Name: A review in the form of a pros and cons list, followed by a conclusion (made it as non spoilery as possible)
Item: Mobile Suit Gundam
Rating: 80
Author: NotSoSlimShady

Waifra

A review in the form of a pros and cons list, followed by a conclusion (made it as non spoilery as possible) · Waifora

pros:
1) for a show made in the late 70s, a lot of it's fight scenes are pretty decent. Better than most of the shit that indian animators put out, even by today's standards.

2) The background music was more than fine, I had no complaints in that section.

3) The character dev of Amuro was hands down the best part of the anime, his internal struggle with the fact that he was just a boy that was forced to participate in a war that he had no interest in being in, was displayed almost perfectly in the first half of the anime whenever he interacted with the people around him. His reluctance to participate and not your run of the mill shounen characteristics (in the first half) was perfect to the T. And the way the crew banked on him, put additional pressure on him, that entire section of the anime at the very beginning was an entertaining watch in terms of friction between the members of the crew that had no option other than to depend on each other and reach their destination asap.

4) The antagonist: Char aznable and the forces of zeon were also somewhat well written (not as well as the protag’s side... but there is enough meat on that bone when it comes to their character development).There were a few secondary characters on the side of the zeon forces that had their fair share of memorable moments especially within the first 22 eps, after which it kinda plateaud for a while before getting better again.

5) The supporting characters that fought alongside amuro might be the second best thing about the show when it comes to character dev. There were close to 6-8 characters that played a somewhat crucial role in shaping amuro, and their interactions with as well as their own mini arcs where they got the spotlight temporarily, were handled expertly. That alone made the slog worth it.

6) There were some slice of life elements as well as drama mixed in together which I feel made the show better in their own way.

7) Last but not the least... the absolute horror of war was very well portrayed in the first half. Especially the casualties of war i.e the civilians. There were some moments that were just GREAT, I would say that the humanity of the soldiers on both sides were somewhat well portrayed. It wasnt your average bad soldier do bad thing, heck once you take the prequel into consideration along with the OG MSG anime, it kinda shows how neither side of the conflict was completely right or wrong, although it would be remiss of me to not acknowledge that the og anime alone kinda plays down the ambiguity of who is good and bad with their shitty design when it came to the enemy's mecha..... but one has to keep in mind that the show was made for kids in the late 70s, so while it had mature elements, it isnt far off from a kid's show. It has enough amount of drama and political intrigue to keep the average adult hooked too (but eh this is somewhat dependant on the taste of said adult and their tolerance level for the kiddie elements)

Cons:

1) They made gundam along with white base (ship where gundam and amuro reside in) toooooooooooooo OP. Both of the aforementioned entities at first sliced through their opponents like they were made out of butter, then as more eps went by, the opponent's difficulty level increased basically and even though the gundam might not have had an easy time, there was no fucking damage whatsoever. And the first time it sustained some damage, it was cosmetic in nature and it did not hamper the functionality of the gundam . I mean ffs even white base was Op but it still got damaged to the extent that it had to wait for supplies and assistance from the EFF (Earth Federation Forces) before it proceeded to reach it's destination. This basically gave the gundam an air of superiority and the sense of danger and unpredictability was basically thanos snapped out of existence, despite taking a fuck ton of hits, not once was I in a situation where I was actually worried about the gundam and/or amuro (for the first 30 or so eps at least)

2) Yeah.... mecha fights can get tiresome, very rarely does a unique move or 2 come up, for the most part it was ctrl c+ ctrl v....felt like I was mining copper in valheim... was going through the motions. The few time where I was actually somewhat hooked to a mecha fight, there were military tactics and maneuvering involved, but that happens for half of the fights, maybe lil more than half. I got burnt out after the first 14 eps or so,but luckily, the show started approaching one of its peaks as far as story telling is concerned, 6-7 eps later, with those eps serving as a build up.

3) There was no balance when it came to character dev and plot progression, when one would have the spotlight on it, the other would get almost completely ignored or ignored to the extent that it would not even matter to the viewer, only towards the last few eps or so is there some semblance of balance between the two... The first half was very character dev centric while the second half was plot driven.

4) The design of the enemy ships and mobile suits, especially the mobile suits, were ridiculously villainous, in a cartoonish way. I dk if this is due to the era having such a design in general or this was due to meh designers... either way, it was kekworthy.

5) There were some abrupt ends to the arcs of some characters that were relatively interesting. A couple of characters with a lotta potential were kinda shoe horned right at the end. And the tone of the anime itself shifted in the last 8 eps or so... with some whacky elements getting added. While they intrigue me, I cant ignore plot armour when I see it, and a healthy amount at that.. (that is keeping aside the major one in the form of amuro's gundam).

6) There were 5-8 episodes too many... some events were either necessary or dragged on longer than they should have been.
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Conclusion:

While it was an entertaining watch for the most part, it felt a bit longer than it should have been. Is it a good show? yep, is it worth a watch? if you are semi interested in mecha and you are patient as heck, yes. Is it a 'throw everything aside and watch this only rn' kinda recc? I wouldnt say so. That being said, I would still continue walking down this path, just to see the way they build upon the story which ended in 0079 as well as the fate of the different characters in the series. If I had to drop a rating, I'd say around 8/10 seems good enough.