Gundam 00 — Episode 25
This is the last episode of the first season, something which I did not realize until halfway through the episode. The ending is rushed as expected and I think that it’s worse than Sunrise’s usual standard. Still, maybe season two will be better? At the very least it will have some funkier spacesuit designs.
Summary
Everyone dies, or at least appears to die.
Gone in 60 seconds
“Pikapi…”
He sees dead people
Alejandro is betrayed by Libonze, the real super villain. Graham and Setsuna fight to the “death”. A destroyed Exia floats in space with Earth as its backdrop while Marina cries over a letter Setsuna sent her before he sortied.
Gay harem
Three years later, the United Nations is officially renamed the Earth Federation (I kid you not). And one year after that, the Earth Federation Peacekeeping Force is formed and the various national armed forces are slowly dismantled and integrated into a joint command. Their mobile suits look suspiciously like Knightmare Frames…
Uh… All hail Britannia?
Saji is now working in space and a few other familiar characters make short appearances in the last few scenes of the episode.
The namesake of the entire series, 00 Gundam, makes a short five-second cameo right at the very end.
Critique
There are a lot of things wrong with how the ending played out, but I shall just focus on the most jarring bit: Graham.
Immediately after Setsuna defeats Alejandro’s bling machine with Exia, Graham comes flying in with his GN Flag looking for a fight. After some clichéd and completely nonsensical smack talking, the fight ends in a draw as both Exia and the Flag are destroyed.
“I am Sunrise’s bitch.”
I don’t personally like Graham much, but this rushed battle really cheapens his entire existence. Having waited for so many episodes and bore the pain of losing two of his close friends, all Graham gets is a short quickie which the scriptwriters forcefully squeezed into the last episode.
We all know that the plot calls for Exia to be destroyed so that Setsuna can embark on a journey of recovery and eventually obtain a much cooler Gundam. But it doesn’t have to be Graham. Setsuna could’ve drawn with Alejandro instead.
And what exactly is the point of getting Graham to make a short appearance in the last episode just to “die” in a spectacular explosion of GN particles?
Darth Veda
Sunrise needed a masked man. Oh for the love of…
Screencaps
Ha/Allelujah’s secret overpower move: using both eyes simultaneously
Mecha guro
“I don’t know what I should do in such situations…”
“Why don’t you try smiling?”
Plamo coming soon
Plamo coming soon
Oh Marina, you silly paedophile
Tieria MkII?
The first Gundam
This was a triumph / I’m making a note here…
I’m guessing the Earth Federation will be opposed by a group of smaller nations who do not wish to give up their sovereignty? They can even call themselves Zeon if they want…
On another note, I am so tempted to upgrade to the newly-released Wordpress 2.5, but I fear for the many plugins that my template relies on…
March 30th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
I’m surprised no one has mentioned anything about the apparent president of the ESF being black. I think it’s a plug and/or endorsement for Obama from Sunrise.
All in all, they needed one more episode to finish this season. They had too much to put it all into one episode.
And Graham’s mask is more like Hannibal Lector’s.
March 30th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
What is with Tieria’s Lockon-like hairstyle?
Seriously, the EF’s MSes look ALOT like the Knightmare Frames. They ran out of mecha design ideas?
March 30th, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Is Nena with Sumeragi and Ian now or was she just spying on them? @_@
and…
What’s with Louise and Tierra? =))
In one of the last few scenes, I think I saw Patrick behind Manequin during the assembly… @_@
March 30th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
I guess no one bothered to read my earlier posts.
Code Geass was a rip off to begin with. Don’t say “those look like Knightmares” because Knightmares are rip offs of Armored Shrikes from Blue Gender. And from the name “Shrike” you can tell that even THAT was a rip off of an older Gundam show, V I believe.
What it boils down to is that Code Geass is a rip off of Gundam. Both Code Geass and Gundam 00 may be made by Sunrise but Gundam 00 has the originality, not Code Geass. Hell after looking at some of Geass’s designs I can tell ZEON will sue after seeing the Guren Nishiki. Char would be pissed if he saw that.
Like I said before, the ESF (Earth SPHERE Federation) suits are a cross between Wing’s Leos and the Evas from NGE.
Am I the only one who was paying attention this episode? They even put up the name “Earth Sphere Federation” on the screen. Please do acknowledge the “Sphere” because this series is based off of Wing, not UC. Remember the United Earth Sphere Alliance from Wing?
Geez.
March 30th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
There are so many unanswered questions to S1 such as the Corner family that it seems the writers are more focused on awesome violence rather than plot cohesiveness. My predictions for S2 is that Ali lost his legs due to Lockon’s shot. Also it will start with completely new and irrelevant characters and gradually reveal the old one’s status.
March 31st, 2008 at 12:10 am
simple, all you have to do is remove the lances and they won’t look like that anymore
March 31st, 2008 at 12:24 am
Aw… i quite liked that ending. Lots of big bangs and meaningless deaths. Sunrise seem to go for that. And i saw the Graham getting a mask thing coming a long time ago… i just so happen to quite like masks, and Graham too. I’m also glad they finally admitted the whole ‘love’ thing he’s got going on. At the very least, this show gets 10/10 for homoerotic undertones.
I really hope they bring back the oldskool, back to basics gundams cos they are so amazing. Lets be serious, most of the appeal of Gundam really does lie in the uber stylish mechs.
If Ali is alive that is such an insult. Its bad enough Lockon dies, but if he dies for nothing then that just takes the piss.
March 31st, 2008 at 12:39 am
I was satisfied with the last episode. It may not be perfect, but it was worth the wait for me. By the way, I like Tiera’s hair! LOL! But oh my, another masked character? Tsk-tsk-tsk…
March 31st, 2008 at 12:45 am
I’m glad they spared Sergei and Soma Peries. We still knew and saw very little about Soma.
March 31st, 2008 at 12:47 am
aww marina…. Okay I think from the masked doo dclue and the ribbons destroy earth army, this series unfortunately is going to end up like the other gundam. Paus NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
March 31st, 2008 at 1:07 am
It would be better if they don’t resurrect characters (except those shown to be alive after all). But fans would like to see their favorite characters (like Lockon or Setsuna) on the 2nd season. So the better deal, i guess, would be to show flashback dialogues with these characters (like the scene when Setsuna recalls Lockon talking about Exia’s sword).
March 31st, 2008 at 1:36 am
i wasn’t really happy with the abrupt ending…too fast…i was going =_=;; when daybreak started playing. And Ha/Allelujah really made me laugh. To think Sunrise gave such a “thing” at the end. And i suddenly felt that i was watching a prequel to the real “gundam 00″ that they are going to show in season 2. The change of the world..
March 31st, 2008 at 1:43 am
the black president makes sense as they love OBAMA in japan, the guy is named after a town.
March 31st, 2008 at 1:52 am
Is not Tieria, diff. VA (Regene Legetta: Romi Paku)
Tieria v.2?
Copypaste:
“・最後にルイスと一緒に出てきたティエリア似の人物はティエリアではない。
字幕だと→ (リジェネ)ふっ。
スタッフロールには「リジェネ・レジェッタ」。
声優は「鋼の錬金術師」のエド役・朴さん。
The person with Louise at the end that looks like Tieria isn’t Tieria at all.
From the subtitle -> (Regene) Hmph.
The staff roll listed her as “Regene Legetta”
Seiyuu is Pak who did the role of Ed in FMA.”
March 31st, 2008 at 2:11 am
That Allelujah thing was…so incredibly obvious. Like on of these days, he gets up and decides to be all lke, “Hey, maybe I’ll pretend to be substantially less emo today~!”
March 31st, 2008 at 5:17 am
Lol, Knightmare Frames.
March 31st, 2008 at 5:25 am
now i get it, gundam 00 is like merging the original gundam and gundam wing!? o_O i may be wrong though…but it does look like it…anyway, this series would have been great if the writers focused on good storytelling and character development instead of inserting characters then killing them off every other episode…anyway, it was a good first season (ok..barely good)…i just hope that it gets better in the next run of the series… ^_^
i’ll expect the same spunky review like this one D.I. thanks alot!
March 31st, 2008 at 5:39 am
i wish they didn’t play the opening sequence, it would have given us another minute and 30 sec. more action!
March 31st, 2008 at 7:31 am
Why do people say homoerotic instead of gay anyway?
March 31st, 2008 at 7:36 am
that gundam was the plutone!! I think??
and that had to be Tieria, for some reason he landed on earth, and is going back to space, and he happened to board the same elevator/or some-sort as Louise.
The ending was rushed!!
and sloppy, and very unpleasant.
And it’s quite clear that Marina is gonna become a new Relena,
and that the Earth Federation is gonna have some sort of OZ, and is gonna be backed by the same aristocrats from gundam wing, they’re gonna start dressing like them too, and Graham is the new Zechs, finally a masked man!! I was waiting for him to appear!!