I'm still confused about Full Frontal. a) He clearly isn't Char, but what does he mean by being a vessel? I was under the assumption Char's memories got implanted.
What the hell happened to him? Did Amuro, Char and Lalah steal his soul?
So many people shit talking Hi-Nu in this thread. We have beef. Those colors are awesome and Nu's asymmetry makes it look like an unfinished mess. Also, black, white and yellow is a boring color scheme.
I like the Nu's colour scheme, but I am much more fond of the blue/white striping on the Hi-Nu. Makes it look like a badass space cop. Hi-Nu also probably has my favourite looking Gundam shield.
I like the Nu's colour scheme, but I am much more fond of the blue/white striping on the Hi-Nu. Makes it look like a badass space cop. Hi-Nu also probably has my favourite looking Gundam shield.
All those tracks on Disc 2 (that I saw) are from older OSTs in their original form. Disc 1 has all the new tracks for UC7.
Sternegeang was part of the 5TH MOV GUNDAM track in OST3 but had no vocals (it plays when FA Unicorn takes off in UC6). There was a video of it with vocals in a special bluray or something but it didn't have a proper audio version until OST4, as far as I know.
Not enough brightslap.gifs in the world for this. Strike Freedom is like Hi-Nu's wannabe 3rd cousin with its gaudy gold jewelry.
I like Nu better than Hi-Nu as well, but I do appreciate its bulkier but sleek design. I also like the fact that the RD version allows you to replace the newer backpack booster with the original lineart version that's longer and more intricate. The biggest irk I had about the Hi-Nu initially was the silly gradient lines on the funnels, but the redesigns have gotten rid of that motif thankfully.
So many people shit talking Hi-Nu in this thread. We have beef. Those colors are awesome and Nu's asymmetry makes it look like an unfinished mess. Also, black, white and yellow is a boring color scheme.
I generally liked Unicorn 7 although it lost me a bit after the
2001 mind trip
. That sequence was cool, but it ended up cheating out of a
final battle; Frontal just dies (sort of) and the Sinanju disintegrates. We had Neo Zeong fucking around with Unicorn and Banshee for a little bit, but I was hoping for a real one-on-one or two-on-one duel here.
I generally don't care about where and how the OVA deviates from the novel, but this is one area in particular where I thought the novel did far better.
Also don't know how I feel about how inconclusive the whole ending was.
There are a lot of loose ends hanging in the air and just a general sense of incompleteness, from Banagher running away and then turning back and...nothing. Angelo surviving and retrieving Frontal's cockpit and... nothing.
Maybe/hopefully we get some kind of sequel some day (Unicorn's Flash?) but even still I would have preferred more in the way of resolution here.
I'm still confused about Full Frontal. a) He clearly isn't Char, but what does he mean by being a vessel? I was under the assumption Char's memories got implanted.
What the hell happened to him? Did Amuro, Char and Lalah steal his soul?
His origin ends up being different here than in the novel. I think the implication in the OVA is that
he actually is, in some part, channeling the ghost of the real Char, and is basically assimilated back into Char (along with Amuro and Lalah) at the end.
I generally liked Unicorn 7 although it lost me a bit after the
2001 mind trip
. That sequence was cool, but it ended up cheating out of a
final battle; Frontal just dies (sort of) and the Sinanju disintegrates. We had Neo Zeong fucking around with Unicorn and Banshee for a little bit, but I was hoping for a real one-on-one or two-on-one duel here.
I generally don't care about where and how the OVA deviates from the novel, but this is one area in particular where I thought the novel did far better.
Also don't know how I feel about how inconclusive the whole ending was.
There are a lot of loose ends hanging in the air and just a general sense of incompleteness, from Banagher running away and then turning back and...nothing. Angelo surviving and retrieving Frontal's cockpit and... nothing.
Maybe/hopefully we get some kind of sequel some day (Unicorn's Flash?) but even still I would have preferred more in the way of resolution here.
Banagher running away to evolve into a Newtype ghost but Riddhe pulls him back successfully. Banagher and Unicorn then fly back to Mineva to eat hotdogs for the rest of their lives. I assume Angelo and Frontal's cockpit end up getting retrieved by the Federation (or that's what my fanfic would say).
I've been looking forward to 100 years of solitude too. Something about it just popped up on /m/ so ot probably wont be long before we get solid stuff on it
Currently, no idea. It's not been announced yet and all indications from Bandai have been that it's too complicated to make a PG kit out of it. We'll see. If it's going to happen, it'll happen this holiday is what I would bet.
Unicorn 7 was pretty great. I loved the continued glorification of the grunt suits. Especially
the little battle on the ship's catapult.
I was a little disappointed in the Neo Zeong since it just kind of floated there. Would've liked to see Frontal get in there with an agile suit for a bit before the end. After all the weapons got blown up I thought for a minute there that Banagher was about to chalk up another win to the almighty Build Knuckle, but the Newtype magic got it done instead. I really liked how the Unicorn used the shields as bits once he got that going.
This was the first time I really felt like I'd missed some stuff by not having watched Zeta or ZZ. Mostly in that, I assume, I would've recognized most of the scenes of other Gundams that they showed during the weird time trip thing instead of just a few of them.
Unicorn 7 was great. I wouldn't say it's the best Gundam ever, but it's up there.
There are definitely a few outstanding issues with the narrative's writing and its presentation that the most demanding or cynical critics can highlight and even easily tear apart without a lot of extra effort, but overall...I've always been a romantic myself, in the classic sense, so all the idealism and related themes being thrown around by the characters resonated with my interests. I can more or less forgive
the rather lazy way in which Marida died
because it was helpful in making a point later on.
Riddhe did get some nice lines too, I must admit, but as a character he gets no love from me.
To put it simply, the final episode ties a lot of stuff together, both in terms of the OVA series and the Universal Century as a whole, in a way that wouldn't have been quite possible with Tomino in control, Turn A notwithstanding, but which is absolutely informed by almost everything he and his staff did over the years.
Honestly, I don't see how Sunrise can possibly top this. Not even with The Origin coming up. The novel author may have some ugly politics in real life but he definitely has a lot of skill, and the people doing the adaptation -no doubt helped by access to a huge budget and other production privileges including the addition of an extra long episode- seem to have stayed true to the spirit of the source material, even if they might have compromised in a few places or merely handled some of the details differently (as seen in episode 4, but also to some extent here, from what I've gathered so far).
Of course, I had a blast watching all the battles. Even some of the technological absurdities that might be considered anachronistic or inconsistent still made for great mecha spectacle, so it's not too hard for me to forgive them, or at worst just consider their presence to be a minor rather than major flaw. Numbers are often meaningless, in the grand scheme of things, but a solid 8/10 seems appropriate for the finale in my book.
His origin ends up being different here than in the novel. I think the implication in the OVA is that
he actually is, in some part, channeling the ghost of the real Char, and is basically assimilated back into Char (along with Amuro and Lalah) at the end.
I've heard the theory that what they did here didn't truly contradict the novel, but simply focused on portraying a different aspect of it instead. The metaphorical
or metaphysical, for that matter,
rather than the practical explanation. Which I guess ties back into what I was saying about formal writing issues being less of a concern, from a certain point of view.
Fuck, all this Hi-Nu talk made me look up reviews of the HGUC version which looks really awesome and is relatively cheap too D; I must show restraint or gunpla will consume my bank account.
On another note, I agree with criticisms above about UC7. One thing I really don't like that happens very often in UC is
psychadelic/psychommunication sequences being the sole resolution to conflict. I mean, I understand from a character story perspective it's easy to lean on it and have things settle that way on the battlefield, but it gives you major blue balls and is a sort of a cop out for the actual, physical battles that are taking place.
I can sort of excuse it in older series' where it may have been harder to animate or choreograph fight scenes, but doesn't seem to be an issue now. In that sense, I felt UC7 was anti-climactic. And the whole
Banagher/Riddhe thing at the end.. I don't understand at all really. I don't really understand what they were trying to convey about Riddhe's problems at the end there, or if there was any resolution.
I was pretty sure I recognized the characters from the Side Stories Missing Link trailer but I had to do a double take.
I have Side Stories pre-ordered. It will be interesting going through a lot of the older story arcs and missions in a new engine. I look forward to the OT for the game.
It was messy in a couple areas, but I thought it was an emotionally satisfying conclusion to this series (and the UC era as a whole). I echo the comments above that it owes a lot to Tomino for setting up this world/themes/politics, but they made it their own and executed his ideas better than he had. I know trippy Newtype stuff isn't everbody's cup of tea, but the idea of space allowing us to reach our full potential (and the problems that it might entail) is something that I always found fascinating, and what Unicorn examined more thoroughly than any other UC work.
The fights were fantastic. Each one was creative and different from the last, from the grunts to the Gundam clashes. And the animation... dat animation. You could tell their budget for this one was huge. I only wish there was more fighting, but that might have undercut the narrative...
Speaking of which, narratively, it wasn't perfect. Stuff with
Full Frontal and the ending could have been a little more conclusive
, but the core of the story was sound. I've always been a proponent of the emotional and thematic logic of the narrative sometimes being more important than any plot hole and I thought that's where this episode shined. I truly liked this cast, even Riddhe, who made a lot more sense as a character and
underwent a lot of development in this last hour.
And while you can be cynical about whether ultimately Banagher and friends' idealism is for the best, I'm a sucker for this theme of hope and potential, so it worked for me. I'm sure comparisons could be made that it wasn't any different than Kira and the SEED brigade's over-idealism - and in a sense, those points would be right... however, this series treated it with more nuance and skepticism, illustrating that it's more about the execution than anything.
I also thought it wrapped up some loose ends of the UC well.
I really liked the scene with Full Frontal and Banagher flying through time, particularly the part with Char, Lalah, and Amuro. That brought some closure to a 20 year question mark, but also effectively showed that they had all finally moved on, past their bickering and had "ascended" so to speak. That was the whole point of the Newtype discussion in the first place, to show that people could understand each other, even if it was fraught with danger.
So, in the end, the last episode wasn't perfect. This series wasn't either. It made some obvious compromises in order to fit the novel's story into 7 episodes. It's lucky it was given an extra episode (and extra length at that) to finally get some breathing room in the back half and flesh things out.
But Gundam was never about perfection. It's always been a messy amalgamation of interesting thematic content, flashy battles that undercut those points, and crass commercialism that sometimes completely annihilated them. And, when judged against that, it's pretty remarkable that this project is even half as good as it is. The talent surrounding Unicorn honored Gundam's better qualities and even reinvigorated some of its most tired tropes. For a fan of Gundam for the last thirteen or so years who has always been chasing that "high" of another series that made me feel the same way I felt as a kid watching Wing/G/Char's Counterattack, this felt like a proper farewell.
One thing to keep in mind though, is when you buy Full Armor Unicorn your getting more then what is probably enough plastic to build Wing Gundam F, X Maoh, Strike Full Package and the Star Booster.
So while it hurts to drop it on one kit, you will certainly be getting your money's worth for it.
One thing to keep in mind though, is when you buy Full Armor Unicorn your getting more what is probably enough plastic to build Wing Gundam F, X Maoh, Strike Full Package and the Star Booster.
So while it hurts to drop it on one kit, you will certainly be getting your money's worth for it.
I think you just sold me on it. lol
That's definitely going to be next month's pickup, then.
Gotta finish the one I have now before getting a new one. I don't want a Gunpla backlog. >.>
Banagher/Riddhe thing at the end.. I don't understand at all really. I don't really understand what they were trying to convey about Riddhe's problems at the end there, or if there was any resolution.
Banagher/Riddhe thing at the end.. I don't understand at all really. I don't really understand what they were trying to convey about Riddhe's problems at the end there, or if there was any resolution.
Banagher went full Newtype, became one with the suit, neutralized the force from the General Revil with his powers of "understanding," and was essentially going off to die, a la Amuro/Char at the end of CC.
Riddhe (finally learning to appreciate Banagher) didn't want him to die. He chased after Banagher, threatening to take Mineva away from him (jokingly), as a way of desperately trying to make him jealous.
Banagher listens, ends whatever Newtype process was happening, and decides to come back to reality/Mineva.
Completed the torso for my Exia. Connected the right leg. Connected the right arm. Tried to connect the left arm, it won't fit right. I think there's some minor blockage at the rubber ring joint which is supposed to connect to the torso. Don't really want to mess with it too much since it's late. Arghhhhh. This kit!!!! >_<
Finished all of Unicorn in one-sitting last night. I was purposefully avoiding watching it until it was all out because I know the pain of waiting for OVAs to finish, like Giant Robo. >=o
And man, that was a ride. Very tight, incredible action, great characters. I have a few quibbles but it's largely inconsequential to the bigger picture. Very fitting closure to the UC universe, I think.
Completed the torso for my Exia. Connected the right leg. Connected the right arm. Tried to connect the left arm, it won't fit right. I think there's some minor blockage at the rubber ring joint which is supposed to connect to the torso. Don't really want to mess with it too much since it's late. Arghhhhh. This kit!!!! >_<
