@Eej
Sure keep telling yourself that we all know what kind of relationship those two had…

@Eirias
It’s not so much of being a fan of Hobbes, its more like he was right human behavior in the absence of a state.

@SDS
Perhaps.

@D=
At least we had Cadmus In JLU…

@GGear0323
Indeed knowing does not imply actually caring.

@passerby
Were it so easy, given the bleak history of it all and the other standing issues I am not convinced ending the that long running ruckus will change much of anything. After all the Jihad-kuns of the world have been known to screw each other over on occasion (such as September of 1970 in Jordan) and it seems that they are not in agreement over just how far the elders of Zion have infiltrated other groups…if only it were so simple.

Peace is, in fact, quite clear. Return what you stole and stick to the terms of prior agreements. This is not an ideological conflict. It’s a material conflict. Ideology only plays its part if you believe taking is tantamount to title. The jihad-kuns in the world attack because we’re covering for a thief. That’s realpolitik for you.

Now, the question is, what’s in it for US? People are surprisingly keen on peace when it’s in their interest.

It should also be noted that Religions have usually outlasted States. Target enemies you can win against, keep the company of those who are worth fighting for, else avoid a fight altogether.

It’s a shame shit like GN-plotholeticles and Evil Haro Supreme and Infested GaGa Squadron did not generate enough rage beyond that of the weekly discussion and is replaced by the generic politics equal to the politics of Justice League Unlimited.

Sorry buddy but if you care more about how the fucking government deals with a bunch of superheroes than whatever the fuck the superheroes do, then somethings done wrong. Thankfully JL was not a failure.

Crusader on the other hand does offer a perceptive critique of what MSG 00 seems so intent on being but fails, and (in a way) grounds his opinions onto a topic we can relate to. However I struggle to see the necessity of this ‘grounding’ given its obvious Crusader you have very strong opinion on issues that eclipse the remnant of real-world significance MSG 00 possibly offers. With that said given this is an ‘anime blog’ I accept this but it becomes very difficult to dissect your political views.

I qualify – I can see the said ‘real-world’ implications of MSG 00 when I watched it, but I definitely did not attempt to find any real-world messages or critically analyze it. Why? I think this goes without saying.

Honestly, I agree with you on part of this. The post 9/11 war doesn’t involve fighting against a nation state. But I disagree that this is really like the Cold War.

In the Cold War, the country was fighting against a idealogy, but in the end the ideology had a home. We could see it on a map. We could identify it’s landmarks. Even in the case of Vietnam, it had definite and definable armies.

Now you could argue there still is, but in the public’s imagination the terrorist menace is different than the Red Menace. I mean we only let McCarthy rule our imaginations (as a country) for about three years and there are still people who think Jihad-kun is going to jump out with a suicide bomb closing in on nine years after the attack.

Perhaps that’s the difference between then and now. We may be safer, but we feel less safe. This switch from warring nation states to warring terrorist faction versus nation states is present in anime and does seem to coincide with the post-9/11 era.

Now whether or not the two are tied together, I’m not sure if I’d hazard a guess there.

“England did not, however, possess an information network like Veda. If we are to believe that CB had its hands on a pseudo-AI with thousands of information portals (i.e. Innovados) and complete access to all information passed along electronic pathways, it is not much of a stretch to assume that CB not only possessed overwhelming strength, but also the knowledge required to use that strength in a manner that could deeply affect any organization, be it a huge army or a scattered terrorist cell.”

For a moment, let us assume that you are correct. Of course the fact of the matter is that in Gundam 00’s universe the fighting in Northern Ireland stopped previous to a widespread realization that Veda was a factor. A handful of Gundams drop out of the sky and stop a couple of armed conflicts? How is that going to deter the IRA?

Regardless, the proverbial sword cuts either way. If the terrorists and freedom fighters are aware that their mail is being read, they will find increasingly clever and primitive ways to circumvent those who have a tech advantage. If the terrorists and freedom fighters are unaware that they are being read like an open book, why would they suddenly capitulate after centuries of bloody conflict? In either case, the Gundam 00 scenario involving Northern Ireland was ludicrous.

dts

@Grendel
To be honest, I think that more CB’s capability lay with Veda and its (apparently) nigh-infalliable tactician. As you note, the English often, if not typically, had an overwhelming advantage in firepower. England did not, however, possess an information network like Veda. If we are to believe that CB had its hands on a pseudo-AI with thousands of information portals (i.e. Innovados) and complete access to all information passed along electronic pathways, it is not much of a stretch to assume that CB not only possessed overwhelming strength, but also the knowledge required to use that strength in a manner that could deeply affect any organization, be it a huge army or a scattered terrorist cell.

Speaking of that, http://www.starcraft2.com/features/terran/terratron.xml is way more GAR than megadeus.

“I think Dr. Freeman could take on a Gundam. Might take a pretty scripted cinematic sequence and some Quicksave abuse, but it could happen.”

Huh? How on Earth do you scare indigenous freedom fighters or terrorists into submission with the threat of a handful of super-powerful mecha? No doubt the English would be shocked to learn that overwhelming firepower is the solution to combating the IRA.

If the Gundam 00 character development had been anything other than mind-numbingly cliche I might have stuck with the show a bit longer. I attended Berkley for 6 years (3 undergrad and 3 post grad)and I had to endure the ignorant proselytizing of seemingly countless upper middle class hippie wannabees with their misguided geo-political pretensions… but at least my classmates were mildly entertaining. At the very least, Gundam 00 wouldn’t have been any worse with Naked-Guy as a character.

dts

@GGear0323
I suspect that even if you strip away all the masks that you might not like what you find, I have doubts that people are by default decent, but it could be otherwise.

@D=
I wonder if those weapons were made in HRL…

@ghostlightning
Pleasant as it sounds comrade I think if you consider what other people you would have to listen to grand schemes of linking people to some sort of overmind isn’t going to be painless or even desirable. Certainly I don’t think you really want to peer into what goes on in my mind.

I think if Gundam 00 were truly about peace it would deal with the problems of reconciliation, reconstruction, over coming cultural differences, building consensus among a large and diverse group, and the pains of societal change; I don’t think there is much of that in Gundam 00.

SDF-Macross pursued this in its own way from episode 26 on. I’ll gladly watch any other anime that takes this on.

—

Despite my being a total non-fan of the Newtype concept and its related phenomena, Gundam 00 took this further in an interesting way.

It makes me remember how much of a fantasy Gundam is, and this does not make it bad. Being a fantasy, of course it’ll romanticize violence, because it romanticizes giant robots! So in a world where giant robots are important and their pilots are heroes, where would peace come from?

Magic pixie dust. That’s where. It allows everyone to have done whatever violence they did, and through understanding one another via Trans-am burst there is less consequence of violence to focus on in the narrative. Rather, only a future where people understand each other more due to absolute or near-absolute empathy.

Neon Genesis Evangelion did this by turning everyone into Tang, a singular consciousness. Gundam 00 doesn’t, which seems preferable because we will retain our identities. However, the magic pixie dust has to account for more. Then again, if we accept how magical it really is within the narrative, then sure.

http://shortnews.com/start.cfm?id=77942

This explains anything and everything about how 00 works. At least in terms of combat.