Ep. 030 - The Rogues Gallery

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Soul Bro Ryu
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Chris wrote:Even though we've discussed this, we'll probably come back to it because the problem is getting worse and someone needs to call out all these bitchy fans who have to whine about everything.
And if I were a betting man, it's probably going to be after 00 concludes. That ending is probably going to spur mad criticism from critics who think they are the "Word of God".

Looks like as long as there are trolls, this topic will always be evergreen. ^_^
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Chris wrote:Even though we've discussed this, we'll probably come back to it because the problem is getting worse and someone needs to call out all these bitchy fans who have to whine about everything.
The Straight Talk Express needds to visit more stations! :lol:

Reitterating the point -that a single person's preconcieved notions about what he/she wants or likes to see, does not not neccesarely equal good story telling or characterisation- isn't exactly overdone yet. ;)

It's just too bad some people are going in wanting their personal fantasies to be fullfilled or else...
Well, it's their loss if they want to indulge themselves in closedmindedness.


Anyway, this episode was a blast to listen to. Without going into specifics you'd had me laughing out loud a couple of times and made for a very intertaining show. I appreciate the brevity of this episode as well, compared to the amount of showkillers you produce.

I was somewhat suprised that none of you mentioned "WWII with giant robots" -aka MS IGLOO- heavy referencing of classic WWII movies, most notably "Das Boot."
Though perhaps you're waiting for the upcoming Apocalypse 0079 rundown to make a note of that, but I found it rather amusing especially because the series lays on the WWII and Nazi symbology really thick even if that in itself was jarring at times.
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T.V. wrote:I was somewhat suprised that none of you mentioned "WWII with giant robots" -aka MS IGLOO- heavy referencing of classic WWII movies, most notably "Das Boot."
Really? I didn't pick up any sort of "Das Boot" vibes coming from MS IGLOO. "Das Boot" was awesome because they were always alone in their submarine and always under constant fear of being detected and attacked. I was drained after watching it.
IGLOO, however, had the same emotional up-and-down formula for each episode:
  • 1: Excitement at new machine's arrival
    2: Pilot Backstory
    3: Sortie
    4: Action
    5: Death of Pilot
    6: Somber reflection
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I don't meant having the same kind of atmosphere as Das Boot, but having injokes refering said movie.

South Burning pretty much covered it in a past thread about the then upcoming Igloo 2.
South Burning wrote:Here's something else to look for in igLoo 2. The first igLoo borrowed many of its Nazi elements from the German film Das Boot.
It starred Jurgen Prochnow and the captain of the Judenheim (did I spell that correctly?) was named Prochnow. In Das Boot the German actress Rita Cadillac plated a character named Monica and igLoo had a character named Monica Cadillac. (And there are other names borrowed back and forth.) And at the beginning of episode 4, you see some crew members painting a picture of a comical swordfish or sawfish on a piece of equipment; that same comical fish is on the submarine in Das Boot. So, let's see what source they borrow from when they make igLoo 2. Incidentally, I know this is an anime thread, but I thought the Zudah was a GREAT kit, so I'm looking forward to any new gunpla that comes out of igLoo 2 as well.
I just found it worth mentioning for other Gundamn! listeners who are unaware of these nods being present in IGLOO.

I'd also like to profess my appreciation for the Zudah.
The EMS-4 Zudah, that is, which I consider a Zudah being rid of most of its detracting and nonsensensical elements, like the bar infront of the monoeye, resulting in a very nice looking MS.
Too bad we never got to see that one animated, getting the overly ornamental EMS-10 in its stead.
It's a crappy MS with an 88 MPH speed limit (which I blame on ludicrously poor writing or lack of technical consultancy*) but even in its less awesome looking 'reinvented' form its a nice design to look at.


*It would've made a whole lot more sense if it suffered a crippling cooling problem causing its rocket engine to explode after prolonged use, despite offering better performance than a Zaku I.
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thanatos wrote:IGLOO, however, had the same emotional up-and-down formula for each episode:
  • 1: Excitement at new machine's arrival
    2: Pilot Backstory
    3: Sortie
    4: Action
    5: Death of Pilot
    6: Somber reflection
Add creepy God of Death sequence and you have Igloo 2.
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Chris wrote:
Kaioshin Sama wrote:Basically a lot of people seem to have forgotten that how a character acts in a given situation and how they think they would have reacted in that situation are not the same thing and that a character behaving differently from the way they think they should act is not necessarily bad writing or characterization.

I've been seeing a lot of shows getting hammered for this, and it's often not even a matter of characters acting out of character which would actually be a legitimate issue, it's characters not behaving how a particluar viewer absolutely believes they should, whether it be the usual hot button issue of a character making a mistake in judgement (characters with flaws? Oh heavens no), or acting "emo" (The term has gained blanket status in the last couple of years to mean any time a character shows any regret whatsoever), and that viewer blaming it on the studio and writers, even if it's well within the logic of the scene and the characters personality for them to do these things.

Basically I think some people might need to hear a lecture on the fact that they are not the word of god when it comes to a particular characters actions and what they think they should be doing, and when they don't like how a character has acted in a given scenario then the onus is on them to explain why it is a legitimate characterization flaw. And if they can't find a way to prove that it is a real writing flaw and instead have to resort to supplanting their own standard of characterization instead of the what is actually the case, it then becomes their problem and not the studios for them not feeling the connect with character.
I think we touched upon a related issue several times, most notably when discussing Mizushima's reaction to Japanese fans on the internet. This is along those same lines of what we already discussed - fans come with with list of 100 personal expectations of a show, and if it doesn't follow all of them, it sucks. If they don't like the way a certain character acts, even though that's how the character SHOULD act, it becomes the annoying catch all of "horrible writing."

Case in point: you mention the ever-annoying complaint of "emo," and I recall that in Gurren-Lagann after Kamina died, people were raging about Simon going "emo" for three episodes and how it ruined the show. What, do you expect someone to just be happy-go-lucky when a very close friend dies? It's like these people are projecting some unrealistic, tough-guy version of themselves onto these characters, and when the characters show any human emotions or flaws, they suck.

Even though we've discussed this, we'll probably come back to it because the problem is getting worse and someone needs to call out all these bitchy fans who have to whine about everything.
Well if you are ever looking for some good material to address as far as terminal bitchiness goes then one of my associates managed to round quite a few of the latest ones for 00 up in this article here. Of course you guys inspired me to do my own version of the straight talk express, only a little more direct to pointing out the hypocrisy in whining about characters whining. Sometimes they just make it to easy though.

It has become a lot worse recently though and it seems like it's always the same few "issues" getting brought up over and over again. "Overpowered" mechs, emo characters and "no the character shouldn't have done this, he should have done this because I said so" type arguments.

Of course one could always chose to view this sort of behaviour as a comedic farce, which is a level of discourse that isn't really all that hard to break it down to.

Anyway enough on that subject, I really like the Top 5 Best and Worst Villains list. I won't go into too much detail other than the names tonight, but here is my list:

Best:

5. Ali Al Saachez (What's not to like about him. He's got a wild personality that is almost infectious and he's probably the best non-Innovator MS pilot in the show)
4. Paptimus Scirroco (For pretty much the exact same reasons listed in the podcast)
3. Treize Khushrenada (A rare suave and debonaire type villain who is good at what he does, but who also has tremendous compassion for those who put their lives on the line and conflict and even for just the common man. I see what you guys were referring to with him being out of place, but I think if he would work better anywhere it wouldn't have been Gundam 00, it would have been Code Geass. Then again that would be like having two Schneizel's so I don't know)
2. Haman Khan (A rare strong female character in the Gundam franchise and a worthy adversary to pretty much everybody)
1. Char Aznable (Do I really need to explain it?)

Honorable mentions:

Frost Brothers
Gym Ghinghnam
Katejina Loos

Worst:

5. Iron Mask/Karozo Ronah (Just a total weak sauce villain as mentioned. We never really learn anything about him and he's just another pure black villain in the end who wants to commit genocide. Ghiren did it better)
4. Yuna Roma Seiran (Such a pathetic and whiny baby like character. I couldn't stand his antics and found it extremely depressing that so much time was put into taking care of this clown. They also felt the need to devalue Cagalli's character in order for her to have to have her struggle with this guy)
3. Chief Engineer Tuberov (HAHA! With my Mobile Dolls we'll make Romefeller the master of the Earth Sphere. Mobile Dolls, Mobile Dolls...Preciiiiiiiiiiiouuuuuuuuuuusssssssssssssssssss Mobile Dolls. Even back when I didn't know any better I thought this was such a dumb character and I still remember to this day laughing my ass off at his death scene where he went out in an explosion rambling about how awesome his mobile dolls were)
2. Lord Djibril (MWHAHAHAHAHA! That about sums this guy up)
1. Sweatson Sutero (Like Chris said, this guy is just ridiculous and stupid. He's absurdly fat for some reason, gets off on jumping on his subordinates, and does absolutely nothing of value whenever he's on screen. I've always had my qualms with Tomino's style of comedy, but this guy was just beyond lame. I don't think anybody was sorry to see him get punk'd by Gym later on in the series. I would have probably done the same thing if I were in his position.)

Honorable Mentions:

Murata Azrael
Lupe Cineau
Wong Yun Fat
Ulube Ishikawa
Dekim Barton
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Glad to finally hear a segment on villains. Something seemed to be consistent in all of them was the best of them being charismatic and relentless while the worst were all so utterly pathetic deep down.

If I had to do a best/worst 5, in no particular order it would be.

Rau Le Cruset: My introduction to insane Gundam Villains

Ribbons Almark: A recent entry who has grown on me. Now if only his plans would stop failing

Paptimus Scirocco: Manipulative charisma at its finest

Master Asia: Don't question this guy. He is so awesome that, as my friend put it, "Domon killed him, and then he came back an episode later with a terminal disease."

Char Aznable: Self Explanatory

Honorable Mentions for The Frost Brothers, Haman Khan, The Devil Gundam, and of course, Lacus Clyne

Edit: Worst in no particular order

That fat guy from Tigerbaum: So pathetic I don't even care to look up his name

Arthur Goodman: The fat stupid cousin of Jamican

Dorel Ronah: Pathetic kid with nothing going for him

Commander Tasilo: A true expample of stupid evil. Okay until he shot Maria. What an idiot

Agrippa Maintainer: The guy had nothing going for him

Dishonorable Mentions go to the majority of Wing villains, who alone would take up a top five; Ghinias Sakhalin, Colonel Killing; and Lord Djbril
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Kishiria wrote: After that, I hate, loathe, despise and spit upon Ginias Sakhalin, the only character in Gundam who is possibly more self-centered than Char Aznable. Any sympathy I could have had for him ended when he poisoned and then blew up those scientists. He's a zoinking zoinker (that's not your censorbot, I'm using the word "zoinks" because it's funny) and I hope he got zoinked to zoinking zoink in the afterlife.
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Kaioshin Sama wrote:[


Worst:

3. Chief Engineer Tuberov (HAHA! With my Mobile Dolls we'll make Romefeller the master of the Earth Sphere. Mobile Dolls, Mobile Dolls...Preciiiiiiiiiiiouuuuuuuuuuusssssssssssssssssss Mobile Dolls. Even back when I didn't know any better I thought this was such a dumb character and I still remember to this day laughing my ass off at his death scene where he went out in an explosion rambling about how awesome his mobile dolls were)


I forgot about that guy and his weird obessesion with mobile dolls.
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Kaioshin Sama wrote:5. Iron Mask/Karozo Ronah (Just a total weak sauce villain as mentioned. We never really learn anything about him
You could say the same thing about pretty much every character in F91.
Kaioshin Sama wrote:4. Yuna Roma Seiran (Such a pathetic and whiny baby like character. I couldn't stand his antics and found it extremely depressing that so much time was put into taking care of this clown. They also felt the need to devalue Cagalli's character in order for her to have to have her struggle with this guy)
Yuna was such a tool that he barely seems like a real antagonist. He never really masterminded anything and he barely held on to his position of leadership since his troops switched over to Cagalli at the drop of a hat.
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I don't know, I believe the other characters in F91 weren't that bad. F91 should've been a 6 six episode OVA, not a movie. Even if that happened, Iron Mask still would've sucked.
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I'm a bit late on the podcast, but Ali cooler then Yazan? Blasphemy!

Anyway, I think there are far too many good villains in the Gundam universe, especially the more morally ambiguous ones like Norris Packard. I'm a bit surprised no one mentioned Ghiren, though (despite being executed prematurely). The guy blasted his own father into oblivion. Being an oldschool nostalgic of course, my choices would have been completely biased.

Also, shouldn't killing one of the Moon Moon sisters gain some extra points? Granted, she died from falling somehow, and he didn't really even touch her.
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Genocide wrote:I'm a bit late on the podcast, but Ali cooler then Yazan? Blasphemy!
The reason? Two words: Double Zeta.
The Equation of the Robot Apocalypse:

The Admiral + Flashlight = Dead Robo

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hawk of endymion wrote:
Genocide wrote:I'm a bit late on the podcast, but Ali cooler then Yazan? Blasphemy!
The reason? Two words: Double Zeta.
Double Zeta? Bad? Heresy!

Besides, according to the sub I watched, Yazan isn't in ZZ. There's a suspicious looking man-rodent named Yarzan Gerbil, however. All that remained of the poor guy with a pork bone.
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Re: Ep. 030 - The Rogues Gallery

Let me see.

Fav villians.
1.Rau Le Creuset, he's been discussed plenty of times before and it's easy to see why he could make the list.
2.The Frost Brothers.
3.Hamarn Kahn.
4.Zechs Marquie/Milliardo Peacecraft.
5.Ribbons

Least Fav villians.
1.Quinze/Cairns.
2.Djibril.
3.Tsuberov.
4.Annavel Gato.
5.Cima Garahu.

So there is my list, didn't go in much detail, I should note my list isn't in any particular order.
But Iron Mask and Chronicle Asher sound like such loosers for villians. :lol:

Honorable mention I agree with Chris for Bernard Monsha.
I would also agree with Swetson even though I haven't seen Turn A, even in SRW games he annoyed me to no end and came across like a troll type guy and all that.
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