Meaning of Gundam series...

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Pan
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Meaning of Gundam series...

Hello this is my first post and i incoming whit an ask (Argh! stop the gun ahhh!!!! Please!)!

For you what is the meaning of Gundam series (make by Tomino, for example the mitical first)?


PS: excuse me for my bad english, but it isn't my motherlanguage :wink:

PS of PS: i'm excuse in advance whit the admin forum in the case that i have opened a second similar topic, i'have controlled, but...

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ORegan
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For me, the Gundam series means kick ass entertainment. As well as, in my mind, Giant Robot Wars(not to be confused with the actual Super Robot Wars.)

Some regard Gundam as the greatest thing to hit television since commercials of sliced bread, but I regard it simply as awesome robots of death being piloted by awesome people and whiny guys who cry about using the giant bringers of destruction. Then again I'm very bland when it comes to this sort of stuff, and others will be able to give you whole reports on what they thing of Gundam.
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Big B
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Unlike, say, Neon Genesis Evangelion or RahXephon, Gundam really isn't made to make you go into deep thought. Having said that, the big theme that pops up is basically how war isn't so great, unlike what kids may fantasize about on the playground.

The Gundam franchise revolves around giant robots that are used as military hardware in a more realistic scenario (i.e. they're usually not some single ultimate weapon, can be defeated, people die [thanks, Tomino], etc), disregarding the giant combat robot part being far away from reality to start.

I loved robots as a kid, and, to an extent, I still do today. Gundam means big robots that blow stuff up. I know what I'm getting with a Gundam series in some sense. The fine details change, but some things are staples and don't change.
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The Tomino ones usually throw in themes of whether it is possible for humans to understand each other. This often manifests as soldiers on opposite sides coming to an understanding (or not), though things like Char and Reccoa's relationship also play with this theme. In this context the Newtype phenomenon can be seen as a hopeful answer to the affirmative, but the tendency of Newtypes to be used as weapons and nothing more can be seen as a more pessimistic approach. Really I don't think that the various series ever really come to a consistent view on the topic, they just more raise the issue and explore various aspects of it.

Not that that is the only thing that Gundam is about. There are perspectives on war, on the relationship between children and adults, on politics, on mankind's impact on the environment and every series also is primarily for entertainment.
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Mwulf
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Big B wrote:Unlike, say, Neon Genesis Evangelion or RahXephon, Gundam really isn't made to make you go into deep thought. Having said that, the big theme that pops up is basically how war isn't so great, unlike what kids may fantasize about on the playground.
Exactly. Gundam is about dealing with incredibly difficult, important themes and making them very accessible. Well, most of it is. In my opinion, the non-Tomino works (excluding 0080) really don't quite get the whole "gundam" thing right.

I guess the best way to sum up what Gundam means, in my opinion, is that one question that came up at the end of each MSG episode "Who will survive?"

It's a bit lame, yeah, but it really helps to set the tone for something great.
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Well Gundam to me is about Whiny, Little, Paranoid, Kids getting godly weapons of mass destruction Aka a Gundam. Where it slays countless no names as they scream for mommy....

But then again its about harsh wars Dictators, Good Guys who ain't so good. Come on Feddies are just as bit as Guilty as Zeon... Sieg Zeon... But wars concerning harsh things and lots of sorrow, and the Char Maneuver. But most of all I love it(UC Gundam... Anti Seed and Wing) Where else do you get to see sad side of war without the Hero being Emo and Crying, then half way though the show he becomes a pacifist with the most godly machine(insult made towards seed)
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I view most of the Gundam series as war dramas, especially those set in Universal Century and obviously not in the G Gundam timeline. It's all about two or more factions battling each other for rights and independence utilizing advanced war machines known as mobile suits. Gundam itself IS a war machine after all that can be destoryed. According to Mwulf, the Gundam series can also be about survival in critical war periods. To sum up, it is a war drama. IMO, the Universal Century timeline best portrays the Gundam series unlike the other timelines I have seen.
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Dendrobium Stamen
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One of the great themes of Gundam seems to be moral ambiguity. We have a habit of looking at history in terms of "the good guys" and "the bad guys", seeing one side as virtuous and the other as villainous, without going much further in determining just how accurate that picture is. Any true hero has their flaws, just as any villain has their virtues, and this seems to be something Gundam picks up on pretty well.

The best example of it I can think of is the end of SEED; the war basically descends into two sides, both equally committed to the other's absolute annihilation by any means necessary. The Earth Alliance are determined to nuke PLANT and wipe out Coordinators, while ZAFT seek to turn GENESIS on the Alliance forces and then on Earth itself to wipe out Naturals. And in the middle, you've got a bunch of traitors and thieves trying asserting a highly aggressive anti-war statement. So really, while there are good people on all three sides, none of them are truly good, though at the same time none are truly evil, either.
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I know someone who has written several great essays on the meaning of Tomino's Gundam, and although I could go on forever on it, the basic gist is:

Understanding other human beings. This is echoed through the Newtype concept, as well as the dialogue of characters. You see Amuro and Lahla talking about how they finally "truly understand each other" in their Newtype mind meld, and how they hope that all of humanity will be able to reach what they've attained.
We also see this through Camille Bidan, of all people. The source of his angst is usually though his relationships in which someone will make no effort to understand him- his parents, for example. He also tortures the Titans officer in episode 2 to make him understand what it felt like to be picked on.
Of course, this doesn't always work. We see Newtype villains- Haman and Scirocco, who use their powers of empathetic comprehension to rule over humanity. Plus the general downfall of the Newtype concept in later shows.

You can also see a theme of family. Often characters' real families are dysfunctional and uncaring, while their surrogate families (the White Base crew, in Amuro's case) are their true familes. This can be seen in more than one series.
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Alastor
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Dendrobium Stamen pretty much said it for me. Gundam is indeed one of those shows which takes apart the whole "good guys-bad guys" dualism we've grown accustomed to when we were growing up. And unlike, say, Eva or Shoji Kawamori's recent works (Sousei no Aquarion in particular), Gundam manages to get its message across without resorting to esoteric references and religious / New Age-y arcana.

And of course, drool-worthy mecha designs (I'm looking at you, Destiny). ^^
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WingZero20xx
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the early series (MSG, 08th MS TEAM, 0080, zeta, etc) i think are meant to convey the reality of war and the toll it takes on everyone

however, when you get into the newer shows like gundam seed, seed destiny is when u see the focus being more on how cool and destructive they can make the mechs

gundam wing was pretty much a pacifism fest imo

g gundam was a parody i believe

i think the one series that really conveys the message of gundam is a tie between 0080 and 08th MS Team

i saw the first few episodes of v gundam an it really caught my eye...until the guy uploading the episodes screwed it up and ive heard a lot about v gundam
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Ascension
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WingZero20xx wrote:g gundam was a parody i believe
To a great extent, yes, but not entirely. While the bulk of it is satirical in nature, at its core lies a serious and complex story of man's corruption by power (represented by DG cells), vengeance, family loyalty (Domon and Kyoji), romance (DomonxRain, DomonxAllenby), coming of age (Domon vs. Master Asia), and, ultimately, the triumph of sincere love over all. A lot of people forget the story in the midst of the jokes and the flashy fight scenes and everything, but it's there.

G-Gundam is what got me hooked on Gundam.
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Additionally, G Gundam lays claim to the Gundam theme of humans at war, by offering the Gundam Fight as a supposedly superior substitute for war--a substitute that turned out to be not so great.
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padre
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I imagine my opinion on this will seem somewhat radical.

I don't think Tomino's shows have ever been about war. They're set during wars, of course, but I don't think he was ever particularly interested in war. He's much more fascinated with how humans interact. Tomino has a very simple method of story-telling: he presents some characters and follows them around, rarely, if ever, bothering with anything else. This sometimes shifts the focus off the grand events playing out in favor of what's happening with his characters (e.g. episode 48 of Zeta). This sort of thing makes it clear to me that the war is not the point; it's these people and the relationships they have. At the same time, however, he's fascinated with conflict. War is the most grandiose of human conflict, but the conflict between parents and their children, or a lover's spat is no less important to him. He goes out of his way to include every sort of conflict he can think of: war, familial, generational, gender-related, racial, personal. At the same time, however, he introduces Newtypes, which are supposed to solve all of these problems. It's a very brute-force way of addressing these themes.

I think Imagawa is doing something similar in G. "Communicating with one's fists" has taken the place of Newtypes, but the underlying point that understanding is necessary for the resolution of conflict is the same. One point the show hammers home is that the difference between the Gundam Fight and all-out war is simply a matter of scale. The underlying causes of conflict, and the consequences of that conflict remain the same. It's telling that Domon's final victory doesn't come through his strength, but through his love. His final conflict isn't one of violence, but of his and Rain's inability to understand one another's feelings.

War in the Pocket and Wing, on the other hand, are about war. Both, I think, are clearly anti-war. War in the Pocket shows us a senseless sacrifice, and so the ultimate futility of fighting. Wing approaches this somewhat differently, as it presents diverse characters with radically different viewpoints on the nature and purpose of war, and plays out the conflict between them. Ultimately, however, it's conclusion is similar to Tomino and Imagawa's. The image of Heero's refusing to fight Wufei and dropping the Wing Zero into the ocean is a telling one. He won't fight Wufei; there are other ways than force. Ultimately, humanity choses to pursue those alternatives rather than the use of violence.

X ultimately seems to be pursuing a point about equality, but I don't have any faith in my ability to offer an analysis of it. I rather dislike it.

Most of the other Gundam series are not primarily focused on any sort of thematic material or "meaning." SEED and Destiny introduce some ideas about racism and the potential consequence of genetic technology, but these ideas aren't pursued in great detail. There's also an odd parallel with the free will theodicy (free will as an answer to the problem of evil), but I suspect that's a coincidence.

Overall, I don't believe there's any sort of unifying theme of "Gundam." "Gundam" is just a name, not a thing or a kind. Unless, of course, you define it as "Bandai's continuing attempts to sell you Gunpla."
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Mwulf
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Er... Padre, by making a case for Tomino's work NOT being about war, I think you've inadvertently made a case for why Tomino's work IS anti-war, and why it does it so well. :roll:

A choice bit:
You wrote:sometimes shifts the focus off the grand events playing out in favor of what's happening with his characters (e.g. episode 48 of Zeta). This sort of thing makes it clear to me that the war is not the point; it's these people and the relationships they have.
That's exactly it. Stories that are simply about war tend to glorify war. Stories about the ~people~ involved in war really serve to highlight how inhumane and nasty war is. ESPECIALLY episode 48 of Zeta. To slightly modify your last sentence there, it's the people involved and the relationships they have--and how war effects and changes them--that is the crux of Gundam.

All the "other" Gundam-series' (the non-tomino ones, almost to a "T") are anti-war. Tomino is not so much "anti-war" as he is "reality-of-war." (Some may equate the two...). The thing is, these other series' tend to go over the top. "Anti-War" becomes their raison d'etre. The message of the story becomes more important than the characters. This is apparent in the best example, 0080, when virtually every frame of animation is meant to enhance the final tragedy. It's all about driving that message home with a knife.

Wing and Seed (and Destiny) went further and tried less. They browbeat the viewer by simply having the characters rant on and on about how war was bad. Hardly any demonstration. Just a lot of empty, shallow rhetoric.

Every good story is centered around characters. They matter more than anything else. When the theme assumes greater status than the individual characters... that's when trouble starts.
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Mwulf wrote: This is apparent in the best example, 0080, when virtually every frame of animation is meant to enhance the final tragedy. It's all about driving that message home with a knife.
Actually, I am not sure if this is the common view, but I personally do not think of it as much as anti-war as to serve as a reminder of what Gundam is. I think most of us, who has never faced the true effect of war, are not much better than Al in our views of war. We can talk about it or read about it, but most of us can't truly say we understand it. Much like Al, most people here are attracted to Gundam by cool mecha designs and actions in the first place. So to me,having a 10 year old kid as a simplified viewer surrogate and forcing him to witness the horrors of war, even though on a very small and personal scale, does drives to point home better than another 50 episode series.


Dendrobium Stamen wrote: So really, while there are good people on all three sides, none of them are truly good, though at the same time none are truly evil, either.
But we can all count on Lacus and Kira to be truly good eh :wink: . Not to take a shot at SEED, but that is truly what nailed it for me as something I dislike. I was enjoying it relatively well until Lacus an Co. start "saving the world". That is when I went "WTH?". I thought I was seeing a reincarnated Queen Maria, except she is actually a "good" guy...er... girl.
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I never viewed Tomino's works as anti-war. They always had an air of inevitability in the struggles and tragedies they create. I think admist all of the conflicts Tomino portrays, the protagonists and antagonists were fighting to shape the outcome that the war.

I'm sure Tomino knows war is bad just like everyone else, but watching Zeta and Victory Gundam, I think it is also portrayed as a necessary evil with many small pictures that are put together, instead of one big picture.
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padre
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Mwulf wrote:Er... Padre, by making a case for Tomino's work NOT being about war, I think you've inadvertently made a case for why Tomino's work IS anti-war, and why it does it so well. :roll:
Tomino isn't anti-war. In fact he tends to portray pacifists negatively. Look at Amuro's mother or Cameron Bloom in MSG. They're portrayed as naive at best or cowards at worst. Look at the Federation in ZZ or F91. The "heroes" are the people that are willing to fight, not those who avoid conflict at all costs. Tomino is obviously aware that tragedy accompanies war, but he's also aware, and this is something some of the other shows miss, that we believe that it's worth it, that there are things we consider so valuable that we are willing to fight for them. And he agrees with that. There are things worth fighting for, and in fact to not fight for them is reprehensible.

But this is part of why Tomino isn't interested in war in itself. It's simply a symptom, if you will. He's much more fascinated with why we come into conflict with each other, from the simplest of reasons to the most grandiose, and what, if anything, we might do about it.
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padre, you just reminded me why I watch all these shows.
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