24 September 2012

Looking Back at Gundam AGE

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After 49 episodes spanning 3 generations of characters, Gundam AGE is finally over.

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Contents of Gundam AGE was first revealed, or rather "leaked" (before official announcement) in June last year from July 2011 issue of CoroCoro Comic. The character designs and that the co-operation of production by studio Level-5 suggest that Gundam AGE is generally more intended to be for younger audience compared to most of the other Gundam series.

Gundam AGE tells the story of three generations of protagonists of the Asuno family, with each protagonist piloting his own version of the eponymous mecha, fighting to defend Earth and its space colonies from an enemy faction far more advanced in terms of technology.

Even since the announcement Gundam AGE had left a negative impression on the fans, and throughout the series it received mixed reception, with the negatives making more of a prominence, criticising its storytelling, art/animations, and character/mecha designs.

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Well, the series does have some aspects that are well liked. Gundam AGE-2 from the second generation do earn some respect from the viewers, with the second generation generally have been more likeable out of all 3 generation arcs. The Gunpla models do have rather nice designs, and I admit that while I still don't have any from Gundam AGE series, I am tempted to get a couple of them, namely the G-Exes, Adele, Gundam AGE-2 and/or its variations, and even Danazine (for its dragon kaiju-like appearance XD).

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Overall, the initial impression from the first generation of the anime did make me not looking forward to future episodes (especially with the story and animations, though sometimes I wonder whether some people on the Internet watch Gundam AGE for the sake of finding errors and flaws in it). Things improved a bit for me around halfway for second generation, but things went backwards again for the third and last generation. Story is not the most believable one, and there are times that I feel as if I were told to "just believe it" for some scenes without much explanation. The target audience also seems a little mucky - initially it may seem as if it's for the children, but later concepts (or lack of) don't really seem to portray the necessary messages very well. Pacing is also another issue, where some parts can have potential to be expanded much more, whereas others that are not supposed to make much of an impact on the overall plot dragged on for too long. The ending is also very rushed (which is quite likely to be affected by the previous point), which leaves very little of an impression for me, though I can see that some people want it to just end asap...

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Nevertheless, it has been a long ride, and in this aspect the title of the final episode "End of a Long Journey" is neutrally fitting. While I had little expectation of it in the first place, I did watched it to the end as it is a Gundam series. Looking back, it could have been a much better anime if it were managed better with the flaws addressed. The concept of generations and that grandfather, father, and son fighting together (but with different motives) is something not really done before in a Gundam series, and I'll give them that for sure. But now despite the mixed reception it may be considered as yet another notorious chapter in the so-called Gundam's "Black History". Heck, some don't even want to admit this as a "Gundam" series in the first place! ^^;;;

Well, we still have other Gundam series to look forward to, such as the remaining 2 episodes of Gundam UC OVA, as well as the GUNDAM THE ORIGIN anime that has been a little quiet since its initial annoumcement last year. Say, anyone still waiting for the Gundam SEED movie? ^^;

How do you think of Gundam AGE? It's quite a subject of debate, but it'd be interesting to hear your opinion of it too. Is it enjoyable to you? Do share out your thoughts!

10 comments:

  1. I hold the same opinion word by word. I really do think that it's a pity for the series to end like this. Or rather, the development throughout is pitiful.

    So many things could have gone right, but I can't help but think that they made Gundam AGE bad on purpose.

    I haven't gotten a single model from AGE. Although I am tempted by a few certain ones, the impact of the show overall always makes me reconsider.

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    1. While there is little expectation from Gundam AGE in the first place, there are places here and there that it could have been better to make it less of a sour taste. However, what Gundam AGE has ended up becoming did not make a lot of the viewers want to watch it seriously.

      You have a good point about models there. Even if it may look good to buy, the anime of which it appears in can put off people from buying.

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  2. I think the main difference between GUNDAM series and other robot animation was its strong and professional SF research. Half of the bugs came from Gundam AGE came from its amateur SF setting, while the remaining bugs are related to crappy allocation of cast in space and time.
    Those bugs and errors are too obvious that audiences are unable to ignore and let them go.

    Even worse, every GUNDAM amination have its main theme of anti-war, and also having its unique sub-themes. However, from Gundam AGE, I could only feel "revenge" but nothing.

    I do hope Hino Akihiro and LV5 could concentrate on its own game business and never involve in Gundam again in the future.

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    1. What makes Gundam stand out indeed is the use of background lore and science fiction to make them sound convincing, hence the genre "real robot" that made itself starting to branch out from the "super robot" genre (although there are debates of it whether this genre really exists or not).

      Gundam AGE really didn't seem to put much efforts in explaining a lot of the lore. Even the instruction manuals in Gunpla kits don't have much info, whereas most others would put good amount of info to back their existence, adding much more wealth to its respective universe. The amount of unexplained issues, plotholes, or even errors make it difficult for viewers to treat AGE seriously, but rather a shameful joke to be remembered for years.

      While I am not fully sure whether all Gundam animation series have the anti-war theme going on (G Gundam feels a little bit of an exception), Gundam indeed mostly revolves around war as the central motivation of the franchise. Gundam AGE seems to try and input some themes that appeared in previous series, but it felt rather forced instead.

      I did hear that Gundam AGE was originally supposed to be a game idea. Maybe it would be better if it were to stay that way at most, but perhaps it would be better if we were to have something else completely different instead.

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  3. I have yet to catch up on this. I am really hoping that it will come out on DVD or Blu-ray so I can get it for me and my son to watch.

    If not, I can see some marathon days watching it :D

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    1. Gundam AGE was aired with various subs on its GundamInfo Youtube channel, including English. However, I think that DVD / BD release may not happen due to the news earlier this year about Bandai Entertainment to stop releasing new DVDs, BDs, and manga. If not, there are always alternative ways to watch them I suppose. :o

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  4. Totally agree with Yui's comment above, after watching only the first nine episodes, I lost all interest watching it.
    I'm one of those that feels that Gundam AGE destroys what other Gundam is known/famous for.

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    1. The first arc is pretty hard to bear with, with a lot of people I know giving up before the second arc comes in.

      Gundam AGE will surely leave a negative impression on a lot of people in the franchise, perhaps much like G-Saviour. Though the latter is so bad that it is not even seen on a lot of Sunrise's web pages.

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  5. I watched it purely because it was a gundam show but I was not impressed in the slightest.

    Everything about the show felt like it was aimed for children and even the mecha designs screamed of some cynical plan to sell merchandise.
    There were bits which became more interesting, such as the later parts of Gen 1 and gen 2 but they were simply treading paths which had been trodden by many other gundam shows before then and it meant that it lost focus on the plot or direction.

    I can't really fault the mecha battles though. They were poor but they have been following the same style for some time, ever since the AU gundam shows came to being. SEED and 00 were particularly bad at dong floaty, weightless battles. It took Gundam UC to remind us what a proper MS battle is like!

    More than saying Gundam age was bad, i'd say it was simply forgettable which, in some ways, is actually worse.

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    1. When Gundam AGE was first announced, a lot of products were shown and planned already. It does show how heavily this is supposed to be merchandised from the very beginning.

      The story seems to lack focus even pretty earlier on, and only to give us a rushed ending with a "oh that's it?" kind of feeling. Battle scenes are watchable, but not memorable, though doing one that feels like it's properly in space is often overlooked by many, even the viewers.

      To me Gundam AGE is more bad than forgettable. Gundam 00 would fit more to become forgettable, and as for AGE the number of bad things the Internet community can come up with sure makes it memorable, at least for some time ahead (for me at least).

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