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GimmickMan posted:Eh, i think there's degrees of this we can apply to various Gundam series. Tomino says "war is hell" but it's because he grew up in postwar Japan and has things he wants to express through his cartoons, which have toyetic poo poo in them because he has bills to pay. The way Thunderbolt puts its characters through emotional torture front and center is exploitatively gross and the cynical side of me thinks it's done that way just to appeal to a certain grit-loving subset of its audience. Nah the suffering in thunderbolt is very plainly built around the story and message they wanted to tell. They wanted to tell a very dark story but there's no scenes that are just pointlessly cruel to the characters - every moment of suffering is making a very specific thematic point about the characters and reality they live in and true to form very rarely is thunderbolt remotely subtle about what it wants you to take away from it. Like if a story completely soaked through with human suffering isn't your thing I get it but calling it "exploitive" or of lesser artistic merit because it makes you feel gross isn't being fair to what it's actually doing. The story isn't there to make you feel gross, you feel gross because the story needs you to. ninjewtsu fucked around with this message at 00:04 on Jul 10, 2021 |
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Jul 10, 2021 00:01
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what the gently caress
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Jul 10, 2021 00:08
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My brain exploded and I've become a Newtype space ghost.
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Jul 10, 2021 01:31
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This checks out completely.
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Jul 10, 2021 03:26
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ninjewtsu posted:Nah the suffering in thunderbolt is very plainly built around the story and message they wanted to tell. They wanted to tell a very dark story but there's no scenes that are just pointlessly cruel to the characters - every moment of suffering is making a very specific thematic point about the characters and reality they live in and true to form very rarely is thunderbolt remotely subtle about what it wants you to take away from it. I recently finished the Thunderbolt anime and I have to agree with GimmickMan about how needlessly cruel and cynical the narrative feels. The emphasis on up-armored variant designs and prototypes disconnects it from whatever grounding the setting might give the character drama. This animated opening to a game packs more heart and soul in than Thunderbolt managed across eight OVA episodes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUg3r9-sMYg And I've never even seen that clip with subtitles! Can't speak for the rest of the game and if it makes good on the setup.
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Jul 10, 2021 03:46
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whose the dummy watching the ona instead of the film
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Jul 10, 2021 04:00
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I actually like the ending of the season 1 ONA better than the theatrical ending. Leaving it on a bleak note and pushing the season 2 preview of A Baoa Qu to the S2 premiere works better, I think.
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Jul 10, 2021 04:15
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Maarak posted:I recently finished the Thunderbolt anime and I have to agree with GimmickMan about how needlessly cruel and cynical the narrative feels. The emphasis on up-armored variant designs and prototypes disconnects it from whatever grounding the setting might give the character drama. Thunderbolt is an example of there being a bunch of up-armored variants of existing units actually making total sense in the narrative instead of solely being "wow, cool robot!". The Federation units are equipped with a bunch of extra shields and poo poo because they know they're deploying to fight at high speed in a shoal zone full of dangerous debris and random electrical discharges; all that extra crap on them isn't to make them stronger or better, it's simply there to let them survive in that environment.
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Jul 10, 2021 04:50
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Kanos posted:Thunderbolt is an example of there being a bunch of up-armored variants of existing units actually making total sense in the narrative instead of solely being "wow, cool robot!". The Federation units are equipped with a bunch of extra shields and poo poo because they know they're deploying to fight at high speed in a shoal zone full of dangerous debris and random electrical discharges; all that extra crap on them isn't to make them stronger or better, it's simply there to let them survive in that environment. What about the special forces squad during the A Baoa Qu assault? The troop carrier? At some point, the sheer madness of the production capabilities demonstrated in the show starts to throw it into alternate universe territory. Or a scene from Build Fighters. From what I recall of the talk about the manga, that only gets crazier with time. This sort of thing drove me nuts for instance: chiasaur11 posted:It's not about cruel. It's about bugfuck stupid, and most sources on the One Year War said the Federation had, by this point, gotten its poo poo in order on the pilot front to the point where they were running solid veterans and Zeon was tossing high schoolers a rifle and a hearty "good luck!" Maarak fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Jul 10, 2021 |
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Jul 10, 2021 05:08
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Isn't Thunderbolt explicitly not the standard UC timeline, or is it just speculation when people say that?
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Jul 10, 2021 05:23
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Maarak posted:I recently finished the Thunderbolt anime and I have to agree with GimmickMan about how needlessly cruel and cynical the narrative feels. The emphasis on up-armored variant designs and prototypes disconnects it from whatever grounding the setting might give the character drama. One thing that stands out is how the anime version of the Thunderbolt Sector arc edited out pretty much everything from the manga that toned down the edge. The explanation for child soldiers, the neutral radio station, the medals and handshakes for the wounded of the Living Dead squad to tell them Zeon honored their sacrifice (to get them to make it again and again), and even the scene of the snipers talking poo poo about the dead man early on like regular people instead of going maximum melodrama. The anime version just kept ramping up the grittiness until it became a joke.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:27
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Maarak posted:What about the special forces squad during the A Baoa Qu assault? The troop carrier? At some point, the sheer madness of the production capabilities demonstrated in the show starts to throw it into alternate universe territory. Or a scene from Build Fighters. From what I recall of the talk about the manga, that only gets crazier with time. It's a World War II analogy. The Allies were producing mind-boggling amounts of war materials in the late war, particularly the United States as the giant in the playground. Shermans and T-34s were used for decades past their expiration date because holy poo poo we have so many of these loving things. Much like in WWII, the Federation has more GMs and Balls than it knows what to do with, and the warm bodies to fill them. Meanwhile, Zeon is experiencing manpower and material shortages to the point they're putting the Hitler Youth in up-armored trash cans. Also, since Chiasaur was quoted again, they were GM Cannons, not Guncannons. Big difference.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:30
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WrightOfWay posted:Isn't Thunderbolt explicitly not the standard UC timeline, or is it just speculation when people say that? Gundam plays much more fast and loose with canon anyway but IIRC TB was free to diverge from canon so it wasn't restricted from telling whatever story it did. This implies that other things are loosely canon while TB explicitly isn't. It's supposed to explain all the differences and poo poo like the Acguys not being real Acguys or where the gently caress they got a third Dolos from, nevermind one that can survive reentry and sinking/submerging, etc.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:37
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At the same time very little that Thunderbolt has done is really irreconcilable with the regular continuity in a major way
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Jul 10, 2021 05:42
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Warmachine posted:It's a World War II analogy. The Allies were producing mind-boggling amounts of war materials in the late war, particularly the United States as the giant in the playground. Shermans and T-34s were used for decades past their expiration date because holy poo poo we have so many of these loving things. Much like in WWII, the Federation has more GMs and Balls than it knows what to do with, and the warm bodies to fill them. Meanwhile, Zeon is experiencing manpower and material shortages to the point they're putting the Hitler Youth in up-armored trash cans. That analogy holds for the GMs, Balls, etc... that show up in the big battles in the 1979 show, less so Thunderbolt. Re: the Guncannons, it's more the custom bit that throws me off. Perhaps the manga gets to justify it more, but I cannot wrap my head around the thunderbolt sector being that drat important to either side to keep throwing bodies and material that seems wildly out of place with the rest of the One Year War as previously depicted. It's like 0083 all over again. chiasaur11 posted:One thing that stands out is how the anime version of the Thunderbolt Sector arc edited out pretty much everything from the manga that toned down the edge. The explanation for child soldiers, the neutral radio station, the medals and handshakes for the wounded of the Living Dead squad to tell them Zeon honored their sacrifice (to get them to make it again and again), and even the scene of the snipers talking poo poo about the dead man early on like regular people instead of going maximum melodrama. More stuff about the neutral radio station sounds great. Maybe the best scene in the show was Io and Bianca playing their favorite jazz tune on their respective instruments; anything to flesh out the characters a bit more.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:48
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drrockso20 posted:At the same time very little that Thunderbolt has done is really irreconcilable with the regular continuity in a major way Well yeah but that's more because they can just spin off more model kits than anything.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:52
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Still waiting for my Thunderbolt Rick Dom gunpla.
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Jul 10, 2021 05:54
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Gaius Marius posted:Didn't do much in Unicorn, but he was a real bit player in that. Gaius Marius posted:Unicorn: That dude was worthless  e: and since i'm Unicorn Posting, one annonying thing that jumped out at me is that after all that wild goose chase chasing down Laplace's Box, it turns out it was just in the loving basement of the vista mansion the entire time? the same place everyone was in episode 1? you just took four lefts and ended up back where you started that is ALSO the most obvious place! TenementFunster fucked around with this message at 09:08 on Jul 10, 2021 |
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Jul 10, 2021 07:56
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WHAT?!? 
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Jul 10, 2021 10:34
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Thunderbolt fuckin rules and slavishly adhering to canon is a mistake that causes UC shows to shoot themselves in the foot because for some fuckin reason they feel beholden to F91 and Victory of all things
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Jul 10, 2021 11:10
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RevolverDivider posted:Thunderbolt fuckin rules and slavishly adhering to canon is a mistake that causes UC shows to shoot themselves in the foot because for some fuckin reason they feel beholden to F91 and Victory of all things How is F91 or Victory existing holding them back? They still make UC stuff because nostalgia sells and people are nostalgic for the 0079 - CCA period. Anyway where is my story about Shinta and Qum being raised by Kamille and Fa and then joining different sides during the war with Cosmo Babylon? Ethiser fucked around with this message at 14:03 on Jul 10, 2021 |
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Jul 10, 2021 13:58
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it's because those two are bad/icky
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Jul 10, 2021 13:59
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Isn't this an old thing or just the first time he's actually commented on it? Cause I've definitely heard the "Minovsky particles are named for Tomino" thing for like over a decade now.
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Jul 10, 2021 15:09
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https://twitter.com/mecha_tho/status/1399734383624560647?s=21
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Jul 10, 2021 15:25
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RevolverDivider posted:Thunderbolt fuckin rules and slavishly adhering to canon is a mistake that causes UC shows to shoot themselves in the foot because for some fuckin reason they feel beholden to F91 and Victory of all things The only shows that might be beholden to canon because of F91 and Victory is basically the Unicorn trilogy i.e. Unicorn itself, NT and the upcoming Unicorn 2. All of which were created with the specific intention to fill in the gap between Char's Counterattack and F91 and so were never not going to be beholden to it regardless of canon. They wouldn't have been created, as least as anything like what they are, without a desire to lead towards F91. As is, The Origin and Thunderbolt were both created by mangaka who specifically went out of their way to establish that their stories were not taking place in the normal course of UC as it had been established up to that point. Then, when they were being adapted at the very least one of the producers for Thunderbolt noted that they created it to be a work that was "parallel" to UC and not part of UC's "future history". Which is basically how the Japanese are terming non-canon and canon now, at least for Gundam. There's also a .pdf linked on the official Hathaway's Flash anime site that lays out the timeline of events leading up to Hathaway's Flash, and both The Origin and Thunderbolt are in a separate box that talks about "parallel" works. Sunrise is perfectly fine with creating works that don't fit in UC's canon, and they have been with at least 20 years; since that describes the Zeta trilogy too. You could also view 08th MS Team, 0080 and 0083 as being devoted to 0079 and Zeta's canon as opposed to F91 and Victory, but (a) again, they were created to fit into that spot, not hampered by it once the story was underway and (b) all of them altered the canon a bit to suit their view of events, rather than slavishly sticking to the canon of the original entries. The existence of GM's before November of 0079, the entire Apsalus line etc. changes things during the One Year War from what 0079 established, as well as the existence of the Ghineas family implying a noble lineage in Side 3 that didn't exist prior to that, since the Zabis were the ruling autocrats and not part of any lineage. 0083 heavily alters the founding of the Titans as well as loving with AE's early history, and even 0080 messed with the established lore of Side 6. Side 6 was nearly destroyed in the One Year War according to the narrator in 0079, with only a few colonies remaining after some fighting and they maintained a neutral stance after that point, including insisting any visitors basically deactivate weapons to ensure there would be no fighting. Which makes sense as a reaction if the entire Side was nearly destroyed, while multiple others were destroyed and Side 6 wanted to do something, no matter how small to protect themselves. A demand which the White Base took pains to avoid breaking even as Zeon flouted it a bit, though Char was mostly okay with observing that stipulation. There had been no fighting or damage to Side 6 according to 0080 though, and both the Federation and Zeon were much more okay with fighting in their airspace without any kind of retaliation by Side 6 themselves. tsob fucked around with this message at 16:49 on Jul 10, 2021 |
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Jul 10, 2021 16:46
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Maarak posted:That analogy holds for the GMs, Balls, etc... that show up in the big battles in the 1979 show, less so Thunderbolt. Re: the Guncannons, it's more the custom bit that throws me off. Perhaps the manga gets to justify it more, but I cannot wrap my head around the thunderbolt sector being that drat important to either side to keep throwing bodies and material that seems wildly out of place with the rest of the One Year War as previously depicted. It's like 0083 all over again. The Moore Brotherhood - i.e. the ones controlling the fleet and making up a significant portion of its composition - have at least a couple highly placed and influential officials in the Federation government, one of whom shows up in Bandit Flower. It's not just "we're throwing a ton of GMs and MP Guncannons and a Gundam into a meatgrinder shoal zone to flank A Baoa Qu", it's also "this political bloc in the government is moving pieces behind the scenes to divert resources to retake the broken remnants of their home and justifying it by saying it's a push to open a salient to A Baoa Qu". Again, the "custom" units in TB aren't really customs. The GMs are bog standard GMs that the Federation cranked out a shitload of; literally the only meaningful difference between them and the ones at A Baoa Qu is that the TB GMs have a backpack that either has sub arms to hold extra shields or has a cannon on it(the GM Cannon has existed for a zillion years). MP Guncannons are a bit rarer but have existed in MSVs for decades as well. The scale of the battle in TB isn't even that crazy given that it's happening at roughly the same time in the OYW as stuff like the Battle of Solomon. The Feddies had a whoooole lot of mobile suits to throw around by that point because their industrial engine was in full swing and Zeon was kicked off Earth.
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Jul 10, 2021 17:39
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That's a choice right there. For captain chat, Seed also had Murrue and Natarle. How good they are in comparison to others, meh. Murrue definitely came off as the Seed version of Bright but way softer since Natarle was there to do the actual hard rear end moments instead.
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Jul 10, 2021 17:46
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Going into the second half of IBO S2 and my "people that I really don't want to die" list and my "people that I think are gonna die" list overlap by a distressing amount.
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Jul 11, 2021 17:31
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Ibblebibble posted:Going into the second half of IBO S2 and my "people that I really don't want to die" list and my "people that I think are gonna die" list overlap by a distressing amount. lol
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Jul 11, 2021 17:51
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I sure picked the wrong happy ship going for Lafter x Akihiro didn't I
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Jul 12, 2021 15:00
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Ibblebibble posted:Going into the second half of IBO S2 and my "people that I really don't want to die" list and my "people that I think are gonna die" list overlap by a distressing amount. I want to see these lists.
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Jul 12, 2021 15:04
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People I really don't wanna die: most of Tekkadan, Kudelia, Takaki + sis, People I think are gonna die: most of Tekkadan, People I don't think are gonna die but I really want them to: space Hitler dude People who I really really want to die: Iok, I can cross a few off now where I'm at. I do wish that Akihiro got the Jasley kill, though.
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Jul 12, 2021 15:29
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Ibblebibble posted:People I really don't wanna die: most of Tekkadan, Kudelia, Takaki + sis, Depends on if Space Hitler starts bringing up his tragic back story, totally unprompted. For what it's worth, the best character makes it out alive.
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Jul 12, 2021 15:35
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grassy gnoll posted:For what it's worth, the best character makes it out alive. This is distressingly vague even as someone who knows the death list for IBO. Oh, and Lafter is up there with Marida for deaths made explicitly to torment the characters and audience.
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Jul 12, 2021 15:51
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TenementFunster posted:otto was spotty in the first few episodes, and knew his own limits as a tactician (see: inviting zinnerman to join the bridge), but he was a real one when it came down to it. i had the same reaction as the rest of the bridge crew when he broke his foot off in angelo's rear end. Otto was good because at the beginning he was sort of lazy and complacent . He was expecting this easy mop op operation and found himself in the middle of this gigantic conspiracy with full frontal coming after his rear end. He understandably gets flustered at first, Then he gives Banagher the good old captain talk of encouraging the newtype to get in the gundam He then does some real poo poo at the end by willing to tell both the federation and the neo zeon to go gently caress themselves and makes that great speech right before they launch. I mean he does some goofy poo poo in the series., but that's just part of his charm. Just goes to show that the supporting cast in Unicorn was great, Banagher was just the albatross holding the series down.
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Jul 12, 2021 16:03
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My favorite part of Unicorn is that the Second Coming, Full Frontal, fights a guy named "Banger Links" in a robot named after a horse famous for their horn, while nagged by "the Banshee" Subtle Unicorn owns and I love the huge wet fart that is Laplace's box
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Jul 12, 2021 17:11
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Warmachine posted:This is distressingly vague even as someone who knows the death list for IBO.  IBO spoilers: Atra is the best. 
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Jul 12, 2021 17:44
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Hathaway was quite a good looking film. It is too bad that is doesn't actually have much of a plot that drives what's happening in any way that feels noticeable. The fact that it's part 1 of a trilogy is painfully clear. That this first film was explicitly about establishing characters and the politics that are going to play out in the next 2 is evident the moment the credits roll. The city fight was absolutely amazing to watch (I agree with everyone excited about how much collateral impact we got to see from it drives home the dynamic the Mafty pilots bring up), and then the Penelope vs the Xi might as well be an blank screen with lights on it that occasionally move, just too dark to see the models or have much appreciation for what's happening. This is the issue I know lots of folks have with the OG film trilogy, but I'll have to grant it's a fair criticism of this one. It's not built like a standalone film. It just kinda ends without having really done much, we get this slow burn around Hathaway...except the narrative has outed him super early. I felt 0 tension, but also had really no idea where in the film I was at any given time. The climax is I guess because we needed some Gundams? I agree with whoever said this film could have existed without MS in it really at all. If they do really good things with 2/3 in this trilogy, this first one will get a lot more credit from me. Hathaway deciding to do the thing is the plot I suppose, but if that's the case it feels almost hidden until his closing voice over. I do think it has the best expression of Newtypes in the UC timeline they've done in an anime. Gigi and Hathaway's connection and shared emotion during the run from the hotel was the best sequence of the film. It does lead back to the "are there any good Gundam films?" and I guess with this you have to say yes. This was a good film even if it feels kinda narratively light, I liked what it was doing that makes seeing what will come next exciting/intriguing.
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Jul 12, 2021 18:27
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I just binged the rest of IBO. Goddamn, way too much of my list was true. At least Akihiro got to make Iok eat poo poo in the end.
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Jul 12, 2021 19:26
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Monaghan posted:I mean he does some goofy poo poo in the series., but that's just part of his charm. My favourite is when he literally does a 'time for a big sip of coffee before reading this message' move.
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Jul 12, 2021 19:38
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