
A time skip of the appropriate length is pretty much imposible now. Before the throines it was viable. CB was maving things at a much slower pace. The Thrones have drastcially increased the pace from that though and now things are just moving to fast for any kind of pluasible time skip.
February 12th, 2008 at 1:10 am
DM, I know you’re busy, but can I request Nena and Haro’s spoken lines in the eavesdropping scene where she first cites Ragna (somewhere in the ballpark of 8:30-8:40 I’d guess)? It’d be much appreciated, and it’s only two lines long, if that makes it any better.
February 12th, 2008 at 2:02 am
i like the way you put it but since the thrones gens or knock offs then exia is going to outlast then and pwned them into the ground…..and that girl has issues kill her whole family because she has to kill other people i think she needs a pimp slap
February 12th, 2008 at 3:13 am
Louise gets abducted? Are you out of your mind?
She is DIS-ABLED for crying out loud.
My reasonable guess is Saji is going to find Setsuna for help.
In fact, Saji might upgrade Exia with GN Arms. Remember, Saji is an ENGINEER student.
(Spoiler weapon)http://img212.imageshack.us/img212/2607/79972048kp9.jpg
Saji’s Dad must have something to do with CB. In fact, his dad might even be MURDERED by CB for finding out its true intention.
Exia, Virtue, Kyrios, Virtue…they are destined to fight the 3 thrones…I heard it is all over Gundam Ace monthly already.