Under the Knife – Gundam Wing

By Link
(My boyfriend’s a pilot now.)

I’m a fan of Mecha series, however the Gundam series has NEVER sat well with me… like… EVER. Maybe it’s because I’m a Macross fan and Robotech was my first anime ever, so… whatever the reason is, I hate Gundam Wing. So… prepare your hateful words towards me Gundam fans, as you read my review of Gundam Wing. ^_^
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Story:

Ultimately… I can’t remember much about the story to be honest. It was a very interesting and political story from what I can remember, with a lot of interesting mecha design. The story never really grabbed me, the love story felt very forced, especially since Heero wasn’t overly interested in Relena at all. All the political drama and backstabbing was really great, and many times I really thought something amazing was going to occur, but time and time again I kept getting let down by the series’ plot.
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Characters:

The cast was interesting enough, a lot of them had that “We’re badasses.” attitude, but a few characters like Duo Maxwell really shown through all the other crap and became instant favorites. All the characters were fairly well developed, with the exception of the annoying Relena Peacecraft and her rantings of ‘Total Pacifism’. She never really seemed confident or proud, she just seemed stupid and dumb, like she couldn’t get it through her head that total pacifism wasn’t the answer for everything. The villains were all very well done, and they were constantly bouncing around in that ‘gray’ area where the villains weren’t necessarily evil or horrible people, but just appeared that way because they were on the opposing side/team.
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Mecha:

First, we’ll cover some Non-Gundams. There’s Leos, Cancers, and other various constellation named mecha throughout the series. They all look pretty interesting, but ultimately they are fodder for the Gundams. The Gundams themselves were amazing, and each new upgrade & ‘custom’ version looked better than the last. With their amazing weapons, abilities, and just overall design there isn’t much to NOT love about these mecha. Deathscythe Hell Custom possibly being the best damn Gundam ever invented, even though Heavy Arms was always a personal favorite of mine. Honestly, I’d say they’re some of the most memorable Gundams throughout the entire Gundam franchise.
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Gripes:

So with a lot of these positive things… where does it all go wrong? Why do I hate it? The HUGE negative I have about the Gundams is pretty obvious if you think in a Macross fan’s perspective… HOLY CRAP THEY ARE OVERPOWERED! The skill of the pilots NEVER really shows in this series, because these Gundams are rarely ever challenged. Think of it like… Dynasty Warriors, the main character is a Gundam and all the dumb AI grunts are the enemies they face. VERY rarely would they actually face a worthy opponent, such as Tallgeese, Epyon, Vayeate or Mecurius, but… the rest was just eye candy showing off bullshit. Ironically enough, they DID make a Gundam based Dynasty Warriors styled game, and I almost guarantee that it would feel exactly like the anime series.

The entire series falls flat in the ‘fear’ department. Like… you never felt worried for the pilots or anything because it was a very cliche ‘Good Guys always win!’ sort of scenario. Sure, sometimes somebody MIGHT be in a near death experience, but like… it NEVER happened (omg spoilers!) I think I would have had less gripes with this series if it grew some balls and started killing off main characters, heck, any of the main pilots or the love interest or something. Killing off bad guys doesn’t necessarily count, ‘cuz, y’know… they’re bad! Ultimately I have to compare it to Macross’ plot where good guys died and people were upset about it, etc. Like… that was the real drama with a mecha anime, at least for me, was fear of losing a comrade in battle. Gundam Wing just didn’t offer this, with all the overpowered mecha eyecandy “IT’S A GUNDAM!!!!!” crap they fed you every episode. It was like watching Dragonball Z, but without anybody in the series ever dying, and never wondering how they’d save the day. It’s like Superman vs. Government Army, it’s a complete and total massacre!

However these aren’t my only gripes…
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Fanbase:

Never in my life did I think a fanbase could ruin something for me. But, the massive amount of yaoi (Boy+Boy Relationships) fangirls who were drawing artwork of all the Gundam boys in crazy hot orgies totally ruined it for me. Like… almost all the pilots have a female love interest at some point, and Quatre seems like the most obvious cliche choice for being homosexual, but… none of that is ever covered in the anime as far as I can tell, and therefore people need to just leave their damn fantasies at the door. I understand that the Yaoi culture exists, but it was always just WAY too rampant with Gundam Wing. Maybe it’s because it was the first series in America with a primarily all bishounen (cute young boy/guy) cast. Whatever the reasoning behind it… it completely killed it.

Not to mention the fanbase also TOTALLY ignores Macross over Gundam. Like… I honestly feel that Macross TV totally outshines Gundam Wing. Now, I know there ARE some good Gundam series and some bad Macross series out there, but… in this match up of early Toonami shows, Macross wins hands down. It’s a damn shame Robotech got replaced with Dragonball Z, it would’ve been nice to see a Gundam & Robotech power hour or something of that sort. I think it would’ve helped expose more people to the other mecha franchise that rarely gets it’s time to shine on television nowadays.
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Overall:

Gundam Wing is a very interesting series with wonderful mecha designs as well as a few interesting characters, however it’s ultimately ruined by an unnecessary love story and completely overpowered mecha that give the main characters an almost godlike immunity to death. No self-destruction, fencing wound, or overall destruction of their mecha can ever bring them down. I give Gundam Wing…

Arbitrarily Vague Scoring System: 4/10

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