“judau ashta, double zeta, ikimasu!!”
a lot of people dislike zz gundam, because of its tonal whiplash, and some of the continuity issues that zeta also suffered from, but i just love the chemistry of the main cast too much. 0079 gundam felt like a more optimistic view on war, zeta gundam illustrates the horrors of war, and double zeta criticises the establishment, focussing on people on the cracks on society. kids in poverty who have to sell space scraps to survive, an abandoned colony who has developed a religion that helped them find meaning, and the african people who suffered as the earth federation set up their political stronghold in their country.
“the earth is polluted, our space colonies are overwhelmed. right now, we need a new vision!”
out of the 3 gundam protagonists so far, judau is the most compelling in my opinion. everyone involved in a war is complicit in murder, and judau understood that. he’s constantly angry at the adults who start these stupids wars, and constantly griefs the lives of so many innocent people.
the main cast reminds me of a quote from the poppy war by r.f kuang: “children ceased to be children when you put a sword in their hands.” these kids were forced to grow up, and forced to fight a war the adults started. and most of them are newtypes, or have newtype sensibilities, so they suffer the most in war, due to their heightened empathy. the way newtypes are weaponised in gundam feel so much like how queer people and people of colour are so often weaponised for political gain, just in less physical aspects.
all of judau frustrations culminated into a tearful punch directed toward bright on the axis ship. in double zeta bright was written like a war veteran, who knew his way around being a captain. but so many moments he seemed so close to breaking down. and after being on the frontlines of 3 different wars, who could blame him? he was also carrying onto the grief of dragging innocent children into war, on the white base, on the argama, and on the nahel argama. he definitely misses his family so much, but he couldn’t bare to face them. the only contact he had was a video that sayla mass gave to him.
and on the topic of sayla mass, she’s got a few lines in this series (yayy!!).
“this is the will of people who were sacrificed in meaningless fights!”
this scene during the final battle between judau and haman will forever be ingrained in my head. puru, lalah, four, katz, sarah, and kamille, pouring their newtype powers in judau, in the psychedelic imagery gundam is known for.
haman is also such a interesting antagonist, even more so than scirocco in my opinion. and the quebeley is probably still my favorite mecha design. her character further pushes the ambiguous antagonism that i love about gundam. every character in gundam fights for something they believe in, and to dismiss a character as evil, is a very shallow reading.
“can’t you believe in people!? don’t you understand that hatred would just spawn more hatred!?”
but above all, gundam tells us to be optimistic about the future, to believe in love as the only absolute in our world. the ending of zz is very hopeful in contrast to zeta’s ending. judau reunites with his sister. judau and roux move to jupiter. and i’d like to believe that beecha and elle got together after all this. (i love beecha so much he’s my favorite zz character!! and also their outfits in the last scene omg)
kamille and fa took a backseat for this, but i loved the episodes they were in so much. especially the ones in dublin where kamille kinda symbolically passes the torch to judau. zz’s earth episodes have so much more depth than zeta’s in my opinion.
even though amuro and char were also barely mentioned, sayla does talk about him when talking to bright:
“char believed in the world’s ability to redeem itself.”
“judau ashta, double zeta, ikimasu!!”
a lot of people dislike zz gundam, because of its tonal whiplash, and some of the continuity issues that zeta also suffered from, but i just love the chemistry of the main cast too much. 0079 gundam felt like a more optimistic view on war, zeta gundam illustrates the horrors of war, and double zeta criticises the establishment, focussing on people on the cracks on society. kids in poverty who have to sell space scraps to survive, an abandoned colony who has developed a religion that helped them find meaning, and the african people who suffered as the earth federation set up their political stronghold in their country.
“the earth is polluted, our space colonies are overwhelmed. right now, we need a new vision!”
out of the 3 gundam protagonists so far, judau is the most compelling in my opinion. everyone involved in a war is complicit in murder, and judau understood that. he’s constantly angry at the adults who start these stupids wars, and constantly griefs the lives of so many innocent people.
the main cast reminds me of a quote from the poppy war by r.f kuang: “children ceased to be children when you put a sword in their hands.” these kids were forced to grow up, and forced to fight a war the adults started. and most of them are newtypes, or have newtype sensibilities, so they suffer the most in war, due to their heightened empathy. the way newtypes are weaponised in gundam feel so much like how queer people and people of colour are so often weaponised for political gain, just in less physical aspects.
all of judau frustrations culminated into a tearful punch directed toward bright on the axis ship. in double zeta bright was written like a war veteran, who knew his way around being a captain. but so many moments he seemed so close to breaking down. and after being on the frontlines of 3 different wars, who could blame him? he was also carrying onto the grief of dragging innocent children into war, on the white base, on the argama, and on the nahel argama. he definitely misses his family so much, but he couldn’t bare to face them. the only contact he had was a video that sayla mass gave to him.
and on the topic of sayla mass, she’s got a few lines in this series (yayy!!).
“this is the will of people who were sacrificed in meaningless fights!”
this scene during the final battle between judau and haman will forever be ingrained in my head. puru, lalah, four, katz, sarah, and kamille, pouring their newtype powers in judau, in the psychedelic imagery gundam is known for.
haman is also such a interesting antagonist, even more so than scirocco in my opinion. and the quebeley is probably still my favorite mecha design. her character further pushes the ambiguous antagonism that i love about gundam. every character in gundam fights for something they believe in, and to dismiss a character as evil, is a very shallow reading.
“can’t you believe in people!? don’t you understand that hatred would just spawn more hatred!?”
but above all, gundam tells us to be optimistic about the future, to believe in love as the only absolute in our world. the ending of zz is very hopeful in contrast to zeta’s ending. judau reunites with his sister. judau and roux move to jupiter. and i’d like to believe that beecha and elle got together after all this. (i love beecha so much he’s my favorite zz character!! and also their outfits in the last scene omg)
kamille and fa took a backseat for this, but i loved the episodes they were in so much. especially the ones in dublin where kamille kinda symbolically passes the torch to judau. zz’s earth episodes have so much more depth than zeta’s in my opinion.
even though amuro and char were also barely mentioned, sayla does talk about him when talking to bright:
“char believed in the world’s ability to redeem itself.”
