THAT Animeblog

133 Comments so far

1. Li Shan November 18th, 2008 7:53 pm

   For the first time ever not counting when Michel died in Macross F I actually shouted NOOOOOOOOO at my computer screen.

   I agree with both you and Calawain that ep 7 was made of super fail with Sunrise shoving emo shoutas or shouta-sounding guys down our throats. It’s bad enough that there is rampant plot hax and now Sunrise is trying to come up with a couple which magically(read: unfabulously) can go from 0 to kissing within a few hours.

   Now.. tell me who voted YES on Prop 8! (jumps into A Valkyrie and prepares to fold-bomb)

2. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 7:55 pm

   The episode wasn’t out and out bad (remember, while I’m not easily entertained, I take whatever entertainment I can get), but it might make my professor in Creative Writing cringe.

3. Eldar November 18th, 2008 8:00 pm

   Might wanna get some cheese for the whine.

4. Crusader November 18th, 2008 8:12 pm

   @Li Shan
   Indeed the 0 to kiss just made things all the more worse and final.

   @Myssa Rei
   I beg you pardon comrade, “might” make your Creative Writing Professor cringe? Come now comrade I know we both read Warhammer fiction, but mein gott this episode was terrible. Imagine if all of a sudden Abbadon started giving flowers to a Grey Knight or if Marneus Calgar started kissing Alpharius? I dare say this was just as terrible if not worse. Next thing you know Space Marines will start having babies and the Inquisition will no longer drop cyclonic torpedoes, or the servants of the Machine God would stop chanting litanies of activation. It is madness!

   @Eldar
   Silence Xenos scum! The Immortal Emperor does not care for the cheese of Eldar witches, you want cheese then load up on star cannons and pray to Khaine to have Gav write your book. Purge the ALIEN!

5. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 8:21 pm

   Given the amount of badly-written reports that he’s seen in his tenure, I’m sure the old teacher has seen worse, Comrade (and I should know, I spent some time as a student assistant helping him). We’re talking about crack fiction levels of bad. That’s why I said ‘might’.

   Then again, I’ve never given old man Wyco one of my old 40k books for reading…

   Also, there IS a reason why Black Library works have recently been called ‘non-canon’ to a certain degree (I think the scope is only the Horus Heresy Books, some of the Imperial Guard books like Gaunt and Cain, and the Ultramarines books) during the latest shareholders meeting. Think of them as flawed interpretations of events and ‘what ifs’… Haruhi knows that the Blood Angels series is just HORRIBLE (and spits on all established lore for the Chapter so far).

6. Ratwedge November 18th, 2008 8:28 pm

   I salute Wild Bear for his death is assured in the comming ep’s. He was a most wonderful comrade during the Unification and will be missed. Sadly, Mr Bob needs to either a) Get over the whole Samurai thing or b) Kill Setsuna and finally assume command over Gundam 00 like god intended.

   That said, god knows why Setsuna is a pilot in the first place when things like this happen “Oh no I cant beat him, activate Trans-Savemyarse-Am”. The poor guys really hasnt got much going for him lately.

7. Haesslich November 18th, 2008 8:52 pm

   I want to say, after all this:

   “CRY! CRY SOME MORE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….!!!”

   Ah well - at least they’ve ditched one more pilot, and we get to see a busty Tieria, just so Jason Miao can become broken enough to start wearing women’s clothing. He had it coming.

8. Eirias November 18th, 2008 9:01 pm

   Celestial Being never walks alone.

   Seriously though, weak episode.

9. Crusader November 18th, 2008 9:08 pm

   @Myssa Rei
   DO IT. DO IT NAO! give the old man some truly awful literature to read at his leisure, then tell him people actually pay for it too.
   Believe me Black Library stuff generally belongs in the dark corners of a library often heard but seldom read… I am not sure every one got that memo on non-canon, I sure as hell didn’t.

   @Ratwedge
   I am sure that the Kurdish Curse has rendered Jihad-kun a loser, for long will he be humiliated by the likes of Bushido Bob. I am sure Gundam 00 is crying out for the only man worthy to pilot it, sadly Gundam 00 waits in vain.

   @Haesslich
   Et tu Haesslich?

   Well I am sure that having a fully gender bent Tieria will be a barrel full of laughs. I am sure we shall see pictures of Miao in meido outfits soon enough…as to whether if he could break people like Mako-cakes and Alto-hime, well time will tell.
   @Eirias
   Ali will make them walk alone soon enough…I hope.

   With any luck Sunrise will bring back Prince Ali and Patrick in full force to make amends for killing Soma in such a hideous manner.

10. Kaioshin Sama November 18th, 2008 10:03 pm

    You gotta lighten up there Captain America and just learn to take em as they come. I’ve gotta side with my man Sergei in this one and respect his decision. He doesn’t want to let Soma go and would gladly take vengeance on Allelujah for the death of his comrades, but he’s man enough to realize that this is her decision. As the excellent song goes, you can’t always get what you want.

    Afraid I’ve once again got to totally break with you and praise Sunrise for some really good writing and solid romance. As this one has been hinted at since essentially the beginning of Allelujah and Soma’s relationship I can’t say it was forced in the slightest. In fact I was fairly impressed that they managed to tie what happened in this episode all the way back to the first one Soma appeared in in which Allelujah had those flashbacks to his time as a Super Soldier candidate. I was worried that that was never going to get dealt with.

    And on top of that the episode also manages to segue quite well into what looks like an answers arc for Tiera, Ribbons and much of the Aeolia backstory that looks like it’s going to form the core plotline for the rest of the series with Tiera’s encounter with Regene in the post credits sequence. So we even have fairly good pacing as it’s been for most of the season.

    Overall it’s definitely been the best episode of the season and it only looks like the show is about to get stronger. By the way, you now have your reason as to why the A-LAWS are a group worth fighting. Sending in Ali to burn down a whole country in secret and then moving in under the guise of friendship to install a provisional government? Very sneaky. It seems that Ribbons federation isn’t above ruling through coercion if they can’t rule through popular support. Hell it seems he’s not above nation building in order to make things happen.

    It seems to me like he’s truly trying to carry out Aeolia’s plan, only by accelarating it to the point where what Aeolia wanted in a peaceful world is instead lost in chaos instead of allowing things to transition through a series of guided steps over time. Now obviously forcing a world into a new life style isn’t without it’s lack of morality so Celestial Being may have to answer for this as well, but stopping Ribbons from creating his empire of Innovators should be top priority. That is why the A-LAWS are currently the greater of two evils and not the lesser.

    Again solid episode and I hope Sunrise keeps up the good work.

11. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 10:06 pm

    Crusader: It’s surprising that one of the forumites owned a substantial bit of GW stock, so he was invited to the annual shareholder’s meeting. A distillation of his experiences were posted on DakkaDakka, Bolter and Chainsword, and the Conclave, respectively.

    The pertinent part of his little summary was about GW’s stance on Black Library, and I quote:

    2. In further conversation, George emphasized that Black Library’s main objective was to “tell good stories”. He agreed that some points in certain novels could, perhaps, have benefited from the editor’s red pen (a certain multilaser was mentioned) but was at pains to explain that, just as each hobbyist tends to interpret the background and facts of the Warhammer and 40k worlds differently, so does each author. In essence, each author represents an “alternative” version of the respective worlds. After pressing him further, he explained that only the Studio material (rulebooks, codexes, army books and suchlike) was canonical in that is HAD to be adhered-to in the plots and background of the novels. There was no obligation on authors to adhere to facts and events as spelled out in Black Library work.

    A link to the thread in B&C that has the complete rundown of the GW Shareholder meeting:

    http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.php?showtopic=146582

12. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 10:15 pm

    Kaiohshin: I have to disagree a little with how favorably you viewed the resolution to Soma and Allelujiah’s running subplot. It was hinted on from the start, yes, but how it was *resolved* was clumsy; not only could we have done without the enemy/mine setup, the suddeness of Marie subsuming Soma made me raise an eyebrow. Yes, I understand that romance was never a strong point in Gundam, but still…

13. Crusader November 18th, 2008 10:32 pm

    @Kaioshin
    Get off their gonads Canadian Peanut Gallery.

    Really this qualifies as solid romance, either you jest or you really carry around a sack full of shit. Marie comes out full force in this ep and in the space of less than a day is already kissing the guy who abandoned her 10 years ago to be a guinea pig. I understand that there are such abusive relationships, but I hesitate it call them romances let alone solid ones. I cannot imagine what kind of spineless woman would be so daft as to let the one who had an active role in her unhappy fate simply have his way with her in the space of an hour, Soma was never that craven thus she is dead replaced by some bint who in a decent story could never be allowed to pilot again unless we take the GSD route and ignore the whole litany of reasons why Haptism should take care of Marie.

    I cannot fathom how completely replacing Soma who has been with us for 31 eps with someone new to end a plot thread is a stroke of genius beyond compare let alone competent. The face to face was decent, but this Island ep was more hateful than the ones from SEED, here we saw the replacement of a character in the most base way possible there was no reconciliation and now we get this docile character who by all rights should never be allowed to pilot ever again.
    Marie was just brought before use and already her fate is sealed, it was rushed there was no build up in any sense of the word. Over the course of a decade neither party had spoken to one another…it is hard to accept that it can be so easy for them to start kissing so soon. If it had been delayed a bit more even with the horrible birth of Marie it would have been tolerable, but that kiss was just rushed and it showed.

    Soma is not Marie. If your mother was to declare herself the Pope I doubt you would gladly accept it without seeing a doctor first. Really tell me you jest, otherwise this is brown nosing of a most vile sort if you declare this as a “solid romance” because honestly this bullshit has nothing on Aina and Shiro, Chris and Bernie, Domon and Rain, fuck even Heero and Releena was more tolerable, mostly because it was not shoved down our throats in the space of less than an episode. Gundam has never had solid romance every single instance has had the subtlety of 105 barrage. Romance has never ever been the focus of the franchise, Macross I can understand but this?

    The A-Laws lose a pilot, Haptism a rival, so tell me what use is there left for them? Haptism had the least development last time and it seems that in the interest of saving air time the book has been closed. Problem is they were too ambitious and went in over their heads this was a rushed development a conclusion that is all too premature. Now we have to develop this Marie loser and her “romance” with Haptism. Again if Prince Ali kills them both then the problem is solved otherwise it will be just another way to waste time.

    Until I see 00bama working hand in hand with Ali or for that matter Homer, Ali is a secret agent for Ribbons. That said I have not seen orders given by 00bama or Homer for Ali to burn Azadistan to the ground, Ribbons gave that order whether or not the Federation was aware is at this point vicious rumor and idle speculation by rebel-tards who revolt against any authority. Is Wang a better alternative given her let things burn attitude and playing of both sides against one another? Just because CB has possession of the titular Gundams does not make them all that better. The A-Laws are professionals they carry out orders they do not make them as any military under civilian control ought to be, CB is just a band of idealists who refuse to integrate and side with an armed group with dubious morals and a hazy agenda.

    Here’s to less of your “solid romance” and more Prince Ali and Innovators being excellent evil.

    @Myssa Rei
    Good for nothing share holders…making things more expensive than they have to be.

    Well it varies from gaming group to gaming group but at least the rules are fairly consistent, Marines being the best aside… Still Black Library can always be counted on to give a few good laughs. At least most of these writers have a side job…

14. Kaioshin Sama November 18th, 2008 10:34 pm

    @Myssa Rei: I was deliberately being overly positive to counteract Crusader’s overwhelming and more than a little silly negativity. Sometimes like I’ve said before you just have to take the good and let it have a place in your impression of the episode. And for the most part I felt the episode was really good. I like how you pointed out that it isn’t quite resolved though. I think it’s only fair to give Marie the time to develop that she deserves. To me it just seems like people are upset that Soma’s character development has headed in a different direction now that she’s back to who she’s really supposed to be. I’d prefer this as opposed to seeing Soma stagnate as a character.

    Speaking of which I think more than a few things went into bringing about this “resolution”, one is that Soma had already been moving more towards her original less “soldiery” personality as she was witnessing the A-LAW tactics that she didn’t agree with and the other is that Allelujah has been gradually working on trying to get her to remember her original personality since the end of the first season. They’ve only met face to face a couple times and only under the current circumstances of her doubt and distress once, which seems to have been the catalyst that finally brought Marie to the forthfront. I think the Soma personality is only as dead as she wants it to be though and am curious to see where things go from here.

    You see the difference between me and folks like Captain America is that I can accept a new direction in a characters storyline when I recognize that it’s been building up for quite a while and acknowledge that it has the potential to create an interesting dynamic between her and Allelujah if I at least give it the chance to get off the ground before deciding it’s unnacceptable. Humouring as opposed to outright rejection, though really unlike most people I have faith in Sunrise to carry a burgeoning subplot such as this through since I’m not the type to constantly hammer them on absolutely everything they do just because I might not like the path a character develops along or the way a certain faction is portrayed. Is it the best possible development? Maybe not. Is it good? I think so. Hence why I’ve gotta give them some props for this one. Like you I take my entertainment and storytelling as it comes. You’ve got to otherwise you’ll never be happy. I still say this is an excellent set up for the episodes to come. Especially now that the stage appears to have been set for the real showdown between Celestial Being and Ribbons.

    And there’s really no amount of negativity that can kill my optomism for where Gundam 00 is headed for the time being. Though perhaps that’s because I actually have that option on the table to begin with and want to like the series. And really, so far I’ve felt no real struggle to do so during this season like I did for Gundam Seed/Destiny, Gundam F91 and Gundam F90. What you’ve seen from me is actually what I’m about as opposed to Code Geass R2 where I held back until the end of the season.

15. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 10:37 pm

    Crusader: Haaaaaaaarsh. I’ll just agree that the resolution to the Soma/Haptism subplot was mishandled, and could have been done better, shall we?

    Kaioshin: The subplot was resolved rather poorly (I’m taking a Post-Grad in Creative Writing, darn it, so it was obvious to me), but it doesn’t color Gundam 00 as a whole for me.

16. skoll November 18th, 2008 10:38 pm

    This was just hokey. I don’t know what Kaioshin thinks is solid romance, but this is hilariously not it. First of all, the whole damn ‘romance’ relies upon a derivation of the time-honored ‘childhood’ friends ploy. Why did Mr. Orange-bitchface fall in love with ‘Marie’? Uhh….

    …um….

    …They hung out when they were kids? For like a couple months? Just because you were friends with a girl when you were a kid does NOT mean that you’re fated to fall in love, this is a trope played ludicrously straight in this series. Adult Orange-bitchface never knew adult ‘Marie’– in fact, adult ‘Marie’ existed for a good…. hour or two, and childhood affections in no way necessarily translate into adult feelings.

    In short, it was forced. More forced than watching a hypocritical Kurdistani terrorist with a Japanese codename (nippophilia) fall in ‘love’ with a social antiquity.

    On another note, I find Orange-bitchface’s voice to be many different kinds of annoying, and listening to him say shitfaced lines makes me try to will his head into exploding like in Scanner-cop.

    Again, on the political note, regardless of the greater or lesser of evils presented, and I say ‘presented’ because only due to bad writing could the megalomaniacal moral fundamentalist terrorists possibly be considered ‘good guys’, the political conflict is done BADLY, and unconvincingly.

    I am waiting for the day that Sunrise cuts loose, drops the facade and says, ‘Fine, you know what? We’re going to do it.’ and makes a Gundam where a team of androgynous young male pilots defeats the evil United States and stops World War II, leaving the Japanese military to relieve themselves of their urge to vice upon the undeserving populace of all of China.

17. Kaioshin Sama November 18th, 2008 10:52 pm

    @Crusader: Actually Soma is really Marie as has been established by this episode pretty throughly and I say that you cannot judge a character unless you’ve spent some time with her. I don’t make snap judgements and say I hate this character or relationship without letting it get started. I say let them have there time together and then evaluate the quality of the relationship.

    I’m sorry this show can’t follow all of these rules you seem to have set out for it in order for things to be acceptable to you (and really that’s the only fault this episode seems to have committed if you can call that one), but as I’ve said I take things as they come and then evaluate, not the other way around. That and I just can’t deal with things in absolutes like you when you say something like Marie is a terrible personality when all we’ve seen of it is 12 or so minutes thus far when she’s of course going to be at her weakest. I mean if you’ve just regained control of yourself after doing all of these things that you would never normally have done you might be a little disoriented, perhaps a little self-deprecating and just really happy and beside yourself (pun not intended) to just be rid of that life.

    You can yell all you want and say I’ve brought a load of crap to the table, but there’s really nothing you’ve said to convince me that this is some character massacre and not just the start of a new life for Soma Peries that is pretty much well deserved at this point. One where she’s happier and free of the HRL’s brainwashing and can for the first time in ages chose the path that she as Marie would want instead of the one that was forced on her by some scientists. In that sense perhaps I’m not so much in outright disagreement with you as I am willing to look at the situation in another light.

    @Skoll: And somehow these things only become a problem once they are featured in a Gundam series. Elsewhere I’d be challenged to find a lick of this type of scorn for telling a story with the use of a trope done well. Again nobody has really said anything to convince me that this episode is anything especially bad other than shout a lot and get really worked up.

18. skoll November 18th, 2008 10:56 pm

    Kaioshin, I don’t understand why you’re the least bit not concerned by the fact that a veteran character JUST DISAPPEARED. I mean, call it what you want, but the fact of the matter is that a character that is better defined, and had time SPENT in developing her has simply ceased to exist. That’s bad writing. It’s not a death, it’s not a leave of absence, it’s nothing but a shameless plug of a newer, more boring character, made worse by the absence of a far more interesting one.

    I mean, you eat this shit up like fine wine. Even if it were tolerable, which it isn’t, it’s nothing special and it’s far from a magnum opus of wartime epics.

19. Kaioshin Sama November 18th, 2008 11:08 pm

    @Skoll: Because I’m willing to give Marie the chance to come into her own instead of just screeching “BAD WRITING OH MY GOD!” Of course Soma is better defined and had more time spent developing her because she’s had 31 episodes and Marie has been given 12 minutes sinc she’s literally just come to the forefront. Let the girl have a chance to show what she’s made of. Not bad writing and character development, character development that has just begun to unfold in a new direction. I don’t see how a person couldn’t be willing to give this twist in the Soma character a chance given the potential it has based on the strength of Soma’s character beforehand (what? you assume they are going to just totally drop the ball on Marie based on how well they’ve handled the character of Soma? Based on?) so I think we’re pretty much at a stalemate here.

    If you’re unwilling to let Marie develop for the remaining 19 episodes we have and see where they take her then that’s really not Sunrise’s fault, that’s just stubborness on the part of you as a viewer. It could be bad, it could be good and interesting, but how can we know until we’ve seen it. Not gonna prejudge the Marie character and her relationship with Allelujah after just 12 minutes of seeing it full force. That’s not enough time for me to say outright that a character sucks so I say “this is an interesting twist and it was handled well for now, let’s wait and see how it unfolds”. If it is for you fine, but me, I’m different as you’ve probably already gathered.

    Again the only read I’m getting is “I liked Soma and now I think she’s dead, boo hoo”, but how can you know that. How do you know Soma isn’t still in there somewhere and that you might find something to like about Marie just the same? Should I even be asking the question or have you and Crusader just already made up your mind how to perceive things as it seems you have for the entire show. Like Myssa I’m not going to let something minor like this colour the whole show for me. I liked Soma too, believe me, but I want to see where this Marie thing will go before I call it character assasination or something.

    I think I just overexplained my stance. Oh well…..

20. skoll November 18th, 2008 11:20 pm

    @Kaioshin

    I could give the least bit of a flying-wombat-fuck twenty-thousand leagues under the gas-sea of Jupiter about whether she’ll come into her own and you’re argument at this point LITERALLY hinges on the promise of a developed Marie in the future. PROMISE. Which is the hugest load of fermenting horseshit I’ve ever heard in my life.

    If Marie becomes a great character later, good, sweet, that’s awesome. But that is an occurrence unfortunately DIVORCED from the singular act of eliminating a main character in some trippy fucking acid dimension-shift. THAT is bad writing. It IS. The very fact that Marie has been reintroduced, whether it be now, or whether it be long before is a call to the dominance of the character of Marie, who, frankly, CANNOT be better defined than the character of Soma.

    Furthermore, the Feddies just lost one of their few likable characters, further proving my old point:

    “The g-men that AREN’T assholes are only g-men because they don’t know what the fuck is going on, and that the rest of the g-men are assholes.”

    Slowly, we see the Federation move further into the territory of ‘absolute Evil Empire’, also the mark of BAD WRITING, black and white moral snobbery that even TTGL, in all it’s bravado and singular message, managed to avoid.

    As for your comments of your acceptance of the ‘childhood friends’ trope, you know what you just did? You just revealed yourself to be an insufferable fanboy. That’s exactly what it is. I pointed out the usage of a tired case of poor writing, and you blew over it. That’s fanboyism. Its also dumb. It’s also illogical. I don’t think you’re in any position to be arguing with Crusader, considering that everything you say comes from infantile attachment.

21. Crusader November 18th, 2008 11:28 pm

    @Myssa Rei
    But Comrade the prices for models is far harsher than any words of malice i may have for those money grubbing shareholders. Surely the customer has a right to complain about pricing practices.
    It could have been better, and I really wish that it was, but alas…

    @skoll
    Indeed it was ripped right out of a harem animu of the most generic sort, basis of attraction is the same one we have seen far too often. For some reason Tomino’s Curse is as strong today as it was during SEED I have no idea why but only the most heavily bankrolled teams can come up with this level of BS, at least VOTOMS and Keroro Gunso kept things less heavy handed for the most part.

    CB and their Kataron lackeys are no more just than FARC, I see little reason to blindly accept their view point as teh truth given how they are as unreliable as you can get. With any luck Prince Ali will deliver us from this Marie and Haptism development.

    @Kaioshin
    Look Peanut it was lazy of them to justify that kiss using a harem animu trope of the most common stock variety. I will not pretend otherwise out of some misguided need for optimism from a desperate need to believe that the curse of SEED has been removed, if they make it better then I shall give them credit, but this was just awful and I will declare it as such. I fail to see any hint of Soma in this Marie Purpleton, and as such I do believe this to be distinct personality, to declare Marie as the only legitimate existence is to discredit all the hard work Soma has put in for volk and fatherland in season 1. We have more than enough new faces adding to the roster of newbs is not going to help things…Ginin, Homer, Lindt, KFC, 00bama, Renge, Revival, Klaus, Yellow, Bushido Bob, Lyle, and now Marie are all vying for some development. To compound the problem of new faces we still have to deal with the crew from season 1, I dread what might happen to them as in the tragedy that was Code Geass R2 and the problems brought about by a huge cast. I do believe I have every reason to be cynical Marie was not neccessary. From what we have seen so far I am not as impressed or as overawed as you, Marie is Mariana II both have bleeding hearts and neither seem to have much fight in them, more over this clueless broad is an easy hit given her lack of resistance to Haptism’s advances after a 10 year separation; clearly modesty was not part of her personality. I have my doubts that this is merely a beginning given the speed at which the pentultimate kiss was delivered, but if for the sake of your solid romance that the rest of the series has to suffer then so be it, spray your perfume onto the less than ideal end product. Ambition is a funny thing it can cut towards success and failure, if this “solid romance” starts cutting in on the main plot I am sure you will find some “reason” to justify it.

    I believe your optimism is making you blind, you call this a “solid romance” while at the same time the price already includes the loss of some cool Soma/Ahead action. How can you even call yourself a mecha fan if this harem animu justified romance is something you deem worthy of such a high price in Ahead action? It took 31 eps to create Soma, Marie has 18 to prove her worth. If this were the end then so be it, but I am wary over the very real possibility that Marie will start dragging the rest of the plot lines down. Sunrise is not infallible or divine they are made up of humans who are just as dumb and uncouth as the rest of us.

    The struggle to free her self from the dictates of fate planned for her would have been far more agreeable than just magically making Soma go away and giving us Marie so she can frolic happily about without a care in the world. Soma is not Marie, Marie is a liar I see nothing of the Soma I knew in that person who stole her face. Wild Bear declared that Soma was dead, I find it hard to argue with that assessment given how Marie did not beat the crap out of Haptism for moving fast in their new relationship. The promise of development is not one I can blindly accept as recompense, Marie might be developed better but at what cost? Air time is finite, if this were a book it would be fine. However air-time is a limited resource how much time must we give to this Marie? At least while Soma was a round the cost of development was lower, now its going to cost us much more given how early this was. Had this been in the end game it would not need development, but now either Marie develops or she becomes and anchor, waste too much time she becomes a developed anchor. It’s not that easy to balance out air time, now we have some newb to compete against all the new faces and some under developed old ones as well.

22. meliadoul November 18th, 2008 11:30 pm

    Why did the woman’s identity have to be the one subsumed in the relationship?
    Al gets to have the romance but can keep his principles and goals, while Soma/Marie has to accept and embrace her “lover”’s life faster than Kaoshin can rant about a negative opinion.
    It makes me rage even more to think the same will probably happen to Louise with Saji. Urg, Louise is awesome as she is, she doesn’t need a man to “morally” save her, dammit.
    Still waiting for Patrick.

23. Myssa Rei November 18th, 2008 11:33 pm

    Ah, the heady scent of testosterone-laden heated discourse. We’re not yet even at the halfway mark, folks.

24. skoll November 18th, 2008 11:35 pm

    I’m going to add something and say that the ‘childhood friends’ trope is NOT a bad thing, it’s simply PLAYED badly. An important part of the childhood friends scheme is the concept of reconciling old feelings with new ones. IE, boy and girl grow up platonically close, are baffled by the onset of new feelings, and worried as to losing what they were. Alternatively, there can be a gap of space the boy and girl spend apart from one another, and upon their reunion, they must come to grips with the idea that they are either different people now, creating a romance from the ground up, or still similar, building a romance with existing foundations.

    We have NONE of this here. We have only a instant of a glimpse at childhood interaction, and an equally short glimpse at adult interaction. When you break it down like that, it really DOES sound like they pulled it out of their ass, neh? There was neither time to determine the intimacy of their childhood, nor time to determine their reconciliation in adulthood, making this one undeniably a forced romance.

25. blind_dead_mcjones November 18th, 2008 11:38 pm

    i’m with skoll and crusader on this, the marie thing does feel like a bit of an asspull, though I wouldn’t count soma as dead and buried just yet, with any luck she could re-establish her role as the dominant personality and wreak havoc on CB’s ship from the inside, and snap saji’s pathetic weakling neck in the process, i’m tempted to call her hallelujah 2.0 at this point but will refrain for now.

    btw nice job breaking the 00, setsuna, you were told not to use the trans-am but what would ian know? he’s only an engineer with qualifications as long as his arm

26. Kaioshin Sama November 18th, 2008 11:42 pm

    @Skoll: I enjoy the show. So sue me. What can you do about it? Scream some more? The more you shout, holler, and carry on the more I start to wonder why you’re even interested in the show to begin with and why I should care what you think. In fact, why do you care so much what I think as far as enjoying the contents of the episode go? I say better a fan who is open to possibilities then a person that can never accept anything outside of what they want in a story.

    Unfortunately you seem like the type of person I’m never going to get anywhere with. You’re so situated in your perceptions as the absolute god given undisputable fact (they aren’t by the way but you don’t have to feel bad about it) and think you can shout down anybody who won’t agree with you and deride them for just trying to get a little enjoyment out of a series they do in fact happen to be a long time fan of.

    Again what are you going to about it? Honestly? Like I said shout all you want, but you’ve yet to even come at my point with anything other than a “your wrong because I say so” clause. Show me something that will actually make me agree with you instead of cursing and swearing in such a childish manner and maybe you might actually get me to agree to something as far as how unacceptable you perceive Marie’s character to be.

    How pointless…..

    For the record, god I love TTGL as much as the next guy if not moreso but it was one of the most black and white series I have ever seen. In a fun way though. I mean come on, Spiral versus Anti-Spiral? Apathy versus Activity? Man versus Beast-Man? Progress versus Decay? Of all the series to use as an example for a shades of grey franchise that would be one of the last ones I’d pick. Though it does lend some credence to the theory I’ve been entertaining that unless every show is exactly like Gurren Lagann with non-stop action and brimming with hot bloodedness at every turn then it’s the auto suck. Man do I miss that show just the same though.

    @Myssa Rei: You’re enjoying this way to much aren’t you.

    @Crusader: Well I believe your negativity is making you a little blind too so I think we’re even in that regard.

27. Ominae November 18th, 2008 11:42 pm

    Never liked the Allelujah/Marie moment at the end. It was too soon.

    But I did like Soma getting on top of him. Man, I wish I was in the 23rd Century and was a CB Meister pilot. XD

    Maybe I’ll get reincarnated in the near future and remember this blog post.

28. skoll November 18th, 2008 11:53 pm

    @Kaioshin

    You’re absolutely free to like whatever shit you want. That is your sovereignty, and it has nothing to do with me. Unfortunately, we’re in an argument here. A debate. And whatever piss-poor delusions you hold are in no way going to fly here. YOU yourself chose to come on this blog and argue with the blogger, I don’t want to hear pissy flailing out of you unless its grounded and it’s logical. Which you clearly aren’t. Arguing with your perceptions as fact is unfortunately a critical lack of objectivity. Hint hint, that would make you, “…situated in your perceptions as the absolute god given undisputable fact”.

    I have concrete reasons for why this show makes me sick. I am in no way ’situated in my perceptions’. I LIKED Gundam a LOT when I was a kid; I grew up with it. Unfortunately, I’m a more intelligent person, now, and when you shovel shit in my face, I’m going to be far less likely to accept it. And deride it I will. Maybe I’m watching this show in the hopes that it’ll pull a Zipang.

    As for TTGL, way to strawman me dipshit. I said black and white MORAL snobbery, not black and white… I don’t know, comparisons? Every major villain in that show was villainous out of necessity, Genome wanted to protect the human race, Rossiu wanted to protect the human nation, the antispirals wanted to protect the universe, and at no point was any opposing faction shown to be the ‘Big Bad Evil Empire’ that likes hurting people for no tangible reason. So shove it.

29. Crusader November 19th, 2008 12:09 am

    @meliadoul
    Yeah given the sad fate of Soma, I fear that Louise either has to die or end up beholden to Saji. Death i s certainly preferable in this case. If Patrick jumps out of that Teal MS I will be decidedly elated.

    @Myssa Rei
    As a Marine player you ought to know something about testosterone…
    I know it’s not the half way point yet but this is certainly the first real low point.

    @skoll
    The problem with the childhood friends trope is that it has become stale and boring, it has been used often enough that it takes much more flair to pull it off successfully these days. I agree that was not the case here though.

    @blind_dead_mcjones
    Jihad-kun was too busy worrying about Saji to listen to Ian, I guess it was to be expected from a kid who did not make the cut for Ali’s jihad…

    Well if we are lucky Gundam 00 will get Gundam jacked by a pilot worthy of it, either Bushido Bob or Prince Ali will do. Be funny if Patrick gets free ride though.

    If Soma were still alive I am sure she would have killed the crew in short order and forever rid us of Saji, sadly I do not believe that this will be the case, awesome though it may be.

    @Kaioshin
    Look Peanut, I was appalled that you called this sorry excuse for love a “solid romance” the same can be said about your pathological need to overlook the most glaring of flaws. This was harem animu bullshit it did not have to be this way, yet here you are singing Sunrise’s praise as if this was the greatest Japanese Romance since the Tale of Genji. I would have respected you more had you acknowledged that it was fairly generic, but instead you declared it “solid romance” even within mecha you still have the Macross yardstick to measure by, hell even with the shorter Shiro and Aina stick any one could have seen that this was not up to par and was decidedly rushed. I do not recall any other Gundam couple moving as such break neck speed, but here it is and it looks awfully generic if not outright terrible. The rest of the ep was okay the set up for the next episode was great, but this “solid romance” of yours hardly makes this the best episode so far that honor belongs to episode 1.

    @Ominae
    Sweet then I can hope to become Prince Ali…

    I would have preferred that Soma give Haptism an ERUPTING BURNING FINGER though.

30. Myssa Rei November 19th, 2008 12:14 am

    Crusader and Kaioshin: As a woman, I think it’s a guilty pleasure to enjoy watching the menfolk grunt and bash each other over their heads with rocks over what amounts to a fumble by screenwriters who, by all evidence, aren’t beholden to the watchers (much). There’s still the rest of the season to look forward to though, so it’s far too early to call for the burning of Sunrise. There’s still time for the same screenwriters possibly make an even BIGGER mess, or make something that fits well with the rest of the story so far.

    And just to throw an example in, I think ZEGAPAIN handled romance better by comparison.

31. Ominae November 19th, 2008 12:15 am

    @Crusader

    - But if that’s the case, we’ll be enemies. I doubt if we can “remember” each other.

32. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 12:17 am

    @Skoll: Yes yes, make up your own world in which you are absolutely right about everything and just scream and scream and flame and scream. Way to Argument Ad Hominem me there loudmouth. Funny that Crusader has threatened to ban me from this blog for far far far less rudeness then what you’re giving me here. And I’m the troll. Man I’m half kidding here and just trying to spark dicussion, but you’re just making me laugh myself silly in the same way I laugh at the Tourette’s Guy videos.

    Thing is you’ve said jack shit that has any weight whatsoever so don’t give me any of that crap. All you’ve done is come here and be as obnoxious as you possibly can while I’ve gradually gone through all the points as to why I felt this episode was well done and opens the gate for a good story and if all you can do to counter that is to be a dick and scream about how I’m wrong because apparently your automatically right then I’m afraid you’re the one who is failing to live up to the level of debate we’ve got going here. Take a course in critical thinking or debate or do something with that attitude so that next time if it happens we can make this worthwhile instead of having me argue with Crusader while you just flail about. Yeesh.

    @Crusader: Yes well, we’ll see how things unfold like I’ve said. I hope the story can hold it’s weight (though I see that most of the characters we have this season are the same ones we had last season as opposed to Geass R2 which introduced a bunch of new characters that had to share the development with the old cast and it didn’t work out as well as it could have) and will also add that while Sunrise is not infallible and I’ve never said they are but that I will give some kudos when I think they’ve done a good job. Truth be told I’m not a huge romance fan and I was more interested in the prospects for the characters as opposed to getting all touchy feely. What can I say, you got me.

    Anyway, I’ve said all I think I need to say now. Mr. Screamo here will probably give more of his loudness, but I don’t see it going anywhere. If you’ve got anything else to add then I’ll talk to you though. One more question though, why peanut? Ja ne.

    Oh, one more thing, you’ve got to lighten up a little when I poke fun like I did in the Tytania thread. I’m not trolling you bro, I’m just breaking balls. It means I like discussing things with you and having these crazy debates even if I find you a little stubborn at times. A part of me hopes you do to and most of the angry stuff is just a schtick.

33. Myssa Rei November 19th, 2008 12:22 am

    Kaiohshin: If you understand that, had Crusader been playing Space Marines instead of Imperial Guard or Tau, he’d collect the proud and bright-yellow armored Sons of Dorn, the Imperial Fists… Or Black Templars. Or Crimson Fists… Well, it would make sense.

    (For reference’s sake, Imperial Fists replace standard Combat Tactics with the Stubborn Universal Special Rule)

34. Crusader November 19th, 2008 12:24 am

    @Kaioshin and skoll
    Look I am going to let boys be boys, your both adults and besides I have to slog through Virginia Woolf. So for today Myssa Rei gets to have her fun, and I’ll let her decide because I trust her. So if se wants to see you guys tear each other apart do so quickly you have 6 hours GO!

    @Myssa Rei
    Since you seem to be enjoying this so much you get to have the privilege of making sure Kaioshin and skoll play nice…just say stop and first person that does not gets it.

    Indeed it is quite fun to watch two girls fight as well tearing and clawing at each other with their hawt mud… Oh wait.
    Do not doubt the power of fandom after all MGS4 was prompted by endless death threats to Mr. Kojima, so the story goes… Besides I am not sure if Gundam can take any more GSD type series, this was a fumble and like any rabid sports fan I feel like killing the guy who dropped the ball on a fourth down.

    Let’s also not forget why Gav was disallowed from writing any new army books by himself…we all know what prompted that.
    Also I play Blood Angels Successor though those vanilla rules are so tempting and I don’t get a real codex until the 41st Millenium. Nice try though.

    @Ominae
    Still we both win you get Soma I get to torch a whole nation, everyone wins!

35. skoll November 19th, 2008 12:29 am

    @Kaioshin.

    I don’t know what alternate reality you live in now, but I have presented my points, albeit bluntly, and you have not answered them. Crusader and I have thoroughly sodomized your presumption on ‘good romance’ and have likely defeated you on a political angle that you have, yet, avoided confronting me on.

    Ad hominem is not name calling. If ad hominem were name calling, you all have long been guilty of it. Ad hominem is an argument against the man, get your terms right before you have the presumption to tell me off on them. My argument is not against you, the man. My argument is against your point, to which your own inadequacies are related. Therefore, I am not making an ad hominem attack.

    Again, my points are clearly laid out, and you have simply refused to answer them by belittling my worth. Which IS an ad hominem attack. Funny, the hypocrisy runs thick. Again, I have explained to you why 00 is a moral abomination, why its romance is bad, why your argument is wrong.

    So try to answer next time, instead of cowering behind tough words.

    Ah, and I have no clue as to what the language standard is here on THAT, but the reason Crusader has yet to tell me off is likely connected to the fact that I’m right and not a slavering fool. This is his blog, he and any other blogger, is free to warn me at their own discretion. There’s no law that says people have to be treated equally, though if Crusader himself feels that obligation, he is welcome to slap me on the wrist, ban me, whatever. It’s his blog. Not yours.

36. Haesslich November 19th, 2008 12:42 am

    Is anyone else a tad bothered by the way Marie suddenly surfaced? It’s one thing to go from ‘I don’t like how this is going’ to all-out “I’m MARIE!” mode. Allelujah’s been trying to bring her back, but they didn’t really get much time together, although the revelation later that he was acting in order to help bring Marie out wouldn’t be out of place later on.

    Now, as for the romance part, let me trot out a good example, and a bad example, neither of which come from Gundam since that’s a hot-button for certain people on the Intarwebs.

    Good Example: Mahoraba the manga/anime. Yes, Ryuushi and Kozue were childhood friends, of sorts, even though they didn’t see one another for more than a day or two. But what gets Ryuushi to fall in love with her is her personality and that’s after spending months with her - her love for Shiratori Ryuushi is based mostly on one incident which he’d forgotten about, but it was something she’d clung to for years when her life had gone in ways which weren’t all that good. On the one hand, one could say that the romance was forced - as it was based on an incident which happened once and that’d been completely forgotten about by Shiratori. But at the same time, they both grew into their romances with one another… and that was developed carefully in the manga, albeit less so in the anime which had to speed things up to provide a set ending.

    Bad Example: Star Wars Episode 2. Anakin falls in love with Amidala after meeting her once as a kid. They go places together later, and suddenly they’re so completely in love that Anakin’s ready to burn worlds in order to protect her, while Amidala’s willing to ignore mass slaughter of Tuskan women and children in order to hold Anakin to her breast. They met once, they didn’t really talk too much afterwards, and suddenly they get together and are in terrible lust with one another? Plot Device, much?

37. Myssa Rei November 19th, 2008 12:47 am

    skoll: Actually, not really accurate there. This is an entry BY Crusader (and Calawain, lest you forget) FOR the THAT Blogger team, not an entry on his blog. Now I’m all for lively discourse, but do keep some civility. The same goes for Kaioh. I might not be able to personally drop the hammer, so to speak, but I can call in the whirlwind.

    Take a page from Haesslich. He’s an old-timer, but he can give a heck of an argument without going over the lines of tact.

38. skoll November 19th, 2008 12:52 am

    @Myssa

    Hence why I included ‘other bloggers’ in there. It’s my understanding that Crusader is part of this team, no?

    But fair enough, I’m simply sick of being talked down on by the guy when he never answers me. I’ll refrain.

39. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 1:01 am

    @Crusader: Just one more thing to add, if you didn’t make it out like this series was the hell spawn of satan and that everything it does is wrong (really I can’t think of even one thing you’ve ever said it has done right in any of your blog posts) then I think we could probably find more common ground as well. When you’re always this upset over everything the show does though it sort of dulls the impact and weight of what you are saying and just makes me think “Oh here he goes again”. It makes you look unpleasable to the point of absurdity as opposed to tough but fair. And yet you want me to tow the line and agree with all of your points on the episode when I also found a lot to like about it? Sorry, but good like with that.

    I mean as a person who has a lot of things good to say about the show how much can you agree with a person that seems to hate everything about it? Part of it is perspective too. I see a flaw and I am disappointed, maybe a little annoyed but I don’t freak out massively and think that it spells the end of a show everytime there’s a character point or plot development I’d rather not have happened. Respective faults and offenses get filed under the the degree to which they matter, I don’t bring them to the forefront and let them dominate my entire impression of a show for the worse. For example I didn’t like the insert song at the end, I though it blew and cheapened the whole scene, but that’s just one aspect and like 3 minutes of the episode. I didn’t feel the fight was that great either (Sumeragi’s saving the day was more than a little contrived), but there were some aspects of it I found exciting like Setsuna’s duel with Mr. Bushido which featured some nice choreagraphy. By contrast you’re all in for everything being crap seemingly all the time or at least give that impression, and I can’t get into that perspective. Thus we clash. I’m the kind of guy that is happy when things are interesting and flow well, you’re the kind of guy that apparently needs everything to fall into place exactly how you deem it should otherwise it’s awful. Two completely different perspectives, but is either one really absolute?

    That said even still I simply cannot see this as a ball drop or anything approaching a mess so much as that they probably could have done with Allelujah and Marie joining up without the kiss and the romance. A little forced, but really it was still a development I can throw my support behind. I mean the season for Allelujah has been more or less building towards this point. So it’s not perfect, what is? How much can you really fault the entire episode for a few shortcomings though. When I balanced it all out I came up with an 8.5/10 in terms of how much I enjoyed the episode.

    By the way, if this show gets anywhere near the level of Seed Destiny you will hear about it from me. That show was barely a 2/10 by the time I was done with it Gundam 00 is still a long long way from Destiny though.

    One last thing, if Ali gets in on the action will you be that happy? Really? Somehow I just can’t see it since I cannot at this point ever imagine you being happy with even one minute little thing as far as Gundam 00 goes. Me, I’ll just continue to take the good with the bad, keep an open mind as long as things don’t completely go apeshit plotwise and enjoy this darn good series. Though I do sincerely hope you find something to like about the show. I can’t even imagine how it feels to be this unhappy with something you are watching since I would have dropped the show long ago if I was in your shoes. I mean if you’ve given up all hope as far as what you want from the show and think it’s going to go Seed Destiny then what’s the point. Unless you’re a masochist or something.

    @Haesslich: I think it’s more or less something that just sort of happened. I would have to ask the question how long is the ideal amount of time to spend working on getting Marie out. I mean he chatted her up all throughout the latter part of the last episode and during his stay in prison.

40. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 1:29 am

    @Skoll: Until you bring an argument to the table that isn’t just “I’m right” you’re not going to get that which you apparently so desire. You’ve given me nothing to acknowledge but you’re apparent desire to be incredibly rude to me. I don’t know what you want me to say other then yeah, you’re a really rude person. I mean you don’t even seem to notice that your aren’t even talking about the episode now so much as trying desperately to convince everyone you’re winning an argument that you’re pretty much just having with yourself.

    You cannot win an debate nor have one just by saying that you are. That is why I don’t think much of you right now. Yeah your words are tough (actually I would go with loud), but they don’t amount to anything and I also must ask, what’s the point of debating a person who is already convinced he’s won?

    If you’d like though since I’m a nice guy I’ll take you up on a point you made.

    Nothing has been ass pulled here since all of this was foreshadowed way back in episode 01 season 05. Soma comes into contact with Allelujah for the first time and Allelujah has a flashback to exactly what we see here in his escape from the HRL. Only we didn’t know what it was that happened then. As for what happened when they were young, isn’t obvious? Allelujah was afraid of his surroundings and Marie comforted him and helped him get through it (See episode 04 of this season). Not only that but she gave him the name Allelujah so that he wouldn’t have to think of himself as a specimen anymore. Hence why the whole the whole way in which she referred to him as an inferior test subject was such a big deal in their dialogue this season (See episode 03 of this season). And he clearly didn’t ditch her either and would have saved her if he could when he left the facility, but she couldn’t even walk at that point so there was nothing to do and the way she comes across I would think she told him to go anyway. The intimacy of their childhood set beside what they have now is that she took care of him and helped him get through the Super Soldier progam experience and now he returned the favour in helping her eventually work her way back to her normal self.

    Soma kicked ass, but somehow given what we learned at the end of season 1 this just feels right for her and I’m willing to let her go as a pilot if it should happen. Seeing as there was more to the scene then met the eye with just the kissing and crying (which truthfully I couldn’t care less about) and how it tied back to some aspects of their relationship going back as early as season 1 I would say this was a reasonably tight little plotline. That’s what I’m getting at. Is it as good a romance or story of childhood friends as something you would find in a series where that is the key focus? No, of course not. Is it satisfactory given that Allelujah is one of many characters to have their past revealed in all of these current happenings? Hell yes, and I would say it exceeded my expectations given that this series isn’t really about that sort of thing nor could I have seen it coming. And this is just the beginning.

41. skoll November 19th, 2008 2:13 am

    @Kaioshin

    I’ve never brought an argument to the table that was not ‘I’m right’ and yes, I’m incredibly rude, partially owing to the fact that the very first post I made on this series was demeaned. By YOU. My very first post in fact was a moderately lengthed exposition as to why this series makes me angry, which you and I had a long argument about.

    I don’t want to hear about rudeness from you, and no, my point has never hinged upon my inherent rightness, true as that may be in this case. Let’s break this down for a moment. Excluding the points I have made on earlier episodes of this abomination unto god, a term which I use only half-facetiously, my point on this episode is the following:

    This romance is BAD, this show is worse for it, this is a sign of generally bad writing.

    The supporting facts are as follows:

    -There is no basis for this affection other than a very very brief exposition of childhood exploits.
    -The usage of said childhood exploits is trite, badly used, and generally done well.
    -Admittance of adult romance comes all too quickly, even in Gundam time (that is, time as the characters in the show perceive it, not as we, the viewer, perceive it).

    Your response thus far has been, ‘that doesn’t bother me’, which I have noted amounts to absolutely nothing in an argument given, which, in turn, led to you claiming that I argue from self-absolutism, which ironically is an adjective that in this situation could only be used to describe yourself, as you have chosen to use your opinion as a counter to my accusation of the triteness of this romance.

    Now that we’re clear, let me move on to what you’ve just posted, with your trademark haughtiness. To boil it down, what you have just said amounts to the following:

    First section- you’re an ass (accepted), you have no argument (disproved), you are arguing against no one (disproved).

    Second section-

    -This romance is not ‘out of the ass’ because it has been obviously hinted at for some time.
    -This romance is justified because Orange-bitchface had some intimacy with ‘Marie’.

    Third Section-

    -This romance isn’t good.
    -This romance is still relevant and well-written because it relates to earlier points and because it reveals character elements.

    Now allow me to counter, this time more explicitly, since when I say something to you apparently it amounts to flapping my gums.

    Just because this romance has been coming for ’some time’, which I disagree with, since two episodes hardly counts as ’some time’ for me in a two-season series, does not make it good, satisfactory, or any of the above. What does ‘pulling something out of one’s ass’ mean? Exactly what it sounds like, coming up with something that really reeks on the spot. And this really reeks, for all the reasons I have already conveyed. It is so utterly grounded in the conventions of anime that literally, if someone who does not understand the childhood friend trope were to approach this moment, he/she would doubletake. It doesn’t work, as I said before, childhood affections do not translate into adult romance, and adult it is, given that kiss.

    Neither is it justified by the fact that there was some intimacy, which we were quite literally TOLD, not SHOWN, a point that relates to my overarching point on the bad writing rampant in this show. How long was that flashback? Not very long. And from that, we, the viewer, are supposed to feel satisfied with this hamfisted romance? Utter nonsense. There was maybe one conversation there, from that conversation, through the conventions of anime, we were to extrapolate that Orange-bitchface’s creepy combat-inhibiting attachment to Soma is supposed to be love? Poor writing, and it makes the romance BAD.

    Now, in this last line of thought you directly contradict yourself. You specifically called this romance “solid”, and now you abandon it. At the very least tell me you’re conceding the point, cuz that’s what you’re doing. Including bad romance is bad writing, which you have also specifically taken the opposite view (you say, “good writing”). The fact that romance isn’t the focus is no excuse at all. Was romance the point of Cowboy Bebop? No. Was it still good? Yes. Is the point of Berserk? No. Is it also still good? Yes. If you can’t do it well, don’t do it at all. Frankly, I see the entire subplot as being drastically superfluous. Orange-bitchface doesn’t have to be a super soldier, it’s like they stuck that in there to make him weird somehow, because god forbid you have a normal human being with no tragic past in the cockpit. Which, answers your second point of the third section. No. No it’s not relevant, and who cares if they’re making connections or developing characters. I EXPECT them to make connections and to develop characters, the question is whether they’re GOOD connections and developments. In this case, they’re either bad or superfluous.

    I am hoping to god for the slim possibility that this be the Gundam where the plucky group of color-coded five realize the necessity of war as a means of discourse for the differences of humanity, and embraces its existence, abandoning their futile plot to alter all of human society with five humanoid machines, carrying out actions that would, in any other context, be considered totalitarianism (changing society through force to suit the needs of the few).

    I stuck through Zipang, which was RANK with Japanese nationalistic overtones and was pleasantly surprised by the end, wherein the protagonists accept the course of history and accept the purpose of war– loss of it especially.

    Now, I don’t agree with Crusader entirely here, I think Ali is solidly a villain, and I don’t particularly like him, but you’re largely wrong, on a lot of things, in my view.

42. skoll November 19th, 2008 2:22 am

    ERr, minor error in the above post.

    “-The usage of said childhood exploits is trite, badly used, and generally done well.”

    Supposed to be done BADLY. Don’t know what I was thinking

43. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 2:48 am

    @Skoll: That’s it, I completely give up on you. Not going to bother with this anymore. You’re replies aren’t even making sense anymore and still are just “I’m right because I say so” and “it’s bad because I say so” style of argument on top of wearing your bias on your sleeve. There is literally no point in continuing this discussion as far as I’m concerned because you’ll just keep countering that you are right because you say so and rant and rave about “Orange-bitchface” or whatever it is you’re on about.

    Everything you’ve said up to this point is the very definition of begging the question. Understand this, there can’t be a debate when somebody just keeps assuming the inherent rightness of everything they are apparently trying to argue and then using that as their “supporting evidence”. Honestly……because of this it’s really hard to take you seriously and that is the primary reason why I’m not really giving much credence to anything you’ve said up to this point.

    It’s a good thing that Gundam doesn’t have to kowtow to your every whim as some universal qualifier to be considered good (no matter how absolutely 100% you are convinced in your rightness, which is rapidly approaching the comical side) otherwise this show would be in quite the pickle.

    By the way, it’s “poor writing” not “bad writing”. God I hate it when people can’t get their grammar straight. That’s another thing, how can I argue with something that I can barely even read. Something that’s loaded with slang, random capped words and just plain awful sentence structure. Man oh man you want to talk about poor writing.

    As for your edit, maybe you should start thinking your points through clearly instead of just trying find as many ways as you can to be over the top. Just a tip and another reason why I’m having a hard time taking you seriously.

44. Silver November 19th, 2008 3:00 am

    Very interesting thread I see here today. From my perspective, the first post that I see is from Kaioshi. The next post I see is from skoll replying to Kaioshin with “either you jest or you really carry around a sack full of shit.” Thus, rom my perspective, skoll is the one who initiated the attack. Let’s all be nice to each other okay? It’s nice to have differing opinions but to resort to attacks makes everyone depress (or fun for a certain someone).

    Anyway, personally I thought this episode was still rather interesting and enjoyable. Of course, like the general consensus, the pacing and the general writing for this subplot was rather weak. However, I usually still enjoy it as much as I can rather than picking out and focusing on the bad because what fun would it be anymore if I do that. Of course I would focus on the bad if it’s the only thing that is prevalent in the series but it’s not. Overall, all I am saying is that this episode was good and enjoyable to me. I will repeat once again. This episode was very enjoyable TO ME. Perhaps it was not for you?

45. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:01 am

    @Kaioshin

    It’s not wearing my ‘bias’ on my sleeve it’s making clear my opinion. Nobody come to an argument with an objective stance. That would, in fact, defeat the point of arguing.

    I’d like to beg ‘where’ to where I’m begging the question. So far my point has been that the romance is bad because it was developed short and was stereotypical, neither of which are involved in the ‘question’. This is what I’M talking about when I claim you’re being haughty and running from me. I’ve countered you point to point and you’re being a bitch about it.

    You’re every response to me has been almost entirely rhetorical, which makes me wonder how Crusader ‘argued’ with you at all.

    By the way, ‘bad writing’ works. Type it in word, it accepts it, hand it in on a college paper, it’s accepted. My professor’s HANDOUTS had a paper titled ‘bad writing’ before.

    Which is all besides the point, given the fact that we’re not writing for a fucking government agency, nor are we debating on TV. I can be colloquial all I want– nobody else here seems to throw a fit but you. Crusader gets me fine, Myssa got me fine, everyone got me fine but you. So, again, shove it.

46. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:04 am

    @Silver

    Not at all. If you divide the opinions on this show into two camps, the pro-gov’t people, myself, Crusader, and the peaceniks, yourself (apparently, forgive me if I’m wrong), and Kaioshin, it was Kaioshin who first came on attacking Crusader’s point, which he made in his original blog.

    I merely came to bolster his defense.

47. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 3:25 am

    @Silver: Nice to see at least one other person that more or less shares the same viewpoint I do. Sorry you’ve had to see all of this. I was all for just stepping in and stepping out, but you can’t always get what you want unfortunately.

    @skoll:

    1. ” Neither is it justified by the fact that there was some intimacy, which we were quite literally TOLD, not SHOWN, a point that relates to my overarching point on the bad writing rampant in this show. How long was that flashback? Not very long. And from that, we, the viewer, are supposed to feel satisfied with this hamfisted romance?”

    2. “The supporting facts are as follows:

    -There is no basis for this affection other than a very very brief exposition of childhood exploits.
    -The usage of said childhood exploits is trite, badly used, and generally done well.
    -Admittance of adult romance comes all too quickly, even in Gundam time (that is, time as the characters in the show perceive it, not as we, the viewer, perceive it).”

    3. “Including bad romance is bad writing, which you have also specifically taken the opposite view.”

    4. “This romance is BAD, this show is worse for it, this is a sign of generally bad writing.”

    5. ” I EXPECT them to make connections and to develop characters, the question is whether they’re GOOD connections and developments. In this case, they’re either bad or superfluous.”

    6. “Now, I don’t agree with Crusader entirely here, I think Ali is solidly a villain, and I don’t particularly like him, but you’re largely wrong, on a lot of things, in my view.”

    All of these “points” are what you seem to be trying to prove and you just keep using them like they are evidence or support. That’s begging the question. So far all you have done and will probably continue to do is attempt to use your own argument as it’s proof. You can’t do that, you’ve got to come up with something you can use to support you’re argument that isn’t just your own inherent belief. If you were just stating an opinion then there’s no issue, but you are trying to convince me of something here and so far you’ve yet to convince me of anything other then that you personally think this episode is “an abomination against god”. Well good for you *claps* .

48. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:25 am

    @Silver

    Ah, I just went up and realized, that was Crusader. The, “either you jest or you really carry around a sack full of shit.” schtick.

49. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 3:35 am

    @Skoll: I’ll gladly ask you to point out where I “attacked” Crusader to the point where he need you to “defend” him. In fact as I recall I merely came in and said “I’m afraid I have to totally break with you here” followed by the reason why. I fail to see how disagreeing with someone on the content and quality of an episode is “attacking” the person. I never once made an attempt to ridicule or insult him. Unless saying “I disagree with you” and then praising the episode is somehow attacking somebody and judging from how you seem to think I’ve committed a mortal sin in doing so such that you had to fly to Crusader’s “defence”.

    Honestly, I have to know now, are you actually for real or is this a troll? If it’s the latter then I am mildly impressed and I’ll let you know that you got me for a while but otherwise just…..whoa…

50. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:36 am

    @ Kaioshin

    Sorry to burst your overwhelming bubble, but all of those facts are later justified. But I’ll play along.

    The first instance of circular reasoning is not circular at all. The intimacy was told and not shown because it was done so quickly. Maybe a minute, I’m too lazy to go back and time it.

    The second instance contains several points accepted by even you. Such as the first, as you yourself described the basis for their affection as coming from episode five. Also, there is not development of affection shown whatsoever aside from that part. This is pretty much empirically true, I don’t know how else to tell you that. The second is a point proven by the fact that it relies upon the childhood friend trope, which I again proved, in that their childhood affections spontaneously erupted into adult romance. A point which apparently flew over your head. The third is again a fact simply proven by timing. Use a stopwatch, whatever. Compare and contrast, even with shittier romances in other action anime. Weep.

    For the third… isn’t that self evident? Do good writers write unnecessary and bad romance? If you’re complaining about my usage of the term ‘bad romance’, that’s a point I already solidified.

    The fourth is my point. My thesis if you will. I wasn’t taking it as fact, and you’re a dipshit for not recognizing that.

    This fifth point came at the end after a personal discourse, and is neither thesis nor supporting evidence. Strawman again.

    This sixth point is my concluding sentence….

    ACtually, for a lot of these you took what conclusions and wrote them off as evidence. Actually, I think you knew you were doing that, but you went ahead and named them anyway because you just wanted to be a tool.

51. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:37 am

    You attacked his point, fool, that’s all I was ever talking about. And this didn’t get personal ’til you started being an ass.

    …Don’t you call him Captain America? That’s ridicule, lighthearted or not.

52. mai November 19th, 2008 3:45 am

    My two cents:

    Soma is not dead even though they say she is, as she still resides inside Marie, and I believe this to be an indication that she’ll be back someday, provided that she is given the right triggers for it. I understand how Allelujah made Soma go, as there are some childhood memories that change our knee-jerk reaction to events. Allelujah was the only one who ever talked to her before being changed into Soma by the Super Human Program, it’s natural that she feels just like Marie again upon hearing Allelujah’s voice. Besides, it was established that she did not feel anything wrong about being in the Super Human Program, and for that reason, she shouldn’t hate him for leaving her in that facility. I found Allelujah’s actions forgivable, as he was just a kid, and a sorry guy who’s trying to atone for his wrong actions in the past is much better than just a sorry guy. The only thing I felt uneasy about, just like the rest, is the too-quick pace of the love story - the background is just not enough no matter how you look at it. They were teeny weeny kids back then, that’s not a good basis for a relationship!

53. skoll November 19th, 2008 3:48 am

    @mai

    Thank you, indeed, kiddy friendship =/= adult relationship outside of animu.

    Off ‘ta bed now. I’ll be back.

54. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 3:50 am

    @skoll:

    1. Yes it was shown, you’ll note the clip where Allelujah stood beside Marie’s bed as she comforted him, gave him his name and they developed their supportive relationship.

    2. It’s irrelevant that it relied on a trope, what matters is that it happened, which it did.

    3. Still begging the question. Moving on.

    4. Yeah too bad you can’t prove a thesis with itself. That’s what they call, say it with me now, begging the question.

    5. Well maybe if the whole thing was better structured instead of all over the place I might have picked up on that.

    6. While I may be a bit of a tool, no, it’s just another example of you saying that I’m wrong because you say so.

    Also here’s a challenge, give me one sentence where you don’t just casually insult me with some lame retort like “fool”, because it comes across as pretty hypocritical when you are trying to explain how I am attacking someone. Hint, don’t commit the act which you are trying to condemn as you are attempting to do so. Man do you really remind me of this guy I know when you do something like that.

    Well, I’m turning in for the night. That was a whole lot of getting nowherem but at least it was entertaining. I’ll give you some credit for that.

55. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 4:04 am

    @Skoll: And in return he called me Canadian Peanut. Don’t know what it came from, but we were just having fun. Funny that this is the first time this has even come up with you, and coming from the guy that has called me more derogatory names in one night then I’ve been called in the last 10 years. Pot calling the kettle black. I’m almost starting to suspect that you are that guy. Or perhaps you are getting a little desperate now that you see that your attempts to bully me into agreeing with you are never going to work.

    As for childhood friendships, hate to break it to you, but yeah they actually do on occassion blossom into adult relationships and sometimes marriage in real life. Happens all the time actually. Anime exploits it to an absurd degree, but it doesn’t mean it’s an impossibility in real life.

56. rollchan November 19th, 2008 7:40 am

    such a sad day for Smirnov Sr… he lost a possible common law daughter…

    as for Smirnov Jr, I betcha, he still craves for Louise’ body… arwwoooooooooo!

    Allelujah x Soma.

    who’s next? Lockon x Feldt? hehehehe…

57. elvadrieng November 19th, 2008 9:15 am

    I hate you Crusader. You and your posts about the hardo gei in gundam b00bies made me see nothing but hardo gei when I finally marathoned through the entire show. Damn you.

58. Allelujah and Marie’s Romance, The Work Of The Devil or A Long Time Coming? « When Anime Past Meets Present November 19th, 2008 10:06 am

    [...] 00 is the catalyst for this particular counterpoint so if you want some context head on over here.  What I’m on about this week is the notion Crusader presents that somehow the budding [...]

59. Square November 19th, 2008 10:37 am

    wtf… WTF… W. T. F!!!!! That’s all I could think during this whole episode. So much failed in this ep. I won’t even go into the Soma/Marie plot debacle, hence now referred to as Island Gate (any time sunrise uses an island to throw two people on opposite sides of a conflict to make them all lovey.)

    1st: The Wild Bear has been tamed, declawed, lobotomized, and is now on is place at your local zoo. Seriously, I thought I saw a flash of the old bear before it was brutally crushed by the actions of an out right traitor to the Federation. Why not bring the terrorist back for justice! He could have worked out a information for protection plan! OK sure, I’ll give him one pass cause of his prior actions in S1, but then SIGNALING a terrorist group to their location and giving them a high ranking officer that had intimate knowledge of operations, and probably a high security clearance level is TREASON! The Bear has become unstable in his old age, it’s time to put him out to pasture before his action cause countless deaths.

    2nd: Bushido Bob… you FAIL to live up to the Acre legacy! Be gone from my sight, you are DEAD to me DEAD! Where was the burning passion to avenge your fallen comrades, the willingness to get the job done!?!? Ok, fine don’t kill the terrorist FINE…. but at least capture the suit! Leaving a weapon that potent in the hands of your enemy will cause deaths that will be on Bob’s hands.

    3rd: Not really a surprise but Saji still = loser. Defending yourself in a fire fight is not becoming a murderer! He could have at least pulled the trigger and missed! Instead of getting his hand dirty, he has decided to become deluded with the idea that just maintaining weapons of mass destruction isn’t the same being an “evil murderer”. Sorry to break it to you Saji, but with out a doubt the Gundams will be used to end the lives of many loyal Federation soldiers witch includes your precious Louise and her comrades.

    4th Kataron + Poverty Princess: Ummm… you guys are morons. Ardizatistupidstan has been in bad shape for the last 4 years, the Princess has done basically NOTHING to alleviate the common person’s suffering. When she was captured by the Federation forces she wasn’t even in the country! How do I do know? Why the F would a princess stay in a hotel in her own country?

    Finally some ok stuff: Ginin… I feel for him being the only real professional solider on the battlefield. They could have had a decisive victory over CB but because of BOB’s blundering and gundam snobbery more of his squad has fallen.

    Linct did the right decision to leave the recovery to another regular military unit. While I can understand the frustration from the other A-Law members, it’s not like Linct was saying to not look for them at all. He contacted another unit to look for the lost member while they could peruse a very weakened CB. From strategic stand point, CB was down two gundam, effectively cutting their fighting force in half. Add to that the two gundams left were only long range units, it might be not be another chance they could have again.

    On a final note, maybe comrade Calawain will finally see the Sunrise backed CB for the falsehood that it is.

60. skoll November 19th, 2008 10:54 am

    @Kaioshin

    Holy shit you’re an idiot.

    Post #1

    1. No. You’re just wrong. If you had a romance that consisted of one conversation, some pissant speech during combat, and then a kiss, I pity your definition of romance. Romance is defined as a story about love, and story is defined as an account of a series of events. Two events is not a series of events. Its a pair. You’re numerically wrong.

    2. You see, that what my whole point. Simply ‘happening’ is NOT the mark of good writing. I can SAY a lot of good things, and call it entertainment, and it wouldn’t be entertaining unless it was fucking executed well, dipshit. Relying on a trope, not BUILDING off of it is bad writing. Having to use a genre convention for your audience to understand something, rather than having it form the basis of fist impressions is BAD WRITING.

    3. No. No it’s not. I don’t know how claiming that bad romance is bad writing is begging the question. Probably because its not.

    4. A non-issue, regardless of whether or not I proved it. Which I did. By your logic, any thesis is begging the question because it is inherently an opinion to be substantiated, numbnuts.

    5. Or maybe you could learn to read.

    6. This really doesn’t address anything. In fact, I’m having a hard time understanding exactly what you were retorting to.

    And no, I don’t feel the need not to insult you, in fact, it’s quite natural to me now. Take it affectionately if you like.

    Post #2

    I want to make it clear that I’m not trying to convince you of anything. Again, I’ve already proven you to be an irrational fanboy, and it’s pretty clear that you will suck up any Gundam shit no matter how glaringly bad it is. What I am trying to defeat is your point, your accusation to Crusader’s original, and largely correct, point. Don’t be so vain as to think that I care about what you believe in.

    “As for childhood friendships, hate to break it to you, but yeah they actually do on occassion blossom into adult relationships and sometimes marriage in real life. Happens all the time actually. Anime exploits it to an absurd degree, but it doesn’t mean it’s an impossibility in real life”

    Caught you retreading old points I already won again. YES, they do blossom, but they blossom because the couple in question spends time together and reworks their relationship. Or grew up near each other all a long. Unless your balls dropped when you were six, I DOUBT that you even had the physical capability, much less the mental capability, to form the semblance of an adult relationship. This is a point I made much earlier. Marie and Orange-bitchface had exactly two face to face moments wherein they actually exchanged feelings, so far as we know. Once in their childhood, where it was half-assedly thrown in our face that they were childhood friends, and once in their adulthood where they were suddenly lovers. What. The. Fuck. There was NO transition between these two stages, and since there were no meetings between the characters in the interim, it can be concluded that the basis for the adult relationship lays in the childhood one (your point), which doesn’t make ANY SENSE given the fact that they were just kids. That would imply that their romantic feelings started in childhood, which is bizarre and stupid.

61. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 11:05 am

    @Square: All of which is only the case of you’re viewing everything throw the narrowest of possible viewpoints. I for one am glad that every character isn’t some clone professional soldier like Barack Zinin (who is about as one note as they come) that you seem to want them to be and are capable of actually developing in more than one singular and predictable direction otherwise this would actually be a crappy series instead of just not being the show that you desperately want it to be.

    Lol at all this faux outrage. Hahaha. Glad Sunrise is making this show and not you guys otherwise this would be the most boring predictable show ever. I can see it now:

    Sergei: I can’t see beyond my own personal desire to have Soma as my daughter. Thus I shall simply become a static character who’s sole trait is that he’s an old soldier type instead of maybe learning a thing or two and vice versa from my protege.

    Setsuna: Hoorah let’s move out soldiers.

    Klaus: Clearly we can’t be right about anything ever so I say we just disband and become soldiers in the regular army.

    Thus it was that everybody all joined the Earth Federation as a soldier and Gundam 00 become the shortest Gundam series ever at 1 episode.

    Saji: Our cause is the best cause, I was supposed to be a civilian drawn into the conflict by chance, but the boss said more soldier types so let’s fight! YEAH!

    Graham Acre: I was supposed to slowly go crazy and as a result take up a new set of beliefs from a different culture to support my way of doing things, but instead I’m going to continue being a stactic character and try to avenge my comrades even though I already have. To Battle!

    What a boring show that would have been. Amrite? Here’s to characters with more depth than a G.I Joe.

62. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:07 am

    Come to think of it, I’m not even quite sure exactly why you think that the romance of 00 is even particularly good, even if it were adequate, or what makes you think reliance of a trope (compared to usage of a trope) could ever be considered, in your own words, ‘really good writing’. Or to be more loquacious:

    “Afraid I’ve once again got to totally break with you and praise Sunrise for some really good writing and solid romance. As this one has been hinted at since essentially the beginning of Allelujah and Soma’s relationship I can’t say it was forced in the slightest. In fact I was fairly impressed that they managed to tie what happened in this episode all the way back to the first one Soma appeared in in which Allelujah had those flashbacks to his time as a Super Soldier candidate. I was worried that that was never going to get dealt with.”

    The only basis for your argument being that YOU were impressed with the tie-in, and that it managed to avoid REALLY bad writing. Unfortunately, avoiding really bad writing does not make it ‘really’ good, which is your first logical fallacy, which is later followed by a string of false accusations, strawmen, and ad hominem attacks (”I can’t take you seriously so you’re wrong”).

    So explain this to me. What makes this better than, I don’t know, Kare Kano, which, by the way, uses the childhood friend thing well?

63. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 11:13 am

    @skoll: And I’ve already proven you to be a delusional opinionated sad little man living in his own little lala land where everything is just as he says it is and where he can make up a situation where you’ve already one your argument. Now please just give it a bloody rest already and wake up to the real world. Cause the only basis for your argument is that you say you didn’t like the scenario and that somehow this automatically makes you right.

    You are now beyond a shadow of a doubt the most pathetic person I have ever encountered on the internet. What reality will you dream up next? One can only wonder.

64. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:17 am

    @Square

    Don’t listen to Kaioshin because his idea of ‘good plot’ apparently consists of ‘twists’. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with having more professional soldiers, because professional soldier is a descriptor, not a stock character. There’s also a difference between developing a character and turning one into something the audience hates.

    If I were Sergei, I would have shot the emo-bitch. THEN, I would have dragged my daughter back to the ship, and haver her taste the consequences of mutiny. You have to discipline your kids, after all, and they’re not above the law. Especially the law that you put your life on the line to defend day after day.

65. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:20 am

    @Kaioshin

    We’re discussing what is constitutes good writing here, asshat, it’s an inherently subjective subject. Again you fail to prove that anything I’ve said is merely my ‘opinion’ rather than an acceptable observation. Your arguments FOR are much the same. ‘I like this scenario, therefore I must be equivocally right’. The only difference is, I support better.

    Bitch.

66. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 11:22 am

    Yeah maybe Square should listen to Skoll since they already seem to agree and because Skoll’s apparently right about absolutely everything just because he says he is just like George Bush thinks right about everything just because he repeats his talking points constantly and with as many power words as possible until people start to believe it or just give the hell in. Good thing there are still some of us that are smarter then to fall for that sort of tactic.

67. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:26 am

    Yeah, because I don’t have the stomach for roaring Japanese nationalism, that makes me a Republican. I’m sure you’re being TOTALLY on the EDGE and cool and noncomformist by accepting the views of every liberal fuckbait kid out there. No, no, people, listen to Kaioshin! He must be the messiah of all opinions, after all, it’s a fucking miracle that he could strawman so many times.

    And for the record, I voted Obama, shitface.

68. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 11:30 am

    @Skoll: No you’re clearly the messiah of opinions. You’re Skoll the guy who once he says something will declare that it’s the case and delude himself as such. One who also likes to say the word Strawman a lot too apparently because he thinks he’s actually made an argument that isn’t just a circular one. Make a damn well good case for yourself instead of just flaming and you’ll get yourself a counterargument.

    This is the part where you counter in your usual way and preface it with some lame ass insult that I’m supposed to care about and you assume is supposed to strengthen your cause in any regard. Yawn…..I’m getting pretty tired of this stupidity I’ve gotta say. When you make it so easy it’s barely even worth it.

69. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:32 am

    Who’s flaming? All my points are unanswered, assface, and you’ve done nothing but argue against what you THINK is my point. Actually, that’s too good for you. More often than not, you come one and tell me that I can’t be listened to, then dismiss me. Or say that I’m being circular and not say why, even when I prove it not to be the case.

70. Ascaloth November 19th, 2008 11:39 am

    @Kaioshin and skoll,

    This is…..too funny. You two have made my day. XD

    Seriously, best LULZ I’ve had all week. Thanks for the entertainment, guys. :p

71. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:40 am

    I don’t know why, I prefer xD to XD. I dunno, the off-center eyes just make it for me.

72. Ascaloth November 19th, 2008 11:43 am

    @skoll,

    No, xD is not better than XD, you are just making a CIRCULAR ARGUMENT here. (j/k) :p

73. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 11:44 am

    You’re points are unanswered because they aren’t even points. It’s just you saying you’re right. And with that I’m done. This is stupid, you’re a total joke, you’re not coming up with anything worth discussing. I’m a shitface, assface, idiot, whatever, I don’t give a damn what you say because it’s all just a joke to me at this point. Go back to your own reality now because I’m not going to entertain it anymore. Back to the real world I go.

    And if you can’t see that the transition between the the two’s childhood relationship and what we have now has been the course of the whole series then you are the blind one. I’ll fill out your next comment for you so I can save you the trouble though:

    @Kaioshin: No assface, you haven’t answered any of my points. You’re an idiot who thinks this is a good romance when it’s not. Bite me dumbass! This is a subjective subject where you’re only support is your own opinion, but it’s wrong, because mine is right. Take that dickhead!

    @Ascaloth: It is pretty amusing yes.

74. skoll November 19th, 2008 11:49 am

    “And if you can’t see that the transition between the the two’s childhood relationship and what we have now has been the course of the whole series then you are the blind one.”

    Logical fallacy. Ad hominem.

    Also, you strawmanned me again. Damn, must be the new Rick Roll.

    It’s bad because it relies on a stereotype, is unoriginal, is too short, and no, there WAS NO transition, because the two character met face to face only twice. Actually, in the totality of the show they only talked twice, if you consider Marie to be a different character. Which she is.

    So if you consider reliance on stereotype, unoriginality, and suddenness and lack of development to be good romance then yes, you have me, you win. But until you counter my on any of my accusations of its stereotypicality, unoriginality, and utter brevity and suddenness, I’m afraid I declare victory. *Exhales, sits back, and lights up a cigar*

    Honestly, it looks like most people here agree with me. Maybe not on 00 is a bad show, but almost everyone here thinks that the romance was a wank.

    Oh, I forgot, wanker. Just for you

75. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 12:04 pm

    @skoll: Dude, you’ve already long since declared victory from the moment you started arguing yet you never managed to prove a single thing other then that you’re argument exists so there’s no real need to celebrate. Your whole argument has just been one big celebration after another. In that case I might as well just declare victory for myself because you never actually managed to definitively disprove a single thing I said. Gotta love these situations where everyones a winner, including the people watching from the sidelines.

    As a treat though http://animehistory.wordpress.com/2008/11/19/allelujah-and-maries-romance-the-work-of-the-devil-or-a-long-time-coming/

    There’s everything you’ll need as to my points on the whole scenario. Take your pick, claim I’m wrong, but be warned, don’t expect that you can continue this type of discussion over there otherwise you’ll find yourself on the blacklist faster then you can say “I’M RIGHT AND YOU’RE WRONG!”

    As for Sterotypicality whatever, yeah sure, it was pretty typical of an anime romance, but that does not make something automatically bad. Especially when it’s been lead into to the degree it has. Maybe if you had just come to me with the desire to agree on the fact that it’s fairly average then I might have given you some leeway, but you just came out screaming about how it was this “abomination against mankind” which is laughable and something that I’m of course not going to agree with.

76. Square November 19th, 2008 12:10 pm

    people are in entitled to their opinions, personally I’ve been watching anime for a LONG ASS TIME and I’m jaded. I’m tired of overly emotionally unstable teenagers always knowing better than adults and only looking at the short term and never the long term.

    I’m tired of the harem moe blobs dominating every anime. I want something like old school gundam (my favorite is 08th BTW) where it’s about war and not about super robots and emo teen crushes. I want characters that act like humans and not cartoon characters. People do not have massive mood swings that completely change their personalities nor are they forgiving at a drop of a hat.

    Gundam 00 was supposed to be a throw back to the old gritty days of Zeta, season 1 was fine for setup and the beginning of season 2 looked to be heading in that direction. Then ALL OF A SUDDEN we get the worst Char clone ever, teen angst from a perspective that no one really wanted, a worthless princess that doesn’t even have any convictions (Relena is kick ass compared to princess poverty and she didn’t even have a country until the end of the show!), an “evil” organization that hasn’t done anything genocidal on screen (Nena killed more innocent people and enjoyed it in one scene than the whole of A-Laws combined current airtime).

    Also being a professional solider doesn’t mean they’re card board characters. My favorite was Norris Packard from the 08th. He was a noble father figure that cared about his people, but knew what war really was. There was no romanticizing it even when he found out that Shiro was Aina lover. He knew he had a job to do and did it to the best of his ability.

    As far as romance goes, I’ll just reflect on Macross Frontier, (Sheryl sama!) Trying to force a love on someone just doesn’t work on a normal person. It takes real sacrifices to love, and just having a shared childhood memory or puppy love is not a good foundation for a lasting love.

77. skoll November 19th, 2008 12:24 pm

    @Kaioshin.

    I’ve read this all before. And its still countered. I’ve never argued that it came out of the blue, only that it was bad and cobbled together poorly. Neither have I argued that the the romance is because of bad writing. I HAVE argued that it IS bad writing.

    Your evidence stems from a reliance upon a checklist-like formula of good writing. Which is inherently bad. See, this may be shocking, but just because it was ‘a long time coming’ doesn’t mean that its good.

    Nowhere in your blog have you addressed my point of the transition from prepubescent affection to adult feelings. In fact you seem to be operating under the impression that their feelings were romantic from the start, as you write, “Soma: “I’d go with you if I could darn well do anything other than communicate telepathically”” which is nothing less than disturbing.

    You call that kiss ‘experimenting’ and I do beg to differ. That scene lacked any of the awkwardness or shyness associating with experimenting. In fact, it most closely resembles the perennial ‘reunion kiss’, as in, the reunion of lovers. Which again, they simply weren’t before this episode, either because of age or lack of contact. Hell, this ‘Marie’ crap only came about this season. Is this bad writing? Or is this poor directing? Either way, it’s not ’solid romance’.

    And that’s why it’s forced. It’s forced because it takes two characters with no actual screentime of romantic interaction, or interaction at all, excluding a short childhood phase that can be discounted by the subjects’ youth, and glues them together for what seems like the express purpose of having a romance between opposing parties, a dichotomy that they have just eliminated with Marie’s betrayal of her foster father.

78. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 12:43 pm

    @Square: Well it’s unfortunate for your case that it looks like 00 is in fact going to be it’s own unique series as far as Gundam goes, but for me there’s no real issue. I could watch MS Igloo 2 for the gritty stuff and 00 for it’s mixture of character drama, morality tales and solid action and enjoy both just the same because I’m pretty laid back when it comes to anime. I think that if you want people that act like real humans instead of cartoon characters though that you are looking in the wrong place by watching anime. This is a universe where we have something like Super Soldiers with split personalities who DO have mood swings and personality shifts much like Allelujah had in the first season and that’s just kind of the way it is. If you don’t like that then so be it, nobody can force you too, but can you really fault a show for just carrying through with it’s own established in universe Science Fiction?

    I do think that burning down an entire country so that it can be rebuilt as a pro EF region borders on genocidal though. It’s about the equivalent of the Titans gassing an entire colony. And boy did Ali enjoy it. As for Norris Packard, yeah he was the man, and so is Sergei, just in a different way. To me he doesn’t have to be Norris Packard in order for him to be a strong character.

    Though I wouldn’t by any stretch cite Sheryl Nome as a hallmark of a good character. At least from my perspective. If there’s ever a character that seemed to keep flip flopping personalites and vulnerabilities versus stoicness then it was her. And she didn’t have a good excuse for it like super soldier conditioning or anything either. I know everybody seems to love Sheryl to death, but that was pretty much my third least favourite character in all of Frontier following Luca in second and Ranka’s dimwitted busty friend Nanae at number 1 with some of the most random reactions to situations that I have ever seen.

    And thank you for showing how to debate something with someone while remaining civil. Now might I strongly suggest MS Igloo 2?

    @Skoll: First of all the Marie thing came up at the end of last season, Second of all, what is with this assumption that children at a young age cannot have romantic feelings for each other, Third of all Jesus Christ already dude, just be content that you have your viewpoint of the episode already and that I have mine and be done with it already. Why do you keep carrying on when I keep making it clear that I really don’t care what you have to say because you’ve already made up your mind (thus making this argument long sense moot) and that I originally just came here to express myself and say that I disagree with Crusader and give reasons why. I’ve made up my mind too but the difference is that I haven’t made it a personal quest to convince everyone that mine is the only possible viewpoint and you don’t see me trying to force it on to you do you? Give it a rest already…..Crusader got it, Myssa got it, Haesslich got it and now Square seems to have got it as well. Take your viewpoint, leave me mine already and get off my back.

    I deem it acceptable writing, you don’t, just learn to live with it already.

79. skoll November 19th, 2008 12:59 pm

    @Kaioshin

    We seem to have differing views on raw discussion, you see, you seem to think that I’m somehow supremely displeased right now, and that I want to stop arguing, because argument is bad. That’s simply not the case. I love this, I think arguing like this is a lot of fun.

    Young children fundamentally cannot have adult relationships with one another. They can like each other, maybe play with crushes, but this doesn’t amount to romance. Unless you’re willing to claim that the crush you had in second grade was a sweeping whirlwind romance, I solidly disagree.

    You see, you missed my point again, my point isn’t that they didn’t have affections for one another when they were young, but that those affections do not resemble the ones they have now, thereby making it forced.

    I’m not quite sure what you mean about Square or Myssa ‘getting’ it, they still seem to have their opinions, and Square’s even taken the time to rebuff you.

    I SAID from the start you’re entitled to like whatever crap you like. But like I said, you came to the field of discussion when you posted a counterpoint to Crusader here on this blog, you brought this upon yourself. I’m not trying to convince you. Woah deja vu. Or not, I actually did say that before. Regardless, had you said ‘I think’ or, ‘It’s my opinion that…’ I would have accepted it as your opinion and made my own unrelated. Of course, you didn’t. Your first post was a ‘this IS’ statement, which I joyously read as combative.

    Anyway, I feel the fight coming out of you right now, so why don’t we settle on this:

    The romance is nothing special and its quality is directly related to the degree to which the viewer likes Gundam 00. For me, who fundamentally clashes with the ideals of Gundam, its message, and its delivery, I find it to be especially ham-handed. For you, who clearly is more in harmony with the philosophy posited by our friends at Sunrise, it is far more acceptable. Maybe even, *shudders*, good.

    Now if you’re tired of this, and want to agree to disagree, fair enough. I’m not convinced by you, and it doesn’t look like many people are either. Which is fine, since truth is a concept divorced from popularity. That truism doesn’t really apply here, but you catch my drift, you can think as you are. Now lets shake on it or whatever, I have a lab report to write.

80. Crusader November 19th, 2008 1:10 pm

    @skoll and Kaioshin
    Okay six hours are long over due. Where was Myssa? T_T Any way the Last Domino Falls Here time to take it else where boys…

    @Everyone
    I hope to reply later on, apologies but school calls…

81. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 1:17 pm

    @Crusader: By your leave. *bows out*

82. icelogue November 19th, 2008 1:50 pm

    God, Saji needs to die.

    @Crusader
    Have fun, you’ll need it.

83. Dark messiah November 19th, 2008 3:34 pm

    Whatttt the fuckkkkk……????!!!!! That emo allellujah kissed space loli?? Yadaaa,yadaa,yadaa
    I just wanna see somaXlouise forever and i wish allellujah=the emo meister with saji out of picture sooonnn.
    (Soma will return comrade, Soma will return..!!! for the sake of world Unification)

    Now back with Gundam 00 thing, That’s so silly Setsuna cant beat Bushido-bob.
    @Crusader - Yeah, i think Mr.bushido love gundam 00 more than everything in his life and Gundam 00 starting to liking bushido-bob too, Gundam 00 is bored and tiring become a CB slave for a long-time. remember those two GN drives is a old stuff comrade and it comes from 0 gundam and exia solar furnace…

    Now wait, I’ve seen A busty Tieria in picture Whoa..whoa..whoa
    what have we got here??? this is the first time i’ve seen Mecha series with Three Clones of innovator and one of them is very cute. that 3rd clone is very suitable for Yuri doujinshi material. I laughed so hard and fresh blood come out from my noses…
    By the way Emoism, bokuism, Pacifist ideal, Softcore dead bodies, Awkward military fashion style is a typical sunrise mecha show.
    Damn U sunrise Pansies..

84. FlameStrike November 19th, 2008 4:37 pm

    Whoa mad ass rant, but it’s pretty intresting nonetheless lol. Still Kaioshin it seemed like the whole time all you’ve been doing to counter skoll’s points was say something like “LOL U say ur right and say u won already so ur wrong.” From what I read he DID have pretty valid reasons as to why the romance was bad and provided evidence too… although it was added with tons of rage and swears. Your posts seemed to be the opposite, no rage/swears but I don’t recall you countering his reasons either.
    One of the things that I really didn’t like was the lack of “development” in the MxA apartment. There was a lot of foreshadowing all throught gundam that they might be connected but if you take into account how they interacted and how much interaction occured between them it doesn’t seem to justify the end result of them becoming lovers.
    Oh well everyone has his or her thoughts on the matter. I personally thought it was bad but it doesn’t matter x.x

85. Salyu November 19th, 2008 5:03 pm

    This is anime, so of course they kissed. If this was real life or some real life-ish American TV show, they probably would’ve had a very warm and cuddly hug (while Allelujah cops a feel). And to go to extremes, if this was porn (or lolihentai) they would be having “hello sex” right then and there. Anime characters say hello by kissing (at least when it isn’t a comedy).

    Ok seriously now, my point is, since this is a 25 episode anime series, would you, as the audience, want Sunrise to waste 5 minutes of the next 5 consecutive episodes building up a relationship that you know will inevitably happen? Allelujah and Marie have reunited and established their relationship. It’s done. Over with. In one episode. No need for any more obvious hints. This was the quickest and most efficient way to end a subplot that everyone knew was coming from the first time Allelujah said “super soldier. All Al did was activate his Trans-AM in love. Time to move on to the next mystery (ahoy there Tieria).

    On a side note, props to Allelujah for being the only jigolo in recent Gundam series to take home the girl with whom he gets stranded. Hell Shin couldn’t even seal the deal and Stellar was half naked. Don’t fail me now!

    PS Hallelujah is dead. Soma is not necessarily. She’s still somewhere inside Marie, probably waiting to bust out when Marie gets in a bit of trouble to save her from completely sucking as a mobile suit pilot.

86. FlareKnight November 19th, 2008 5:12 pm

    Finally made it to the bottom of the page….

    Wow glad to see everyone is debating calmly….Yeah ok its a complete mess going back and forth with the pot shots fired on each side. Might get me killed but I didn’t hate the episode. Marie clearly existed under the surface so its not like she hasn’t experienced anything from the beginning. Just that Soma was the personality on top of it. Don’t see why anyone would go and bury Soma right now. Marie taking over as top personality doesn’t mean Soma is gone for good. Its like saying Allelujah was dead every time Hallelujah took over. Lets just wait and see how things turn out for Marie/Soma before losing our heads here.

    Oh and Crusader, Propaganda only works with some level of believability. Ali giving a speech…..Guy would just go around blowing things up and laughing in joy of it. Unless he was held at gunpoint with a speech someone else wrote no way is he doing that.

87. Haesslich November 19th, 2008 5:57 pm

    You know, watching people argue about 00 is sometimes better than some of the plot developments… or in Setsuna’s case, lack of development.

88. Crusader November 19th, 2008 7:00 pm

    @Haesslich
    Tad bothered is an understatement, this is in my opinion one of the worst marooned escapaeds ever to have taken place in the franchise, I was prepared to be let down but that 0-kiss in the space of 15 or so minutes was just too awful to ignore.

    Mahoraba did spend time to build it up and make it a process rather than stick to only yubikiri rules of love. Episode II was simply terrible “I can learn to love sand” was it? Problem for Lucas was that it became too central, at least Han and Leia kept things off to the side nor did they go so far in the films. Teenagers…they ruined Darth Vader. NOOOOOOOO!!!!! indeed
    @Myssa Rei
    Still having fun?

    @Silver
    Comrade I was the one who asked if he was carrying a sack full of shit, not skoll…

    @mai
    I think Soma is dead for good and if she does come back I only want it to be to snap Saji’s neck and rip out Haptism’s balls. Haptism is not just a sorry guy he’s a lecher and a pervert, he moved way too fast to be harmless.

    @rollchan
    Sergei was screwed.

    @elvadrieng
    Mission Accomplished.

    @Square
    Poor Ginin is surrounded by idiots, no doubt he and Bob will come to blows, at least Louise can count on Ginin to teach her how to kill Kataron. Lindt is being a dick, but yes he’s not doing things just to be mean he’s just putting the mission as his top priority. I can’t wait to see Lindt pull his hair out over Patrick.

    I think many of us are hoping that this is will be a return to form rather than a new Gundam in the mold of SEED. Norris was awesome and he is probably rolling in his grave at the sight of this Haptism and how these days cos players are taking down kids in Gundams instead of having it be a fight between soldiers.

    @Ascaloth
    You are having too much fun.
    @icelogue
    Heh, thanks. Indeed Saji must die, he did not embrace democracy so he must be eradicated..

    @Dark messiah
    With any luck Louise will claim this Marie in lieu of Soma, or Louise awakens the once and future Soma with a kiss. Now that would be EPIC.

    @FlameStrike
    There was foreshadowing since the end of last season, but to bring Marie in and have a relationship in the space of 15 minutes or less was really sloppy and lazy.

    I am sure Prince Ali can give good speeches, given that he has not been killing stuff I can only assume Prince Ali is conducting negotiations on the establishment of Kurdistan.

    @Salyu
    The issue is that is was done inthe space of 15 minutes or less it was rushed and even compared to other marooned instances within older Gundams this was by far one of the worst outside of SEED and GSD.

    @skoll
    In the end I agree that this was poorly executed even if it was never a Gundam strong suit, just because every other time was ham handed does not mean that they have license to do worse than previous teams. Even if the message was terrible, delivery could have been improved.

    @Kaioshin
    This was not ’solid romance’ by any means it could have been done so much better and when compared to older Gundams this was still pretty bad. “Gundam 00 being it’s own series” does not excuse poor delivery even if you buy into this tepid romance. I want this to be a return to form and ever will it be compared to the series that came before, otherwise why call it Gundam in the first place? It is an heir to a distinguished legacy and if it is not up to snuff then I guess the old magic is truly dead. I do not believe in unconditionally accepting the promise that things will be all fine and dandy in the end, the treachery of GSD is something I do not think we should soon forget nor ever forgive.

    Cynicism prevents disappointment, if things turn up good, great. If not then it minimizes disappointment and gives a better gauge on when a series jumps shark. I consider this romance to be less than ideal, and much less than solid. If they can recover great, but let us not pretend that this in any way measures up to previous maroonings or Gundam pairings. 15 minutes is hardly enough time to conclude that you love some one and start feeling each other up. Perhaps in Canada the women there are decisive about love and can resolve to enter a romantic relationship in less than an hour, but in my experience love is not that instant, infatuation is, but not love.

    Your mecha license has been revoked since you have discounted one of the better heroines to have blessed Macross in sometime. More over you coupled with the declaration of this as a solid romance it is clear that in the words of Patton “you know as much about fighting as you know about fucking”. Sheryl was the only character whose creation stunned even Kawamori himself that is quite an accomplishment, much like how Misa took on a life of her own so to speak. But back to Gundam 00, if Ali and Patrick show up and the ball starts rolling at a great speed I will be more than happy, it will be at least interesting instead of dialogue expositions by Kataron, and ham fisted romances like the one we just saw.

    You seem far too certain that Ali is acting on behalf of the Federation, we only know he’s on Ribbons’ payroll that does not make 00bama and Homer the ones pulling the strings. Sure Azadistan was independent but Ali burned it to the ground, would it therefore have been permissible to let them all starve even more? As far as the Feddies are concerned it is a failed state whose leadership has disappeared and fled with CB moving in and establishing order is not that evil on the level of a colony gassing. Ali is evil, but he’s not a Feddie, he’s batting for Ribbons so far, not Homer or 00bama. What kind of idiot would set up an obstructionist government that interferes with humanitarian aid missions, why would they set up a hostile government in the wake of the Ali intervention?

    If you think merely dropping aid into a failed state will help you are sorely mistaken, I doubt there is any other feasible way to get aid out there quickly enough, though if you prefer to wait for an ideal solution while people starve then so be it. I think it is better that Kurds and Azadistani get fed under a decent if Feddie government, rather than let Mariana lead the charge under the old order. We have not seen anything overtly excellent evil yet and to say that Ali is on Feddie pay is simply false there is no proof that Ali is working for anyone other than Ribbons who is playing his own games. I fail to see how feeding a failed state and establishing order is any worse and evil than having a well meaning failure who lives comfortably watching TV all day as her people die daily from bullets and want of food. Again you are assuming that the Feddies are bad based on the 4th hand testimony of Kataron and CB. Wang is feeding intel to both I would not be surprised if the Feddies were not as bad as they say once Wang’s motivations for lighting the world on fire are revealed. With any luck Ribbons will tell us of his plans. Unlike the rest of the cast at least Ribbons knows what is really going on.

    @Haesslich
    You are having too much fun…

    Though you are right Jihad-kun is not getting much done other than losing to Bushido Bob and flirting with Saji…

89. Myssa Rei November 19th, 2008 7:03 pm

    Crusader: Sorry, work day drained me more than I thought, and I fell asleep half-way through the evening, so I wasn’t able to keep track of the proceedings. And my word… Otoko ga moeru ze. I’m half-ashamed that I wasn’t able to watch the fireworks, and half-ashamed not being there to step in and smother the flaring tempers. ^^;

90. Crusader November 19th, 2008 7:07 pm

    @Myssa Rei
    It’s fine I overslept as well, though did you have fun?

    Had to stop the dominoes from falling though…

91. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 8:34 pm

    @Crusader: Well I just hope to god that you actually have some intention of acknowledging the series if it does turn out “good” even though after 31 episodes of you making this out to be the worst show ever made I can’t see how you could claim that is on the table. Just keep in mind that good for you isn’t necessarily good for everyone. When you portray this sort of tunnel vision where Ali and Patrick are somehow the solution and end point to every plotline to be considered “good” then it’s really hard to take you seriously as a “critic”.

    I have to ask though, when have you ever been this “cynical” about anything that isn’t a Sunrise series? It really just makes it look like you are following the popular bashing trend and not like you have the best interests of the franchise in mind. Maybe if you’d find just one positive thing to attribute to the show we might find a little common ground, but for now it just looks like you are going through a formula instead of really watching the show as a fan intent on giving it a chance to prove it’s merit, which I think it has on some occasions and has fallen short of doing on some others.

92. Crusader November 19th, 2008 9:22 pm

    There you go again Peanut with the black and white bullshit of there being some overmind and conspiracy that is out to get Sunrise, you are in the minority that believes that Gundam has not decayed in recent years. You have some mistaken notion that everyone who has something less than good to say about Gundam has something against Sunrise. You idolatry of them is strange to say the least, but you are not the only formerly certified mecha fan out there, just because you overlook and declare this “solid romance” does not make it so. The only shows that ever came out of hell were GSD, SEED, Evangelion, and KimiNozo.
    I gave them a chance long ago in the GSD and SEED years, I am under no obligation to be duped by them again clapping nervously along as crap like this ate up air time as something good. You presume much if you think Sunrise is the only target of my cyncism…were it so easy to limit cynicism and skepticism to only one thing. Let me enlighten you on this concept of cynicism which seems so alien to your wide eyed post grad never deployed bag of water mentality, I am in the military my equipment is made by the lowest bidder, my government is not a shining beacon of decency and good fiscal policy, tell me what hope I really have of any of that changing? So you want cynicism eh? Fair enough I am cynical about Tytania in ever having good or even decent animation, I was fairly unenthusiastic about much of the animation in Macross Frontier though they had the courtesy to save the best for the dog fights, however as long as that was the only error things were fine. I am stil skeptical about ToraDora though it has been fun and while I am not blogging it and have deferred to my comrade I am wary that it will become ZnT. Gundam 00 is the opposite problem it looks pretty, but giving me one of the most lackluster pairings in Gundam history is not going to allay my suspicions that the curse of GSD still pervades.

    If it turns out good I shall give a sigh of relief once it is over and done with, but until then I am not going to celebrate early with you that this is a return to form when it is still on going. Because there is such a thing as executive meddling I believe in being cautious, Market Garden was going pretty well at first, but we all know how that turned out. Even the best of us can fail, Gundam 00 is one of the more ambitious series this year as I have said over and over again, ambition cuts both ways. There is a rather large cast, there are a number of plot threads that need to be resolved the possibility of snafu is there and this episode does not boost my confidence. Why should I be optimistic when the demonstrated how much they were willing to make SEED and GSD in their quest for money? Should I trust the company who gave license to make a Gundam to a man who said his personal focus would be on selling toys? They are still a corporation married to a toy company with a vested interest to sell kits, you have every right to trust them, but I am under no obligation to follow your lead. I wandered into one Gundam minefield, as they say once burned twice shy…

    I have not survived this long by making the same mistake twice. If they succeed great, if not well my disappointment will be much less than yours.

93. Kaioshin Sama November 19th, 2008 9:49 pm

    @Crusader: Exactly what I was looking for. I think we have come to terms.

    If you want to know the honest truth though I think that Gundam Seed /Seed Destiny damn near killed the franchise and that is why I am banking so much on 00 to save it. I was exactly like you 4 years ago as far as cynicism goes and I had my doubts early on with 00, but it has done a lot to alleviate my worries over the course of it’s run. Like Mulder I want to believe and so far I can’t say the series has done much to disappoint me. Should this one end in another battle with some fortress in space though I am pretty sure I will have a coronary.

94. Yamila November 20th, 2008 7:32 am

    wow Crusader, you’re even angrier than all the yaoi fangirls out there… o___o;;

    what can I say, I don’t really care about Alle/Soma… for me it’s the same. I’m just mad over the fact that MR. BUSHIDO LET THE 00 GO -___-

    like other people commenting here, I’ve also begun to notice all the plot holes in this damn series. Romantic Alle/Soma came out of nowhere, Setsuna and Marina didn’t die at the hands of Ali, of all people! (seriously, how the fuck did they escape from there???), the Kataron folks having a base in the middle of the desert with KIDS in it… just, wtf? But I’m so addicted to G00 and Mr. Bushido that I can’t leave it even if I want u__u

    but well, guess boobies!Tieria makes up for everything. Hurray for transexuality. XD

95. Kaioshin Sama November 20th, 2008 2:12 pm

    @Yamila: Actually the only one that’s really a plot hole there is that Setsuna and Marina somehow just turned around and ran away from Ali. There’s like no explanation there, they see him and then he turns around to acknowledge there presence, end episode, and suddenly next episode they are back at the base reporting on it. Romantic Alle/Soma is endlessly debatable (I say there’s a path that gets you too it pretty clearly), but there’s really no plot hole in the base having kids on it that were war orphans picked up by the Kataron folks, it’s just a really really really dumb idea.

96. skoll November 20th, 2008 3:25 pm

    I wonder how you make a curved beam katana. Were there beam-axes? Or did the zaku-axes just get hot? I forget.

97. Kaioshin Sama November 20th, 2008 3:49 pm

    When a beam weapon is turned on there is a containment field that is first projected known as the I-Field which consists of opposite charged minovsky/GN particles to those which will fill the I-Field itself. This helps keep the beam intact and form it’s shape into a cutting blade. You can modify a beam weapon to project a containment field in a variety of shapes so that you can have anything from a beam javelin to a beam flag. The same I-Field is also used on Mobile Armors such as the Big Zam to reflect incoming beam particles. It keeps Minovsky particles in and keeps them out.

    As for Heat Hawks, yeah they are just super-heated solid cutting weapons. They don’t use beam technology at all.

98. grss1982 November 20th, 2008 8:19 pm

    “W-why? First off my predictions on which meister would bag the first woman were wildly off. The underdog Haptism came out of nowhere to seize the Space Loli. She already even mounted him and made loud screams that taken out of context appear very sexual.”

    Exhibit A: http://i33.tinypic.com/2niv153.jpg

    Taken out of context indeed!!!!

    =====

    “i see Ribbons is getting a custom suit, I dub the Liberty Two. So Mr. Ribbons where is Prince Ali in Liberty Prime?”

    @Crusader: First thing that came into my head on seeing that green MS was “Tekkaman?”

    BTW….Katie really looks HOT in the pics you posted. It must be the uniform.

99. Haesslich November 20th, 2008 10:48 pm

    Kaioshin: As you’re so fond of pointing out, each Gundam series is different from the other and thus we shouldn’t set any expectations or prejudices based on past Gundams. They don’t explain how the beam weapons (or GN particles) work here, and the old Zaku heat-axes were just normal heat weapons anyhow. Let’s try to avoid dragging Minovsky into this until they confirm they’re still using the same style of ‘physics’ here as they did in UC-based Gundams. Otherwise someone’ll be dragging in Gundam SEED Destiny’s ‘wings of light’ and we’ll have another argument about how SEED Destiny sucks and all that.

100. Kaioshin Sama November 20th, 2008 11:06 pm

     @Haesslich: They don’t explain how Minovsky physics work in the Gundam universe either, it’s all supplementary stuff. And they actually do have a GN-Field in 00 that functions much the same way as the I-Field (see the Alvaaron) so I think it’s pretty clear that they are similar in that regard. It doesn’t need to be told as it’s already been demonstrated, pseudo-science that it is. The only thing I know that is different is that GN Particles act as a heat sink for atmospheric re-entry and I never recall seeing Minovsky Particles do that in U.C Gundam.

     And I believe you mean Victory Gundam’s Wings of Light (aka the Minovsky Drive) thank you very much. :p

     Honestly though, I think that most of the people here are pretty much convinced that Gundam 00 is of the same crap quality as Gundam Seed Destiny (even though it isn’t) so if there’s going to be an argument over a show sucking then it’s going to happen anyway.

101. Crusader November 20th, 2008 11:14 pm

     @Yamila
     Well how could I not be mad over the separation of Soma from Louise, much yuri potential was lost.

     Such a pity that Acre is truly dead and gone. Looks like Gundam 00’s affections will go requited.

     @skoll
     I am sure there is a technology manual out there in the soft sci-fi vein, but failing that for beam Katanas, Rule of Cool I suppose.

     @grss1982
     NOOOOOOOO!!!!! That’s not how it happened, That’s not true, THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!

     Let’s hope Patrick jumps out of it.

     Katie has always be hawt.

     @Haesslich
     I think that will be some expectations, it still bears the Gundam title I personally hope they have every intention of living up to that legacy. I want at least a Turn A, kudos to them if they get to 0083 or better.

102. Li Shan November 21st, 2008 12:16 am

     http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb199/Mangaka-chan/Miscellaneous/1227239909593.jpg

     PATRICK LIVES!!!!!
     (can anyone translate what the japanese words are next to his name?)

103. Kaioshin Sama November 21st, 2008 12:21 am

     It talks about how the AEU ace Patrick Corlasawar has joined up with the A-LAWS in order to fight the Gundam’s and to be with….er support Katie Mannequin. Naturally. Also it seems Sumeragi real name is Lisa/Risa Kujoh.

104. Crusader November 21st, 2008 12:34 am

     @Li Shan
     Sweetness… GNZ-003 “Liberty II” Gadessa, may Patrick jump out of that cockpit instead of Revival.

     Well Louise is looking rather lovely, Andrei will no doubt be delighted.

105. blind_dead_mcjones November 21st, 2008 1:31 am

     The text also says he survived seven times against the Gundams, and got the nickname The Immortal Colosawar (translation courtesy of Ngee Khiong blogspot)

     and i must say he looks quite smashing in that outfit

     @crusader

     that he will be, though the oufit does give her a slight passing resemblence to misa…hmmmm

106. Yamila November 21st, 2008 6:28 am

     @ Kaioshin Sama: oops, that was me with 3 hours of sleep and therefore, failing to express myself T__T You’re right, the only real plot hole is the Setsuna/Marina thing… I mean, Ali says “yeees it’s what you’re thinking and I’m back to cut you in pieces!!!!” and in the next ep you have Setsuna and Marina emo-ing in the Ptolemaios again… just like he did with Nena, Ali-sama never kills the characters I have a deathwish on. =__= Then yeah, Alle/Soma just depends on your vision of their relationship in their childhood, and how it develops when they are older… In my humble opinion, it can be romantic, yes, but not one night after Soma remembered everything… after some more episodes of interaction between them it would have been much more understandable. But well. I love love XD and then yeah =_= they only have the kids there for… the lulz? XD;; *can’t think of anything atm* Thank you so much for the correction!

     @ Crusader: oh, I thought you were a Soma/Sergei fan XDD;;; But yeah, there’s some yuri needed in this series… even if I can’t complain at the amount of yaoi hints.

     Well, I shall follow Mr. Bushido till the end no matter what, but I can’t say I like his lack of determination and even balls at certain points. It’s like Sunrise kept him alive from Season 1 to have Setsuna worry about his ass all over again… *sighs* I just want Billy to design a super kick-ass Ahead for him, he deserves it.

107. lelangir November 21st, 2008 9:48 am

     I don’t have the will to read through 100 comments but I’d second Ali’s killing of both quantum brain wave schizophrenic lovers

108. Haesslich November 21st, 2008 5:31 pm

     Kaioshin: This is like arguing that because Battletech has slow Mechs that mecha in Macross have to be slow on the ground as well, and all have to be 50-70 pounds to have LAM equipment or to move around; which isn’t true. Because they look superficially similar does not mean they operate on the same principles, or that technology used in one series can be used to explain how they work in a different series because they’re both mecha, or in this case both Gundam series; especially as this is a different timeline from the Universal Century and thus they have different technologies. Or like saying that the I-fields used in UC Gundams for the “Wings of Light” are the same as the technology they employed for those beam-deflecting wings/shields in SEED Destiny, or that GN particles = Minovsky particles because they’re the magic plot device which allows them to do the things they do.

     Best not to get into those arguments.

109. Crusader November 21st, 2008 6:22 pm

     @blind_dead_mcjones
     Yes the one thing Patrick has going for him is that he is a survivor and nigh unkillable, long may the Federation Ace annoy Lindt.

     Louise is looking quite radaint such a tragedy that this Marie had to rear her ugly head before the party, Louise could have chose Soma a dress…such a tragedy.

     @Yamila
     Soma met Louise sparks flew and I liked it…I cannot say no to yuri after all.

     @lelangir
     Here here comrade! May Soma and Haptism get Ali as their limo driver…

     @Haesslich
     So Phasers or Lasers friend? Vibroblades or Bat’leth?

110. Kaioshin Sama November 21st, 2008 11:45 pm

     @Haesslich: I have more then a few things to say to that as a counter, but by your request I’m going to let you off the hook as I don’t want this to go another 100 comments as well. Just this once though. :p

111. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 12:11 am

     When a beam weapon is turned on there is a containment field that is first projected known as the I-Field which consists of opposite charged minovsky/GN particles to those which will fill the I-Field itself. This helps keep the beam intact and form it’s shape into a cutting blade. You can modify a beam weapon to project a containment field in a variety of shapes so that you can have anything from a beam javelin to a beam flag. The same I-Field is also used on Mobile Armors such as the Big Zam to reflect incoming beam particles. It keeps Minovsky particles in and keeps them out.

     This is what I’m arguing against. Unless the creators say explicitly that they operate on the same principles as Minovsky, or they have an in-series explanation regarding this, trying to draw parallels to other Gundam series and saying ‘it works like this’ is like getting into a Star Wars versus Star Trek argument and why an Imperial Star Destroyer will utterly crush a Federation Sovereign-class battleship or vice-versa. You have to make too many assumptions that ‘x works like y’, or ‘x is the equivalent to z’ in order to ‘make a point’. And I’ve yet to see anything official which says ‘they work like Minovsky particles and I-fields’.

112. Kaioshin Sama November 22nd, 2008 1:48 am

     @Haesslich: I find it amusing that the one time we’re apparently looking for absolute confirmation on an issue (one that really should be of no contention to begin with but I’ll get to that in a second) is when I’m trying to argue something and all other times here it’s just been whatever someone says that seems to fly unscrutinized and as the god given truth (i.e Soma and Allelujah could never have had reason to have a pseudo-romantic relationship, reason=because), but hey, if that’s the way we’re going to play the game then I’ll just say that Skoll already has his explanation as to how you can create a curved beam in Gundam and that it’s a done deal regardless.

     One question though. You said that you didn’t want an argument. There was never a need for a debate in the first place since Skoll had his answer as to how you can create a curved beam weapon. You’re the only one that really seems so concerned about the possible similarities difference between Minovsky and GN Particles when it’s a non-issue to begin with. You brought this up, you keep continuing it yet you protest that we shouldn’t be debating it. Why this mixed message?

113. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 5:11 pm

     … remind me to ‘thank’ Impz and the rest of THAT’s bloggers later for making this page so large that it crashes the PDA’s browser when I try to post a response. Five times in a row.

     But, back onto topic - I wasn’t the one who brought up the whole ‘I-field’ issue; and the way that another universe’s justifications were used to explain why it worked here is what I’m picking a bone with. The whole point is this - using another Gundam’s explanations to say that things work this way in a different series, unless it’s within the same timeline and uses the same terminology or is explicitly stated by the creators that they’re the same, is not a good idea. As I recall, you were the one who stated that Minovsky and GN particles were one and the same, which is why I quoted that statement as a caution against drawing direct parallels between technologies which look similar but may operate under different principles. Nor am I the one trying to ‘make someone look like an idiot’ by putting words in other people’s mouths - all I’m doing here is saying “look, it’s a bad idea to play mix-and-match with different series’ technologies to explain how things work in this series”, because it really doesn’t work. It’s a bad argument, and ultimately results in holding a losing position as when pressed for justification of the statements posted… one can’t really refer back to the series and say ‘it says so right here’ in some official source. It’s all conjecture and fanon unless confirmation exists elsewhere.

     To quote my own post:

     As you’re so fond of pointing out, each Gundam series is different from the other and thus we shouldn’t set any expectations or prejudices based on past Gundams. They don’t explain how the beam weapons (or GN particles) work here, and the old Zaku heat-axes were just normal heat weapons anyhow. Let’s try to avoid dragging Minovsky into this until they confirm they’re still using the same style of ‘physics’ here as they did in UC-based Gundams. Otherwise someone’ll be dragging in Gundam SEED Destiny’s ‘wings of light’ and we’ll have another argument about how SEED Destiny sucks and all that.

     Best not to get into those arguments.

     or this:

     When a beam weapon is turned on there is a containment field that is first projected known as the I-Field which consists of opposite charged minovsky/GN particles to those which will fill the I-Field itself. This helps keep the beam intact and form it’s shape into a cutting blade. You can modify a beam weapon to project a containment field in a variety of shapes so that you can have anything from a beam javelin to a beam flag. The same I-Field is also used on Mobile Armors such as the Big Zam to reflect incoming beam particles. It keeps Minovsky particles in and keeps them out.

     As for Heat Hawks, yeah they are just super-heated solid cutting weapons. They don’t use beam technology at all.

     Kaioshin Sama added these pithy words on Nov 20 08 at 3:49 pm

     “This is what I’m arguing against. Unless the creators say explicitly that they operate on the same principles as Minovsky, or they have an in-series explanation regarding this, trying to draw parallels to other Gundam series and saying ‘it works like this’ is like getting into a Star Wars versus Star Trek argument and why an Imperial Star Destroyer will utterly crush a Federation Sovereign-class battleship or vice-versa. You have to make too many assumptions that ‘x works like y’, or ‘x is the equivalent to z’ in order to ‘make a point’. And I’ve yet to see anything official which says ‘they work like Minovsky particles and I-fields’.”

     Nothing in there says ‘Minosvky and GN particles are the same’ - only that we don’t know how they work and thus we shouldn’t draw any direct comparisons between the two to explain why things work the way they do in 00-verse. That’s it - inferring more into that statement, like that I said “Minovsky = GN particles” is like saying that Crusader is a firm believer in the merits of socialism.

114. Favorites of the week: Blog Posts « We Remember Love November 22nd, 2008 5:21 pm

     [...] Gundam 00 S2-07: A Day that will Live in Infamy - Crusader & Calawain, THAT Anime Blog [...]

115. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 5:25 pm

     Or, if you want me to point to another example of where similar-looking phenomena do not operate in the exact same way, may I point to the differences between chemoluminescence and phosphorescence? Both processes result in an item that glows in the dark, but the latter works by re-emitting the energy absorbed by the materials while the former operates as materials are excited by a chemical process into a higher energy state where they release visible photons. You end up with the same visible result in the end; materials that glow in the dark, but the process by which each ends up glowing is different. Ditto the visible difference between a fission and fusion-bomb detonation; both have similar gross results (a thermal pulse following a release of gamma and other radiation, but the processes by which each are initiated are different even if the end result is much the same.

116. Crusader November 22nd, 2008 5:29 pm

     @Kaioshin and Haesslich
     Pardon me gentlemen but please keep in mind that if you are going to have a tech comparison that there are other places for them.

     @Haesslich
     My apologies for the dismal performance of this site on your PDA, I hope your PDA is still chugging along fine. I will ask comrade mellowbunny if he can fix the issue in the next overhaul, unfortunately that overhaul will not be until the beginning of next year I am afraid. Again apologies for the overall lack of tech and coding prowess that the team possesses. May the next overhaul fix this issues or at least causes your PDA to crash less than five times.

     Well there are some merits in wanting to create a socialist society, everyone would like to live in a world without poverty, sadly the means to which enforce a socialist society rob it of all merit in the end. Still communism is the very definition of failure.

     Hope you got Fallout 3 to work comrade.

117. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 7:07 pm

     Nothing ‘in there in my response’, even.

     Crusader: It sorta works - it crashes when exiting instead of when doing anything BUT exiting now. But the main issue the PDA has is the pages are too big, and the plugins you have on the side take time for even the desktop to render… much less the less RAM-endowed PDA. Or any other mobile device I’ve got, for that matter. The screenshots certainly don’t help.

118. Crusader November 22nd, 2008 7:54 pm

     I am not sure how much of that we can mitgate, however in the future I could cut back on the screen caps in the future. I have only had experience with desktop and laptop renders of this site in it’s 2.0 configuration will try with my DS lite and my brother’s iPhone come next week. We will do what we can but no guarantees just yet. That said is there any site similar to our own that works flawlessly from your end?

     Still given you imply that your PDA is not well endowed with RAM, good hunting on Black Friday supposing you guys have that in Canada as well.

119. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 8:58 pm

     Crusader: The “It sorta works” is for Fallout. The main issue with this page is the WordPress style sheet you’re using and the plugins, including that semi-Twitter thing and all the screencaps. Between that and the 100+ comments, the PDA just runs out of RAM and the browser crashes. But given it’s an Axim x51v with WM6… well, they don’t really SELL PDA’s with more than 192MB of RAM anyhow, and WM takes like 40-50MB easily. The browser needs another 5MB just to run itself…

120. Crusader November 22nd, 2008 9:32 pm

     Ah so crashing was about Fallout 3, gotcha. Well not sure if MS operating systems will ever stop being memory hogs, but we will do what we can.

121. Kaioshin Sama November 22nd, 2008 11:02 pm

     @Haesslich: Okay fair enough, I probably shouldn’t have had the “Minovsky/GN Particles” part in my first comment and should have left it as Minovsky particles, but the real point I was trying to make was in how you can create a curved beam saber. Skoll never stated which universe he was talking about.

     I will however stand by my earlier suggestion to just get the 360 version of Fallout 3.

122. Haesslich November 22nd, 2008 11:21 pm

     Kaioshin: I can’t wait for downloadable content… and at least my version of Fallout 3 works, unlike those poor suckersearly adopters who got it for PS3. If Oblivion didn’t work for the PS3 (not very well), Fallout 3 was unlikely to do any better. And they fell for it. Hook, line, sinker, pop-in/missing texture…

123. Kaioshin Sama November 23rd, 2008 3:19 am

     @I don’t understand the PS3. Honestly. It’s theoretically supposed to be more powerful then the 360 yet I can’t tell the difference between any of the games I’ve seen cross compared and nothing ever seems to run as smooth on the PS3 either from what I’ve seen of it. Cell processor/wave of the future my ass. I make it a point everytime that somebody brings up the PS3 at work to explain to them why they made the wrong choice, and it’s not because I’m a console fanboy or anything, it just strikes me as there is no valid reason at this time to own a PS3 over a 360 unless you really really REALLY like Metal Gear.

     For the record I’ve played over 20 hours of Oblivion at this point and I’m hard pressed to think of anytime I’ve encountered an error such as pop in or fault loading of models. The only game that has given me any issues was Supreme Commander which locked up all of once in my 30 hours of playing it on a rental disc.

124. Crusader November 23rd, 2008 3:35 am

     @Haesslich and Kaioshin
     Okay boys console wars post belong else where…just a bit of advice you don’t have to buy a PS3 to enjoy it, just find a sucker friend who has one, Lord knows I did not get my signed copy of MGS4 just for looks and dust collecting.

125. Haesslich November 23rd, 2008 3:39 am

     Kaioshin: The PS3 theoretically has more horsepower… but nobody’s using it all that well, and the extra-large uncompressed textures they’re applying to models via the extra storage available on Blu-Ray hasn’t exactly HELPED the visuals to any great extent, IMO; especially since with decent compression a lot of those textures will fit just as well on a dual-layer DVD of the type the XBox360 uses. Plus, with the way a lot of titles are multi-platform now, there’s not the same level of customization and tweaking for a single particular device as there was in the heyday of the PS2’s domination of the console market. Oh, and the PS3 code tools, from what I’m hearing, don’t give you a lot of control over the hardware the way you used to get with older systems… which means the low-level tweaking and tricks they used in the past to milk every last bit of performance out of their platforms just don’t happen anymore as the hardware abstraction layers and OOP tools don’t give them that sort of access, even if they DO want to tweak and fine-tune the game to perform superbly on the ‘higher-horsepower’ system.

     In contrast, I’ve heard nothing BUT praise for the XBox360’s development tools - even if it’s a lot like DirectX with the level of HALs used, Microsoft understands developers well enough (being primarily a software company) to know that they should give the developers a good amount of leeway with regards to what they can do with the tools and platform. Between that, and the fact that most people don’t have high-enough resolution screens to make the difference in horsepower too significant… I mean, how many fully 1080p games exist at the moment?

     None come to mind at the moment - even the newest games generally work at 720p or even 480p, with 1080p kicking in mostly for cutscenes or game menus. Sure, the PS3 promises 1080p gaming, but… And Fallout 3, true to the GameByro engine which its technological predecessor Oblivion is also based on, has… issues with the PS3 - it was never coded correctly for it, and they’ve already had to say they’re patching the game due to the bugs that PS3 owners have encountered. Bugs which should come as no surprise to anyone who played Oblivion… including ‘texture-popping’ which makes the Xbox360 version of Mass Effect look polished in comparison. And THAT game was infamous for the long load times and texture pop-in issues. Hell, don’t get me started on how you have to install stuff to the hardware of the PS3 to get it to run, sometimes… which kinda kills the point of having a console - not having to install games to get them to run, that is.

     Oh, and Gundam 00 S2 Ep 8 is out. Louise is smoking HOT in a dress and shorter hair. She’s way, way better than Tieria in a dress. I’m surprised Setsuna got the gumption to pull out a ring for a girl, though. Poor Ismail-chan. Poverty-kun really isn’t all that useful, is she?
     Another note: Louise Halevy needs to keep this haircut. I have nothing but praise for her new hairstylist. Long may he or she curl.

126. Crusader November 23rd, 2008 3:47 am

     Nice save comrade Haesslich…adding the Gundam related insert using the edit function.
     Still console wars stuff belongs elsewhere I am afraid, I don’t need a SDF and then an Xbots invasion.

     Louise was hawt and Princess Poverty was useless, looks like the only use we can expect out of her is if she marries in episode 10 if the spoilers are correct. Funny how most of the reaction is over Titeria and Louise while completely ignoring Ms. Wang right now. At least the rest of the episode was up to par even if we could have dispensed with Desu-Yellow and the rather lame cat fight between Marie and Feldt. Still Vowels it was and broken will some people be, and Ribbons the sneaky git…

     Patrick and Ali seem to have joined us for reals this time, but I hope Prince Ali just doesn’t let his prey walk away this time I want a chase next week.

127. Kaioshin Sama November 23rd, 2008 12:34 pm

     @Haesslich: Is this a good or bad time to admit that I preferred longer haired Louise?

128. Haesslich November 23rd, 2008 4:37 pm

     Kaioshin: This shorter-haired version got a proposal from someone who doesn’t seem to notice girls, and who she only met once before. That’s saying something.

     Poor Ismail-kun can’t even get a DATE.

129. blind_dead_mcjones November 23rd, 2008 8:20 pm

     hmmmm, i’m intrigued in regards to the pale green suits giant cannon, the thing looks bigger than virtues and seravee’s bazookas combined

130. Are Black Swans in Anime Bad Writing? A Comparative Analysis of Gundam 00 Episode 7 and Code Geass Episode 22 « We Remember Love November 25th, 2008 4:59 pm

     [...] of you who are interested, the pros and cons of the episode have been argued extensively here, and here. Soma doesn't get it [...]

131. Haesslich November 25th, 2008 7:12 pm

     … and for Kaioshin, there’s been official Fallout3 DLC announced, including the Garden of Eden Creation Kit (aka: the construction kit), along with Broken Steel, which allows play past the ending. Only for Games for Windows and Xbox360.

     Another reason for a big “NOOOO!!!!!” from the PS3 players of the world, who are like Patrick but with fewer hopes for the future.

132. Firechick January 31st, 2009 12:53 pm

     Ummm…if you really hate Gundam that much, why don’t you just not watch it?

133. Athrun March 11th, 2009 4:10 pm

     Dude, you are writing a comedy right? It is hilarious. Keep up with it

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