Gundam Seed Destiny 1

One of the new season’s most anticipated series, GSeed: Destiny is the direct follow up to last year’s uber-popular Gundam Seed, and picks up near where the last series left off (albeit a bit farther in the future). At the conclusion of the first series, the war between the Orb, ZAFT, and the Earth Alliance became a total mess after the EA launched nukes at the civilian colonies, and ZAFT’s Death Star thing disintegrated the Earth’s moon base. A tenuous peace was achieved, and everything seemed hunky-dorky.

At the start of this new series, we flash back to the past, when the EA was attacking Orb’s capital, and Kira was engaging the 3 crazy Earth pilots. We see a family running towards the evac boats, but the daughter drops her cell phone and throws a fit, so her elder brother runs to go get it. A stray shot from Kira blasts the area, killing the family, except for the boy who ran off to get the cell phone.

Fast forward to the future, where Cagalli has inherited leadership of Orb, and she’s traveling to ZAFT territory for a clandestine meeting with the new ZAFT leader concerning their recent weapons buildup. Enter a rogue group of youngsters of unknown affiliation, who manage to hijack ZAFT’s newest Gundam models, and begin a rampage through the military base. Cagalli and Asuran are caught in the middle, helpless as newborns. Luckily, they are saved by the new Impulse model, piloted by none other than the boy in the flashback, who’s now grown up and serving in the ZAFT military.

First of all, let me make this clear: this episode was flat out awesome, and is a real treat for fans of the first series. The original Gundam Seed started out as a mediocre series that gradually gained steam over 50-odd episodes to become worthy in its own right. Now that the producers already have some momentum, let’s hope they don’t f*ck this one up. Some familiar faces return for this new round, but most likely they’ll take a back seat to the newer cast members.

Some minor quibbles:
1. As much as I like Hirai Hisashi’s character designs, they’re all starting to look a bit similar. Some of the new chars have very familiar faces, but different hair. There’s a Frey look-alike, a Cagalli look-alike (and she’s not even dead yet!), a Kira look-alike, etc.

2. Speaking of which, the main Gundam looks too similar in design to the main Gundam of the first GSeed (the Strike model), but that’s sort of a tradition. Still annoying though.

3. The intro shows a few flashes of Kira’s Freedom Gundam, but wasn’t it blown up in the first series? Don’t tell me the Impulse Gundam eventually evolves to something that looks similar….

4. The BEST part of the episode is when Asuran and Cagalli hijack the beat up Zaku in order to survive. As fans of Gundam know, Zakus are like the Chevys of Gundam; they suck big time, and the cupholders don’t even work. Typically they are the “background fodder” for the main character to blow up, and it’s interesting to see the tables turned. Asuran puts up a good fight, and I enjoyed seeing him go toe-to-toe with the flashy new Gundams.

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