Ep. 029 - Physics with Captain Ramius!

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Ep. 029 - Physics with Captain Ramius!

Gundamn! @ MAHQ Ep. 029 - "Physics with Captain Ramius!"
- Unplugged Version: 64 kbps - 105 min., 4 sec. (1:45:04) - 48.1 MB
- Remastered Version: Coming Soon!

Special Guest Host: Austin, The "Silky Johnston" of Otaku (2nd Segment)

Segment Breakdown for this Episode:

01. Intro: "Neo News!"
Runtime: 0:00:00 - 0:18:14

02. Preview: Florida Oriental Trading (Commercial)
Runtime: 0:18:14 - 0:19:54

03. 1st Segment: "Mobile Suit Gundam 00 Season Two: Episodes 4-6 Reviews" "Gundam Round-Up!: Mobile Suit Gundam SEED"
Runtime: 0:19:54 - 0:44:33

04. 2nd Segment: "Gundam Round-Up!: Mobile Suit Gundam SEED"
Runtime: 0:44:33 - 1:42:41

05. Epic Sugar Works (Commercial)
Runtime: 1:42:41 - 1:43:17

06. Outro: "Closing/Peep the Websites!"
Runtime: 1:43:17 - 1:45:04

We jump back on our reviews for Gundam 00, and due to popular demand we return to our classic "shoot-the-breeze" format of reviews. Then, without hesistation, we are joined by the Silky Johnston of Otaku, Austin, in our next Gundam Round-Up for "Mobile Suit Gundam SEED"! Mad thanks to the Five-Star General of the Hate-agon and he'll be back again when we cover "SEED Destiny" & "Stargazer"!

In light of our appearance at this year's Megacon, Chris appeared on the nationally syndicated radio show, "Sci-Fi Overdrive", hosted by David Durica. The episode aired earlier today (2/14/09), but if you check the website, that episode will soon be posted and you can download the episode for yourself. When it is, we'll post a thread on this Forum and on Gundamn.net with links for your listening pleasure! Stay Tuned!

More props go to David for having Chris on and for the exposure for MAHQ.net & Gundamn! @ MAHQ! Chris sounded like a pro and I got goosebumps listening!

Thanks for listening and for the feedback!
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Last edited by Soul Bro Ryu on Fri Feb 20, 2009 1:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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A quick note on Rave Master. The blood you spoke of will likely be there. Those guys aren't too squeamish about showing blood and stuff, and really the only thing that is edited is nudity. Most language gets a pass as well so if any lines were changed there for CN, expect the original for Sci-Fi.
Then again, it could still be a bad airing with all the butchery they do for commercials.
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Oh GUNDAM SEED. It's one series that I just can't rag on considering that it was basically my first exposure to Gundam. Granted 0079 and 0083 are what did the trick. I know Chris hates the BuCue, but the first time I saw its head while reading the manga, that's when I genuinely got interested in Gundam. Granted the series is incredibly flawed and many things the staff did came off as lazy, not to mention the melodrama was over the top. But it's fun, dramatically sound, and captures the spirit of Gundam that is noob friendly.

Though with covering the stuff that was glossed over like the SEED and the la Flagga family, you forgot to mention the Winged Whale, which seems like it should have been a landmark in Gundam history.
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Kavik Ryx wrote:Though with covering the stuff that was glossed over like the SEED and the la Flagga family, you forgot to mention the Winged Whale, which seems like it should have been a landmark in Gundam history.
As I've said before, we can't be expected to hit upon every single plot point when we discuss a series. SEED didn't bother to explain the winged whale at all after it appeared, so even with our omission of it, it's pretty negligible.
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I liked SEED when it was out. It reminded me of Star Wars, and Macross mixed with Gundam. I didn't like that no one could stay dead though. I also was not a fan of all the coincidences.
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Great Episode as always.

This was the first episode where I could listen to the review and actually agree or disagree because I've actually watched SEED prior to broadcast. It was my re-introduction to Gundam (I had seen about half of Wing before seeing this) and so I found it hard to see any faults with it up untill now, having seen other shows then re-watched it.

The only thing that stands out to me as a disappointment was how they never explored the Newtype-esque relationship between Mu La Flaga and Rau Le Creuset. I can live with Winged-Whales, Mobile Suit Key sprouting pop princesses and the Star Wars trap that I like many others fell into but it is sad that there was no elaboration on the 'Newtype' thing. I wasn't even bothered about the SEED Factor.

I was also intrigued to hear about the 'possible' endings for the characters. Kira dead, Athrun maimed. That probably would have been a good ending.
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Really enjoyed the SEED segment. It's nice to see some actual INTELLIGENT discussion of the show for once.

Which brings me to the point you made about douchey Seed fans... yeah, they're out there, but on the flipside to that you get a lot of douchey Seed haters as well (*cough*4chan*cough*). I think I mentioned a while ago that there was someone on another board that regarded anyone who liked Seed as the "dumb noob" stereotype, regardless of how much Gundam they had seen (although I got some amusement at his expense by how he reacted when another poster blasphemed in his eyes by saying they'd seen Zeta and hated it)

Regarding Lacus... when she first appeared, I thought she was the dumbest character I'd ever seen in Gundam, and it was only later that I realised it was all an act - in fact, as a friend pointed out, the whole singer thing was essentially just a hobby for her, and her real purpose all along was political. I feel there's really a lot of potential with a character like that, which unfortunately went untapped in the show.

(I've previously mentioned my own theory, that in the same sense as Soma is a supersoldier, Lacus is a "super-leader" designed to be beautiful and intelligent and charismatic - it would be interesting to see a story about her growing up knowing that.)
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SEED was the third of fourth gundam series I'd ever seen. I did enjoy your discussion of the series, one thing I never liked about the show was the actual colour palette they used (and have continued to use); much too bright and high contrast compared to the washed-out colours of earlier gundam series. I also tend to doc points from it for being a precursor to Destiny.

Good to hear episode reviews become a little more conversational tone.

Another great show guys.
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I really like SEED. I'm pretty sure it was like the 3rd Gundam series I'd seen. Certainly the first I watched during it's original run. Pretty sure I watched a bunch of other Gundam series during that time period too. This was back when I hadn't seen that much anime.

Anyways, yeah, show doesn't really get out of medicore level until they get to Earth. Definitely those last few episodes were really awesome. Two characters I'd like to touch upon.

Fllay. Yes, a lot of people hate Fllay. I was one of them. My first time watching the series I thought she was a manipulative bitch that deserved what was coming to her. But eventually I put myself in her shoes and became far more sympathetic towards her. I mean, her father, the only family she had left, was killed right in front of her eyes. That could cause anyone to snap, but in Fllay's case, she's a 15 year old spoiled rich girl. It would definitely hit harder than most. So of course she'd despise ZAFT and, by extension, all Coordinators as a result. Yeah, she stooped to manipulation using her own body to achieve her goal of revenge, but remember that she is a victim too. And later on in the series, she came to regret what she did and found she had genuine feelings for Kira. Course she never got to act on any of this, cuz Kira had to be a fricken moron and fly over to her shuttle. I guess not even gene manipulation can cure stupidity. So yeah, after another watching, I came to care for her and she's one of my favourite Gundam heroines as a result.

Next up is Rau. I am so totally in love with this man. He was just so awesome. Rau made me fall for Toshihiko Seki's wonderful voice. His english VA was also pretty awesome. Not to mention that the Providence Gundam is oh so very badass. I love that suit. Anyways, Chris was saying he didn't understand Rau's motivation. Well, as we know Rau is a result of Al Da Flaga's ambition to be perfect and live forever. To Rau, Al represented everything about humanity: our greed, desire, pride, etc. Rau's thought he could judge humanity, because he was the product of humanity's evils. "If people weren't like this, I would have never been made." He concluded that humanity would continue on like this and eventually destroy each other anyways, so he might as well speed up the process. This is why he was double dealing behind the scenes. He worked to ensure the highest body count possible. He leaked the N-Jammer Canceller to the Alliance, so they could use nukes, and in response, Patrick whiped out GENESIS. If Patrick had hit Earth with GENESIS like he intended, then humanity would have been screwed and it would have been Rau's victory.

One of the things I love about Rau is that he's absolutely right. I mean, barring some sort of huge natural disaster, we're definitely going to blow ourselves up. It's inevitable, I think. Sure, it may take a few thousand years, but it'll happen. Heck, even Kira realised this on some level. While Rau goes on his epic villain speech, Kira can only manage feeble replies of "No! Shut up! It's not true! Humanity isn't like that!" Kira definitely lost that war of words. Too bad this isn't Monkey Island. If it was, Kira really would be dead. Sure, Rau got taken out in the end, but the dude went out with a smile on his face cuz he knew humanity would destroy itself even without him around. You can see how his ghost still haunt's Kira in Destiny.

In conclusion: I think Rau is the best Gundam villain ever. He was fun to watch, he kicked ass, had a wicked voice, and it's hard to argue with him.

Another thing about SEED. I used to love Cagalli. She was the first anime character I naturally fell for (as opposed to deciding "I'm going to like her because of ______). Sadly, Destiny did have a retroactive effect in her case.

I was so hoping to see Kira and Cagalli hook up, but then they pulled the siblings thing. I was quite dissapointed then, but nowadays, wincest be damned, I still ship them!

On the whole, I love SEED.
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Destiny_Gundam wrote:Anyways, Chris was saying he didn't understand Rau's motivation.
I completely understand what Rau claims his motivation is. I don't buy his motivation, which is an entirely different things. He spends the whole series hiding in the shadows doing nothing. He skulks about here and there giving some information to Azrael, and suddenly in the last five episodes he's like "BUAHAHAHA I AM THE SUPER VILLAIN FINAL BOSS!" and starts this apocalyptic agenda. And to his arguments about how evil humanity is, so what? Everyone knows this. Does this mean he gets to judge them for being evil? Really, his whole anger against humanity just comes across as a half-baked retread of the Frost brothers, whom I think had a slightly more legitimate beef in their case.
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Well, in the Frost brother's case, they were rejected because of humanity's desire for power (NewTypes). In Rau's cause, his entire existance was brought about by humanity's desire for power. I don't know where you get the idea that Rau was rejected. If anyone was rejected, it was Mwu. Anyways, Rau's case was like an Octoparrot pointing at its creators, saying "You're playing God!" It has every right to accuse them because it was created, after all. That's why Rau thinks he's justified.

I think the fact that you mostly see him inactive, only to spring his trap at the end makes him an even better villain. I mean, he was biding his time, so of course he's not gonna go all crazy homocidal until the right moment.

But, in the sense of "BUAHAHAHA I AM THE SUPER VILLAIN FINAL BOSS!", I'd compare him to Ulube, if anyone.
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Chris wrote:
Kavik Ryx wrote:Though with covering the stuff that was glossed over like the SEED and the la Flagga family, you forgot to mention the Winged Whale, which seems like it should have been a landmark in Gundam history.
As I've said before, we can't be expected to hit upon every single plot point when we discuss a series. SEED didn't bother to explain the winged whale at all after it appeared, so even with our omission of it, it's pretty negligible.
They talked about it the first time Gundamn! reviewed SEED (I'm not sure Chris was there for that), so props to the guys for hitting a ton of different points this time around and bringing in a big SEED fan for the discussion.

Great episode, I loved the 00 reviews, and Chris has a good point about the Trans-am spam. Another thing about that is it's been 4 years since they started using trans-am, so they've had plenty of time to get acclimated to it. I guess the time skip is 00's equivalent of the hyperbolic time chamber in DBZ.
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On the point about Saji not firing, it's understandable, especially when you consider that in real life there were huge numbers of soldiers in WW1 and WW2 who were unable to fire at the enemy the first time they went into combat - after all, these are people who have been told all their lives that killing another human being is the single most evil act you can possibly commit. The numbers have gone down more recently as training methods have resulted in soldiers becoming more, erm, willing to fire on the enemy. But in any case, Saji has not even trained, much less fought, before.
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Destiny_Gundam wrote: One of the things I love about Rau is that he's absolutely right. I mean, barring some sort of huge natural disaster, we're definitely going to blow ourselves up. It's inevitable, I think. Sure, it may take a few thousand years, but it'll happen. Heck, even Kira realised this on some level. While Rau goes on his epic villain speech, Kira can only manage feeble replies of "No! Shut up! It's not true! Humanity isn't like that!" Kira definitely lost that war of words. Too bad this isn't Monkey Island. If it was, Kira really would be dead. Sure, Rau got taken out in the end, but the dude went out with a smile on his face cuz he knew humanity would destroy itself even without him around. You can see how his ghost still haunt's Kira in Destiny.
To be fair, debate isn't Kira's strong suit. I'm sure Lacus could have handled that aspect better. In fact, it would have been interesting to see Rau engaged in both a physical battle with Kira and a psychological/ideological battle with Lacus.
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Good show as always.

I think Chris really nailed Lacus Clyne. The perfect Virgin mary type of character. I never liked her to begin with and when she became a military leader and a captain of a ship, I thought it was the stupidest thing ever. I think mary-sue gets thrown around to much, but in Lacus case, it is perfectly applicable. One of my least favorite gundam characters ever.

Still, the awfulness of lacus was made up by the druggies. I really enjoyed them as villains. Just pure evil, yet fun at the same time. They also made it so that Kira and Athrun couldn't beam spam.

I'll always have a soft spot for seed since its what got me into gundam again. I was introduced with wing, but seed made me look for more gundam shows. I went looking for the other UC shows and such and fell in love with gundam.
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SEED was my first complete series I managed to watch, though I started it in the oddest way: I found and watched episode 50 and was so enthralled by the BGM and the fighting that I went and found the rest of the series.

It is the first Gundam TV series I started purchasing (which would be followed by OVA series, CCA and F91) and I'll say that is it good. Maybe not the best, but I haven't really decided on that yet either.

Onto Gundam 00: I might not have been able to open fire if I were truly in Saji's situation, but at the same time I more than likely wouldn't have tried to escape the Katharon base like he did.

I classify personal self-defense (i.e. single versus, with or without a weapon) different from something like opening fire with a turret or rifle against a group of enemy. I've been trained in personal combat and would have few qualms defending myself to live. Since the only weapons training I've had relies on right-trigger to fire and right bumper to reload ... I might fail that aspect.

I'd also like to say that the Hate-agon wasn't as potent as I assumed he would be.

Great episode guys, can't wait to hear the big 3-0!
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CanadaMan wrote:I'd also like to say that the Hate-agon wasn't as potent as I assumed he would be.
Yeah, just wait until the DESTINY segment, and then you will feel the fury.
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Wow this segment actually made me want to rewatch SEED, something I thought was impossible. As for my take on SEED while I never hated it but I had a strong dislike for it that stemmed from various things. One of these being , of course, the flashbacks. Sure Nicol's death was sad but after the fifth time it was hilarious. I wasn't sold on the character designs but they grew on me eventualy. On the characters themselves I actually liked Yzak in the beginning despite his attitude, it was probably his attitude that made me like him. I though Rau was cool until the last few episodes where he was giving off a Sephiroth vibe.
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Chris wrote:
CanadaMan wrote:I'd also like to say that the Hate-agon wasn't as potent as I assumed he would be.
Yeah, just wait until the DESTINY segment, and then you will feel the fury.
Oh Yeah!

Back to SEED, man I wonder what was production of the series like, it does seem everything was working-process: first copy the opening parts of the original Gundam, then add some elements from your previous works (Future GPX Cyber Formula), and see how everything works out from there. The good news is SEED IS a GOOD Gundam series, as I would say it had a bit solider storyline than Wing.

Yup, I did like Athrun more than Kira in SEED, as he was more matured and had a greater purpose in the conflict. Sure there was time in SEED where he looked confused and indecisive, but he grew more as the series went on.

But I think Nicol's death was OVERPLAYED, I mean compared to Tolle, Nicol wasn't that important; I mean he's just a feminine, innocent boy that Athrun had easier time to socialized with, compared to the coldness and cockiness of Yzak and Dearka. Tolle was more like the average kid, he did stand up for Kira when he was questioned about his status as a coordinator in the beginning, and wanted to protect the people on-board Archangel.

With the death toll towards the end of the series, I am thankful that Sunrise/Bandai did NOT go with the bloody ending as stated, it wouldn't improve the series at all.

SEED was a Gundam that had good female characters, from the understanding Capt. Ramius, texbook Lt. Badgiruel, tomboy Cagalli, teenage drama queen Fllay, and our holy princess Lacus.

I'll come to this back topic as I have more time later.
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Ah, Gundam SEED, or as I often think of it: Gundam for goldfish. Don't worry if you have zero long term memory, clip shows and flashbacks will always be there to help.
snoops619 wrote:I was also intrigued to hear about the 'possible' endings for the characters. Kira dead, Athrun maimed. That probably would have been a good ending.
No, that would have been an EXCELLENT ending. Comparing that to the actual SEED ending made me realize why Tomino loves killing off all the characters to a show. It's an excellent way of ensuring that future shows don't get bogged down with characters from previous ones.

I know a lot of people say they like the Strike Gundam, and I tend to agree with them. I'll also throw in the rest of the jacked Gundams, but that's about it. SEED (and it got MUCH worse in Destiny) had terrible grunt units. Not to mention their terrible names. Did the mecha designers just mash their hands on a keyboard to name their creations?
I didn't care much for the non-Pegasus remake ship designs. They had a funky, organic kind of feel (think of the Nazca and Laurasia class ships) that was out of place.
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