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Rating: 8.3/10

Impressions:

For once, I had thought that an anime focused too much on the bigger picture than the individual character. For many shows, it’s a matter of finding a balance between the too. When too much focus is placed on the overall story, character development and character empathy is lost. However, if the individual character is prioritised too much, the lack of an underlying flow brings the whole show down as well. For drama, slice-of-life and school life shows, these two aspects are often one in the same. But for more ‘complicated’ shows, those that have tertiary factors such as fantastical or science fictional properties, tend to fall to this problem more often.

In the beginning, Gundam 00 centres on a large scale event, one that involves the world and beyond it. Due to this, a plot is easily established, and we get a sense of direction from the very beginning. But it also meant a great lack of character personalisation. So far, we have only really gotten back-stories in terms of aspects that involve the characters, and a severe lack of growth, interaction and development. I said ‘had thought’ in the first sentence as thankfully, it feels to me that things have finally started moving. It doesn’t seem like Setsuna has learnt anything thus far, but the upcoming mental confrontations he is sure to have will certainly change that.

Personally, I’m growing tired of seeing war-intervention scenario one after another. The problem is, we hardly see anything that comes as a result of each escapade by Celestial Being. I’m pretty sure there is a sequel, but regardless of that, the show has reached its midway point, and we literally need to ’see’ the characters more. Instead of couped up in their mobile suits, it would be nice if we get to see the Gundam Meisters in their daily lives, and how they would function in society. I hope the show doesn’t just come down to a war between humanity and Celestial Being. That would be quite the dull finish…

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