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Unicorn Episode 7....... That was it? That was Laplace's Box? The loving Space Charter with an amendment for newtypes? That's like the Constitution stipulating that if Vampires exist, we should let them run the government. What the hell kind of future-proofing were they thinking of when they wrote the charter? It predates Zeon Deikun's philosophy on psychic humans by fifty years, for god's sake. And to get the ball rolling, the Vist Foundation built the Unicorn to monitor the brainwaves of Newtypes deemed worthy, unlike those filthy cyber newtypes, and guide them to the box. But then they immediately say that you cannot measure a newtype's brainwaves. Did the writers just suffer a stroke while writing this explanation? Riddhe's talk on the matter was alright, but it still doesn't change the fact that the reasoning behind the whole issue is ridiculous. And then he has his breakdown, only to snap out of it and become immediately sharp again the moment Frontal appears. Speaking of Frontal, so much for his philosophy. When he gets thwarted by mind lasers, he just goes "gently caress it Giant Robot Time" and hauls out the New Zeong to have a really boring final fight. Then he tries the mind rape trick and takes Banagher on a roller coaster ride through Gundam's greatest hits as well as the Kubrick space odyssey box. Why do Gundam series always need to end with esoteric newtype nonsense that is never fully explained? Not that the non-newtype stuff is good. The whole Laplace's Box thing rings hollow because the sequels to this show have already been made. All that hope for the future goes down the drain. Even if this is the conclusion of Zeon and Federation infighting, thirty years down the line Crossbone Vanguard still attacks, and before them the Mars Zeon, who apparently never got the message from Mineva's speech. Speaking of the Speech, Sayim Vist basically gave Banagher and Audrey the Deus Ex Human Revolution ending solution: give a broadcast. Because telling everyone that the guys who wrote the charter made a concession for transhumanism that didn't even exist yet will make all war stop overnight. It doesn't do that. The ostracizing of newtypes being "over" doesn't stop petty wars from breaking out, and more civilians dying. What a dumb note for the series to go out on. Final thoughts: Fantastic music and art design, great action sequences, a handful of really really good side characters, and a boring lead, a barebones plot, way too much speechifying, and insane philosophy jumps. My favourite parts of the series have to do with Zinnerman, Marida, Mineva with anyone but Banagher, and Riddhe. Banagher just doesn't do anything for me, and is protagonist by way of "you are the chosen one!" Riddhe has an actual character arc, while everything between Zinnerman and Marida was fantastic. It's just a shame that these are side parts, and not the focus, which ends up being such a letdown.
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Jul 30, 2016 01:39
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Something to think about is that 30 years of peace is a pretty freakin' long time for peace to last.
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Jul 30, 2016 01:41
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Arcsquad12 posted:That's like the Constitution stipulating that if Vampires exist, we should let them run the government. I don't have any frame of reference to the episode you're talking about but I think this would be an awesome amendment to the Constitution.
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Jul 30, 2016 01:48
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Srice posted:Something to think about is that 30 years of peace is a pretty freakin' long time for peace to last. For the time being. Give it a few years and then you can bet some new series will come along with more death and destruction. And the series still ends with the Federation coming to put a stop to the broadcast, plus Vist said that revealing the truth may very well be the incentive for a new war. Having just watched the previews for Deus Ex Mankind Divided, the "broadcast the truth to humanity" message at the end of Unicorn could turn to poo poo really fast. The series just ends before the consequences of Mineva's speech can be examined.
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Jul 30, 2016 01:50
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Welcome to post Unicorn bitterness friend! it never leaves you.
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Jul 30, 2016 01:52
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Arcsquad12 posted:Why do Gundam series always need to end with esoteric newtype nonsense that is never fully explained? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFBg78qA82Q
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Jul 30, 2016 02:38
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I need to get around to watching Gundam X one of these days. Guess I gotta pull out my show listings in terms of enjoyment. 1. 0079 television version 2. Origin OVAs 3. Tie between Thunderbolt and War in the Pocket 4. 08th MS Team 5. Unicorn 6. 0083 Stardust Memory. Now to get back to Zeta and see where I'll fit it in. I imaging it will be better than 08th MS Team, but I really liked Thunderbolt a lot, so I might rate it lower unless it pulls some wild poo poo. What I've watched so far is intriguing, but not a "holy poo poo watch this now" level of investment. EDIT: Okay, maybe too soon on that "holy poo poo watch this now" part. Episode 8 of Zeta, where Quattro has to meet an informant at space McDonalds, and Jerid getting his rear end kicked again. I might be sold. Or it's just late and I found that funny. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 06:14 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 05:28
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SeanBeansShako posted:Welcome to post Unicorn bitterness friend! it never leaves you. Yes, welcome
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Jul 30, 2016 05:55
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Arcsquad12 posted:transhumanism For a moment I read this as trashhumanism.
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Jul 30, 2016 11:21
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Arcsquad12 posted:I need to get around to watching Gundam X one of these days. Yeah. It's not the greatest, with some parts being too slow and others being too fast, but overall it's very solid and the ending is one of the best Gundam endings.
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Jul 30, 2016 12:19
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Arcsquad12 posted:Unicorn Episode 7....... That was it? It's always magical seeing somebody watch through Unicorn for the first time, go "well this is pretty okay!" and then watch episode 7 and go "what the gently caress". Unicorn was worth the production and the watch just for the sheer beauty of it from an audio and visual standpoint, but story-wise it might as well not exist.
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Jul 30, 2016 13:12
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It marks the end of the colonial relationship between earth and the sides in UC; the main thrust and point of conflict in mobile suit gundam. The wars that come after it are a matter of people getting all imperialist as people are wont to do. It didn't end all war forever and judging it on that grounds is the dumbest thing conceivable. And no personally I think the content of the box was dumb too.
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Jul 30, 2016 14:10
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Can we say it rings hollow because the response to Mineva's speech includes a bunch of Zeon nutters who try to blow up Antarctica immediately after?
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Jul 30, 2016 14:43
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I like to think hearing the news of that Mineva pretty much throws her hands up, goes 'gently caress this NOISE!' and does a Salya with a poo poo tonne of gold. Sadly though it depressingly mirrors our real world of idiots not listening to reason and doing horrible things because reasons. THANKS UNICORN!
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Jul 30, 2016 14:57
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SeanBeansShako posted:Sadly though it depressingly mirrors our real world of idiots not listening to reason and doing horrible things because reasons. THANKS UNICORN! I don't know how you can have watched anything at all set in the Universal Century and not concluded it's meant to be depressing as gently caress. Unicorn is hardly unique in that.
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Jul 30, 2016 15:01
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Pureauthor posted:Can we say it rings hollow because the response to Mineva's speech includes a bunch of Zeon nutters who try to blow up Antarctica immediately after? If you can justify constantly bringing that one up but not all the other gundam manga that get forgotten while undermining the series then sure be my guest.
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Jul 30, 2016 15:11
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Lemon-Lime posted:I don't know how you can have watched anything at all set in the Universal Century and not concluded it's meant to be depressing as gently caress. Unicorn is hardly unique in that. Due to recent events in real life the whole UC is even more depressing and Unicorn just reminded me of this.
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Jul 30, 2016 15:16
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Pretty much every main character in Unicorn admits the Box is loving useless except for maybe some vague feelings of hope. I think my favorite part however is the entire drat thing begins maybe a few hundred feet away from where the drat box is and they go on a nice tour of the earth sphere then loop right back around to come back.
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Jul 30, 2016 16:05
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Pureauthor posted:Can we say it rings hollow because the response to Mineva's speech includes a bunch of Zeon nutters who try to blow up Antarctica immediately after? No. Judging stories based off random side material written by other people is crappy.
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Jul 30, 2016 16:08
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Zebulon posted:Pretty much every main character in Unicorn admits the Box is loving useless except for maybe some vague feelings of hope. I think my favorite part however is the entire drat thing begins maybe a few hundred feet away from where the drat box is and they go on a nice tour of the earth sphere then loop right back around to come back. I'm sort of hoping the Gundam gag Manga dude eventually gets around to tearing up post MSG stuff and just makes Unicorn look really drat silly.
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Jul 30, 2016 16:34
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ImpAtom posted:No. Judging stories based off random side material written by other people is crappy. Then how about other shows that come afterwards? The UC is still Tomino's ride, and he says that in UC 130, the colonies are at war with the Federation again. And for a show like Unicorn which is obsessed with dwelling on the past shows, continuity might be kind of important to them. Just maybe. I will judge Unicorn by saying that it refuses to commit to an ending, and just ends on a cliffhanger. The Nahel Argama and the Garancieres crew have gone rogue, elements of both Neo Zeon and Sleeves forces escaped without any change in their thought process, and the Federation are sending a taskforce to stifle the message of Laplace's box. What will become of these people? We'll never know because the show doesn't bother to give an answer to the question its been asking since it began.
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Jul 30, 2016 17:02
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Did the show, at any point, state "Laplace's box will end all wars forever"?
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Jul 30, 2016 17:05
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Droyer posted:Did the show, at any point, state "Laplace's box will end all wars forever"? No, it didn't, but they put so much importance on something that turns out to be useless, and then decide to go ahead with it anyways, all the while the show's presentation is telegraphing this as the most important event in UC history. And the show doesn't have the stomach to point out the irony in something like that.
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Jul 30, 2016 17:16
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As a result of the box being opened spacenoid independence is achieved and the Federation dwindles down until come victory it's defunct. The last hurrah of the Federation is setting up SNRI and killing off anaheim electronics for being a bunch of double dealing war profiteers. It doesn't take a big war and no big mea culpa happens the Federation just recedes.
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Jul 30, 2016 17:28
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Arcsquad12 posted:Then how about other shows that come afterwards? The UC is still Tomino's ride, and he says that in UC 130, the colonies are at war with the Federation again. And for a show like Unicorn which is obsessed with dwelling on the past shows, continuity might be kind of important to them. Just maybe. It's still dumb because Unicorn never says all war will end forever. It, in fact, specifically brings up the idea that whatever may come is incredibly far in the distant future and may never come at all. Arcsquad12 posted:all the while the show's presentation is telegraphing this as the most important event in UC history. No, it really isn't. It's a turning point in UC and that isn't incorrect. The post-CCA timeline is a fairly different world even if war continues. Arcsquad12 posted:And the show doesn't have the stomach to point out the irony in something like that. The show literally points that out so I'm not sure why you're claiming it doesn't. "This is entirely worthless except in a symbolic gesture' is a central part of the final episode. The villain of the show is Full Frontal who wraps himself up in continuity and symbolism and attempts to evoke big important ideas while turning out to be small-minded, hollow and petty. The Laplace's Box is his goal and it is his goal precisely because it fits his character: meaningless and yet symbolic. The conflict over Laplace's Box is a conflict over messaging. The statement inside is ambiguous enough that whoever reveals it can control that messaging. Riddhe knows what is inside already, he just fears that it will be taken as a rallying cry. Mineva's success is changing the messaging so that it is a statement of peace, not war. The fact that war continues isn't ever an intended part of that. Arcsquad12 posted:I will judge Unicorn by saying that it refuses to commit to an ending, and just ends on a cliffhanger. The Nahel Argama and the Garancieres crew have gone rogue, elements of both Neo Zeon and Sleeves forces escaped without any change in their thought process, and the Federation are sending a taskforce to stifle the message of Laplace's box. What will become of these people? That isn't a cliffhanger. Shows are not obligated to give a neat tidy "here is where they are now" wrapup to their entire cast. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 17:45 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 17:32
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ImpAtom posted:No. Judging stories based off random side material written by other people is crappy. I'm not really judging Unicorn for that so much as I'm criticizing commenting on the Gundam franchise's chronic inability to stop undermining any messages they're trying to give out. ImpAtom posted:It's still dumb because Unicorn never says all war will end forever. It, in fact, specifically brings up the idea that whatever may come is incredibly far in the distant future and may never come at all. Eh... If the post-CCA world was going to be a different setting than the OYW-era UC, I'd have thought that the Axis Shock would have been a better catalyst (assuming we even one to pin it down to one event) than Laplace's Box. Of course the show itself points out that people refused to change after CCA (although it comes from noted nihilist Frontal), but if that's the case, what about the Box's opening would have galvanized real change instead? As an event it's far less spectacular or meaningful than the Axis Shock to the populace at large.
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Jul 30, 2016 17:39
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Pureauthor posted:Eh... If the post-CCA world was going to be a different setting than the OYW-era UC, I'd have thought that the Axis Shock would have been a better catalyst (assuming we even one to pin it down to one event) than Laplace's Box. Oh, it was. Axis Shock was the original reason things were different, Unicorn just slots itself in there and takes advantage of that fact. I prefer Axis Shock too. But even Axis Shock wasn't a complete change to the world. Even as far as Turn-A and G-Reco people are still people. It's why Unicorn takes the path of literally going to the very end of time to try to drive home just how far away any potential significant change can be. Unicorn never presents itself as a 'and now everything is solved.' It is very much the opposite and drives home that any changes are in the distant future. At best it's trying to signal the end of the Zeon era. No more Zabis, no more Deikuns. Mineva is the last of the Zabis and her speech signifies she's done with open warfare against the Federation. You can have Zeon remnants around but Zeon has always been a major symbolic figurehead organization. They are, after all, named after Zeon Zum Deikun and even Haman used Mineva Zabi as her figurehead of power. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 17:46
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Saw the art for IBO S2's Gundam Andras yesterday, looks pretty rad: http://www.gundamkitscollection.com/2016/07/asw-g-63-gundam-andras.html Seems to have a lot going on, nice colors looking a bit like the Banshee, really nasty looking blade and head. There's also art of the pilot, which is why I linked it, because to me it looks like Eugene? I used a translator app on it and a different name is given, maybe I'm jumping to conclusions? His outfit is in Tekkedan colours but between how evil Andras looks and the marking on it's shoulder looking like a faction badge, I'm thinking not.
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Jul 30, 2016 19:29
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BizarroAzrael posted:Saw the art for IBO S2's Gundam Andras yesterday, looks pretty rad: http://www.gundamkitscollection.com/2016/07/asw-g-63-gundam-andras.html It's a fanart fake. The edited version of Eugene's official portrait is the big clue. Pretty nice, though.
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Jul 30, 2016 19:34
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Laplace's Box is the mcguffin driving unicorn's whole plot, and discovering that all it is is a ridiculously specific clause struck from the records turns its discovery into a huge anticlimax. I suppose the show does call out the irony of its existence being meaningless. I just think that if vist thought it was useless to begin with, how was he able to blackmail the federation for forty years, and only after the one year war did he realize how dangerous that last article could be? An article everyone admits is pointless as anything but hollow symbolism is the reason marcenas and the terrorists destroy Laplace station so the federation can levy power from the colonies over an issue that doesn't even exist yet. Maybe full frontal's time travel went back to Laplace to put the idea in the federations head to make a clause for Transhuman rights in the future. If you want to go with the idea that the actions in unicorn will only have effects far in the future, that still leaves the issue of f-91 and victory happening, which means that either the box barely succeeded for a few years, or it failed and wait for sunrise to come out with Gundam UC 100 where yet another war has broken out at the moment the Republic of zeon loses its autonomy. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 19:44
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The only gundam that "ends war forever" is Gundam Wing and they did the most absurd things to make war come back.
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Jul 30, 2016 19:46
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Tae posted:The only gundam that "ends war forever" is Gundam Wing and they did the most absurd things to make war come back. G Gundam replaced war with organized sporting events. The Future Century was truly the most civilized of all Gundam centuries. chiasaur11 fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 20:14
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chiasaur11 posted:G Gundam replaced war with organized sporting events.The Future Century was truly the most civilized of all Gundam centuries. Except for Rain's solar plexus.
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Jul 30, 2016 20:35
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Arcsquad12 posted:If you want to go with the idea that the actions in unicorn will only have effects far in the future, that still leaves the issue of f-91 and victory happening, which means that either the box barely succeeded for a few years, or it failed and wait for sunrise to come out with Gundam UC 100 where yet another war has broken out at the moment the Republic of zeon loses its autonomy. F-91 is literally described as being after 'a generation of peace.' Also in most contexts a 30-year gap between an serious open war (and F-91 is debatable about 'serious open war' as it's a smaller-scale conflict) would be peaceful time. As I said before "War is ended" is not what Unicorn goes for. If Unicorn really ended with 30 years of relative peace and no large-scale open conflict that's a remarkably amazing accomplishment for the UC where they've been at near-constant war since 0079, barring a short between classic and Zeta which still featured a large-scale terrorist attack using nuclear weapons and a colony drop. It also would be a serious accomplishment in the real world where 'peace' is defined as 'not THAT many people are dying.' ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 21:54
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chiasaur11 posted:G Gundam replaced war with organized sporting events. The Future Century was truly the most civilized of all Gundam centuries.
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Jul 30, 2016 22:46
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IBO being on adult swim led to me binge rewatching Turn A and G-Gundam but t I really want to power through and watch all of the UC Gundam stuff because it's been years since I was this into the franchise and I really, really liked the Origin manga. Speaking of Wing though, I have a huge gigantic soft spot for it and Frozen Teardrop is amazing for all the best and worst reasons.
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Jul 30, 2016 22:54
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ImpAtom posted:F-91 is literally described as being after 'a generation of peace.' Also in most contexts a 30-year gap between an serious open war (and F-91 is debatable about 'serious open war' as it's a smaller-scale conflict) would be peaceful time. I still feel like it rings hollow, and it is incredibly presumptuous of Unicorn to think that its story is the one that should put the Zeon conflict to rest. I said in my first couple reflections that the show has its head up its rear end about its own self importance. I sort of dropped that about episode 4/5, but it came roaring back for the finale. You treat your work like it is this awe inspiring event, and that is the wet fart you go out on. You could have the nicest animation, music and performances ever, but the arrogance on display in the story department just rubs me the wrong way. The ending to Unicorn doesn't feel complete to me. It certainly doesn't feel earned, with the final military conflict resolved through newtype time travel and Unicorn turning into a magic space crystal. The reveal of the box to the Earth Sphere just felt like a "tell the world what happened here" moment, without really exploring what did happen. It's left unresolved (and I know you said it doesn't require a neat resolution to tie everything together), but I still say that the show shouldn't have been spoonfeeding the audience the importance of the box for the whole series just to then say it is unimportant after all. To use Human Revolution again, the ending to that game gave you the option to tell the world what happened at Panchaea, or to provide two lies to further the ends of people with a vested interest in the matter. But Mankind Divided shows that just because you give somebody the truth doesn't change what has already happened. Millions of augmented people suddenly and violently killing at random will not be forgiven just because the truth is revealed that it was all the Illuminati's fault. For Unicorn, telling everybody that the Federation hired terrorists to disrupt their own charter to gently caress over nonexistent at the time psychics will not change the fact that ten billion people died in one month in 0079. Bad blood on both sides won't be easily forgiven just because the charter now authorizes newtypes to run for space presidency. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 23:27 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 23:22
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Tulalip Tulips posted:Speaking of Wing though, I have a huge gigantic soft spot for it and Frozen Teardrop is amazing for all the best and worst reasons. I still say Wing is legit good. It's my favorite Gundam along with Zeta. I was annoyed to find out Sunrise or someone is being an rear end in a top hat and taking down Gundam stuff on YT, though. Used to be all these extended mixes of Gundam Wing music on there that I'd listen to, as well as HD versions of the OP's. Not anymore. They only used to care about SEED stuff but they are now jumping on other series. Bleh.
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Jul 30, 2016 23:28
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Arcsquad12 posted:You could have the nicest animation, music and performances ever, but the arrogance on display in the story department just rubs me the wrong way. T You're the one claiming all of this 'arrogance' and it's honestly sort of weird and inexplicable. It isn't arrogant to make a television show in an existing universe and not act like the show you're making is unimportant poo poo. You're treating it like the show is wrong for daring to play in someone else's toybox and they clearly think they're superior to Tomino or something which... I can promise you is not how the staff was looking at it. They are Gundam fanboys making a too-reverential homage, not people who think they're the gods among gods. Arcsquad12 posted:. Bad blood on both sides won't be easily forgiven just because the charter now authorizes newtypes to run for space presidency. Even without Unicorn, CCA was the last gasp of Zeon. They were running low on resources and running low on people and political capital. Part of the reason for Axis was it was the only chance Zeon had. Unicorn doesn't change that. At best it recontextualizes it that Zeon's very last figurehead has given up the fight and their very last attempt at relevance got shut down. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 23:41 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 23:31
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ImpAtom posted:You're the one claiming all of this 'arrogance' and it's honestly sort of weird and inexplicable. It isn't arrogant to make a television show in an existing universe and not act like the show you're making is unimportant poo poo. You're treating it like the show is wrong for daring to play in someone else's toybox and they clearly think they're superior to Tomino or something which... I can promise you is not how the staff was looking at it. They are Gundam fanboys making a too-reverential homage, not people who think they're the gods among gods. I don't like shows that treat me like an idiot. I also dislike when shows decide the best way to explain motivations or exposition is through speeches. The way a show conveys the importance of its content is important to me. Unicorn's reference to continuity is a fullstop exposition dump about stuff most people probably already know about. Getting back into Zeta, I'm amazed at the worlds of difference between how it goes about world and character building compared to Unicorn. I think the key factor is how understated a lot of events in Zeta are, while Unicorn blows everything up to these insane levels. And yet Unicorn still comes off as derivative because of the fact it is made by fanboys who are excited to work on a Gundam show. I don't think it was the right direction to take as a sequel to the Tomino shows. In fact, I don't think it should have been a sequel at all, because then you are putting it in dialogue with the Tomino run series, and I find it running up short. The advantage that the 90s OVAs have is that they are telling their own stories on a limited level, which allows them to do their own thing and also to reinforce the larger events going on during the main franchise series. But a lot of Unicorn feels like it wants to go off in this wildly different direction, but also to wallow in self reference, like the show is having an identity crisis. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Jul 30, 2016 |
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Jul 30, 2016 23:39
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