Hello, I’m Conrad’s (Digiho’s?) younger brother, Iconclasm (AKA Victor). I’m finally being forced to do posts for his blog because I actually keep up with current anime while he’s busy snorting pony crack and doing… whatever it is he actually does. I’m a big mecha dork and I generally end up enjoying any show I sit down and watch. I’m not totally sure what kind of posts I’ll be making, but I will try to make them not suck.
SD Gundam Sangokuden continues to be entertaining, but I have to admit I was just a bit distracted when watching episode 2. I couldn’t help but notice the extent to which in this show, Gundams are, in fact, people.
See Gundam wake up.
See Gundam eat a god damn riceball (he really puts it to his faceplace and fucking eats it, I swear) and then get rice stuck on his face.
See Gundam angry (okay, maybe you’ve seen that before.)
See Gundam cheerily frolic with his new pals, Zeta (red) and ZZ (green). (Using the model names to address everyone but Liu Bei because I have zero capacity for memorizing Chinese names.) (Also, I am pretty sure that the models of the Gundams have little to do with the specs of their UC counterparts.)
Anyway, the Gundams, and every other sort of mobile suit for that matter, are people in this show, which begs to question whether the series has anything to do with either Gundam or Bromance of the Three Kingdoms at all. Actually, the truth is that those two names are why this show has such an insanely high budget in spite of being a children’s cartoon with an entirely original plot. Can’t say I’m not glad for that fact.
What we do get, though, is a little bit of an uncanny valley effect, because it is impossible to block out the fact in your mind that THOSE ARE FUCKING GUNDAMS. And it gets really weird when you have mechs like this thing showing up.
It doesn’t even have a face! I’m not even thinking about how weird it is that this is a person, cuz I’m too busy being impressed at how well the animators conveyed it’s evil rage just by moving the god damn edges of it’s helmet!
And it rocks. I mean, this shouldn’t be that surprising. How many times has anime completely turned expectations on their head? Before anime, if you told me I’d love a show called ‘Princess Tutu’ I’d have laughed at you, and if you told me I’d get more emotionally attached to little girls and their everyday lives than to any ol’ samurai, I’d have looked at you funny. However, the truth is that anime has surprised me so often that I tend to be incredibly optimistic. I don’t understand people who still manage to think that all of a new season’s shows look like shit when likely half of them will be surprise jewels. So when I found out that there was, in fact, an SD Gundam Romance of the Three Kingdoms, there was not a shred of negative expectations.
In the world of American comics, fantasy, and sci-fi, most of the big stuff consists of assloads of stories set in one central universe. Marvel, DC, Star Wars, Warcraft – stuff like this has a big universe of works that fans can devote themselves to. Anime has it’s fair share of universes as well, ranging from immensely huge and decade-crossing, some of a great size that are relevant only to otaku, and many smaller universes lying around.
Standing high above anything else are the big guns like the Gundam Universe(s), the Macross Universe, the Leijiverse, the Pokemon Universe and so on. Then we have some universes that are less universally known but still enormous, especially for otaku. The Type-Moon Universe is certainly up there, but for sheer unbridled scope, the Touhou Universe stands above everything. I want to talk about my own favorite universes, most of which are a little smaller and more homely but still large enough that they should be called a universe and popular enough for a strong cult following. (NOTE: Please don’t comment in regards to what should or shouldn’t be called a universe or metaseries, I’m just trying to make a post.)
Because Oi, Hayaku has gone defunct, I will be reposting all my OH! posts here. Enjoy if you haven’t already.
Mecha has always been a huge element of anime since the good old days of Tetsujin 28. There was the super robot era in the 70s, the real robot era in the 80s, the 90s when genres began colliding and Evangelion made mecha psychological, and today when shows like Gurren Lagann make a point to reference and pay homage to all eras of mecha anime. But why do anime fans like mecha so much? What is it that makes a mech great? I decided to analyze different qualities of a that make them stand out, as well as share which mecha I think best represent these qualities. If you think there are other qualities or more deserving nominations, be sure to let your voice be heard in the comments!
My Sword Is Unbelievably Dull 