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Dropped: Gundam Seed (機動戦士ガンダムSEED) (2002-2003)
I've decided to drop this show, mostly because there's nothing going on for me to want to keep watching.
It was difficult for me to stay engaged with the show at the beginning, and the story telling overall just isn't engaging or well-paced enough for me. I felt that the characters I liked didn't have much screen time, which was also a little disheartening.
It's unfortunate because I was hoping to enjoy this anime from my teenage years. I do actually think that if I'd watched as a teenager, I might have still enjoyed it, because the main characters are a little teenage-like. However, as an adult, I couldn't take several of the characters seriously.
Spoilers up to Episode 24.
Story
The main conflict in this story of space politics was between the Earth Alliance, made up of "natural" humans, and ZAFT, made up of "coordinators," genetically modified humans. That was my understanding of the space politics. Kira, our main character, was a coordinator, but was fighting for the Earth Alliance.
I normally like politics, but space politics is somewhat difficult for me to get into, and I felt that this show did not take advantage of the setting they had created. The political story line was very dragged out, and we mostly only saw it through the eyes of our teenage gundam pilots.
The teenage drama was particularly frustrating to get through. Included would be the romantic subplot between Kira and Flay. I won't get into the specifics, but while I can see there is merit in such a story line, it took away too much from the main story line of fighting robots.
In fact, the only "romance" that I've liked so far is Athrun/Lacus because of their low level of drama, even though I know they are not the canon ship. As well, the adults were far more interesting and relatable and steady compared to the teenagers.
The writing was generally too slow paced for me to enjoy. This show was 50 episodes, and now that I'm about half way through, I've realized how few actual events have occurred.
Production
The quality of animation varied widely. The robot fights had most of the high quality animation. On the other hand, the conversations between people would sometimes have strange animation, strange angles, etc. I wouldn't say the animation was BAD, but I do feel that sometimes the animation quality of the human interactions affected my enthusiasm in watching those parts.
Characters
Kira Yamato
Kira was pretty unlikeable, and I think that was one of the reasons it was difficult to like this show. It was only getting better towards the middle of the show (where I had stopped watching), and I think it was because Kira stopped being as major of a character.
Kira was given qualities of the chosen one, being a coordinator, the saviour of the Earth Alliance because he was the only one who could pilot it in the Earth Alliance. The fact that only coordinators can pilot the gundams is not a concept I like, because the point of mecha fighting is that anybody can pilot them. It's the robots that are doing the job. You just need the smarts to know how to do it. I think there was some explanation that the coordinators had a higher brain function or something, but it just took away from the appeal of a mecha anime. In addition, Kira seemed to have a "berserker" mode, which was basically an awakened state where he'd be super powerful. Again, this would work in normal fighting shounen animes, but it was really hard to be convinced of this in a mecha anime.
Of course, Kira exhibited traits of the typical shounen protagonist. He was fighting for the Earth Alliance on behalf of his friends, etc.
Kira also went through lots of isolation. It was why he became so cold, and he'd said that Flay was the only one who'd given him affection etc. (more on this later). He even got into a fight with Sai, which is ironic because Kira was all about fighting for his friends, wasn't he? It almost felt like he had a bit of a god complex, being the saviour of the Earth Alliance.
Kira was just really difficult to like. He was a teenage edgelord, and I could see how he could appeal to a teenager, but not to me.
Athrun Zala
On the other hand, I found Athrun much more compelling. He had a sense of propriety, which was not always a good thing. His sense of propriety was sometimes a strength but sometimes a weakness. It made him complex.
He was on his way to becoming a strong soldier for ZAFT, but his friendship with Kira complicated his ability to do that. His feelings about the war were very uncomplicated up until that. So I just felt that his emotional journey would be more interesting.
As I mentioned before, Athrun's relationship with Lacus was more enjoyable to me. It was arranged, yes, but it was mature, and low drama. Lacus was very understanding of Athrun's job as a soldier, and Athrun tried his best to make her happy, by making her Haros and visiting her whenever he could. I know they're not the canon ship, but that doesn't stop me from appreciating their relationship. It showed how responsible Athrun was.
>Lacus Clyne
I'm surprised by how much I liked Lacus. She was a breath of fresh air in this show. She was naive, yes, but there is a distinct lack of such characters in this show.
Though she was in the middle of the war, she tried to keep things simple, understanding that everywhere, people were people, and were worthy of respect and kindness.
Cagalli Yula Athha
Cagalli was somewhat of a tomboy character, and she was hotheaded. As a teenager, I think I would have preferred her character over Lacus', but as an adult, I can't help but facepalm a bit at her actions.
She was led by her emotions to the point that Kira had to admonish her because her reckless actions had gotten her friend killed.
Her sudden warming up to Kira also seemed to come from nowhere. Cannot compute.
Flay Allster
Oof. Flay is a can of worms. At first, Flay was shown to be disciminatory against coordinators, often saying terrible things about them out of anger.
I interpreted her character as one who cared more for protection than anything else in the world. When the war had started, Sai had taken care of her, and I think that was why her father had the verbal agreement to betroth her to Sai. After her father died, Flay lost trust in Sai. Though she erupted at Kira over his inability to protect her father, she later warmed up to him. I couldn't figure out whether she was playing the long con and was planning to betray him, or whether she truly wanted to be with Kira now because she saw him as the most powerful person in the Earth Alliance. In any case, she was the source of much teenage drama in this show that I would have preferred to go without.
Archangel Crew
I kind of wish we'd gotten to know Kira's other friends more, since he insisted that he was staying with the Earth Alliance for his friends. But he really seemed to distance himself from them. We also didn't get enough screen time on the friends, and I keep expecting them to turn on Kira because that would victimize Kira to the audience members.
I enjoyed the scenes with Murrue Ramius and Mu La Flaga the most, because they were ADULTS who handled things RESPONSIBLY. This show was low key making me ship them because they were the only two people on the Archangel who had any common sense and could work together reasonably.
Though Natarle Badgiruel was also an adult on the Archangel, I do think she was evil coded, and that she would turn on them eventually.
ZAFT
Out of Athrun's teammates, Nicol was portrayed as someone who was kinder and more sympathetic to him, whereas Dearka and Yzak were potrayed as evil to the core.
Rau Le Creuset was the big bad, and he's supposed to be shrouded with mystery, always keeping his mask on. However, I wonder what the significance of the mask was. I kept wondering if he was Mu La Flaga's long lost brother or something, because they were both blond, and perhaps if he took off his mask, he would look exactly like him. (Okay, I checked Wikipedia, and it does say that he is Mu La Flaga's "brother.")
Overall
I was going through some of the Wikipedia pages related to Gundam Seed, and it does seem like there is a lot of exciting stuff to come, but I just can't really bring myself to be excited about this show.
The politics could be interesting, but I'm only interested in the parts that relate to the adults. When it comes to the teenagers, the most interesting teenagers, Athrun and Lacus, are barely on screen, and they also don't end up together. The animation for the human interactions are distracting because they are not as high quality.
It was difficult for me to stay engaged with the show at the beginning, and the story telling overall just isn't engaging or well-paced enough for me. I felt that the characters I liked didn't have much screen time, which was also a little disheartening.
It's unfortunate because I was hoping to enjoy this anime from my teenage years. I do actually think that if I'd watched as a teenager, I might have still enjoyed it, because the main characters are a little teenage-like. However, as an adult, I couldn't take several of the characters seriously.
Spoilers up to Episode 24.
Story
The main conflict in this story of space politics was between the Earth Alliance, made up of "natural" humans, and ZAFT, made up of "coordinators," genetically modified humans. That was my understanding of the space politics. Kira, our main character, was a coordinator, but was fighting for the Earth Alliance.
I normally like politics, but space politics is somewhat difficult for me to get into, and I felt that this show did not take advantage of the setting they had created. The political story line was very dragged out, and we mostly only saw it through the eyes of our teenage gundam pilots.
The teenage drama was particularly frustrating to get through. Included would be the romantic subplot between Kira and Flay. I won't get into the specifics, but while I can see there is merit in such a story line, it took away too much from the main story line of fighting robots.
In fact, the only "romance" that I've liked so far is Athrun/Lacus because of their low level of drama, even though I know they are not the canon ship. As well, the adults were far more interesting and relatable and steady compared to the teenagers.
The writing was generally too slow paced for me to enjoy. This show was 50 episodes, and now that I'm about half way through, I've realized how few actual events have occurred.
Production
The quality of animation varied widely. The robot fights had most of the high quality animation. On the other hand, the conversations between people would sometimes have strange animation, strange angles, etc. I wouldn't say the animation was BAD, but I do feel that sometimes the animation quality of the human interactions affected my enthusiasm in watching those parts.
Characters
Kira Yamato
Kira was pretty unlikeable, and I think that was one of the reasons it was difficult to like this show. It was only getting better towards the middle of the show (where I had stopped watching), and I think it was because Kira stopped being as major of a character.
Kira was given qualities of the chosen one, being a coordinator, the saviour of the Earth Alliance because he was the only one who could pilot it in the Earth Alliance. The fact that only coordinators can pilot the gundams is not a concept I like, because the point of mecha fighting is that anybody can pilot them. It's the robots that are doing the job. You just need the smarts to know how to do it. I think there was some explanation that the coordinators had a higher brain function or something, but it just took away from the appeal of a mecha anime. In addition, Kira seemed to have a "berserker" mode, which was basically an awakened state where he'd be super powerful. Again, this would work in normal fighting shounen animes, but it was really hard to be convinced of this in a mecha anime.
Of course, Kira exhibited traits of the typical shounen protagonist. He was fighting for the Earth Alliance on behalf of his friends, etc.
Kira also went through lots of isolation. It was why he became so cold, and he'd said that Flay was the only one who'd given him affection etc. (more on this later). He even got into a fight with Sai, which is ironic because Kira was all about fighting for his friends, wasn't he? It almost felt like he had a bit of a god complex, being the saviour of the Earth Alliance.
Kira was just really difficult to like. He was a teenage edgelord, and I could see how he could appeal to a teenager, but not to me.
Athrun Zala
On the other hand, I found Athrun much more compelling. He had a sense of propriety, which was not always a good thing. His sense of propriety was sometimes a strength but sometimes a weakness. It made him complex.
He was on his way to becoming a strong soldier for ZAFT, but his friendship with Kira complicated his ability to do that. His feelings about the war were very uncomplicated up until that. So I just felt that his emotional journey would be more interesting.
As I mentioned before, Athrun's relationship with Lacus was more enjoyable to me. It was arranged, yes, but it was mature, and low drama. Lacus was very understanding of Athrun's job as a soldier, and Athrun tried his best to make her happy, by making her Haros and visiting her whenever he could. I know they're not the canon ship, but that doesn't stop me from appreciating their relationship. It showed how responsible Athrun was.
>Lacus Clyne
I'm surprised by how much I liked Lacus. She was a breath of fresh air in this show. She was naive, yes, but there is a distinct lack of such characters in this show.
Though she was in the middle of the war, she tried to keep things simple, understanding that everywhere, people were people, and were worthy of respect and kindness.
Cagalli Yula Athha
Cagalli was somewhat of a tomboy character, and she was hotheaded. As a teenager, I think I would have preferred her character over Lacus', but as an adult, I can't help but facepalm a bit at her actions.
She was led by her emotions to the point that Kira had to admonish her because her reckless actions had gotten her friend killed.
Her sudden warming up to Kira also seemed to come from nowhere. Cannot compute.
Flay Allster
Oof. Flay is a can of worms. At first, Flay was shown to be disciminatory against coordinators, often saying terrible things about them out of anger.
I interpreted her character as one who cared more for protection than anything else in the world. When the war had started, Sai had taken care of her, and I think that was why her father had the verbal agreement to betroth her to Sai. After her father died, Flay lost trust in Sai. Though she erupted at Kira over his inability to protect her father, she later warmed up to him. I couldn't figure out whether she was playing the long con and was planning to betray him, or whether she truly wanted to be with Kira now because she saw him as the most powerful person in the Earth Alliance. In any case, she was the source of much teenage drama in this show that I would have preferred to go without.
Archangel Crew
I kind of wish we'd gotten to know Kira's other friends more, since he insisted that he was staying with the Earth Alliance for his friends. But he really seemed to distance himself from them. We also didn't get enough screen time on the friends, and I keep expecting them to turn on Kira because that would victimize Kira to the audience members.
I enjoyed the scenes with Murrue Ramius and Mu La Flaga the most, because they were ADULTS who handled things RESPONSIBLY. This show was low key making me ship them because they were the only two people on the Archangel who had any common sense and could work together reasonably.
Though Natarle Badgiruel was also an adult on the Archangel, I do think she was evil coded, and that she would turn on them eventually.
ZAFT
Out of Athrun's teammates, Nicol was portrayed as someone who was kinder and more sympathetic to him, whereas Dearka and Yzak were potrayed as evil to the core.
Rau Le Creuset was the big bad, and he's supposed to be shrouded with mystery, always keeping his mask on. However, I wonder what the significance of the mask was. I kept wondering if he was Mu La Flaga's long lost brother or something, because they were both blond, and perhaps if he took off his mask, he would look exactly like him. (Okay, I checked Wikipedia, and it does say that he is Mu La Flaga's "brother.")
Overall
I was going through some of the Wikipedia pages related to Gundam Seed, and it does seem like there is a lot of exciting stuff to come, but I just can't really bring myself to be excited about this show.
The politics could be interesting, but I'm only interested in the parts that relate to the adults. When it comes to the teenagers, the most interesting teenagers, Athrun and Lacus, are barely on screen, and they also don't end up together. The animation for the human interactions are distracting because they are not as high quality.