Personally I feel that the characters in Headmasters were not all that great. But in Masterforce it gets worse. Transformers is about the robots, not about humans controlling robots.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

GUNDAM'D!!1! :eek

Innovation

 

Gundam is a turning point in the history of anime and manga, as it is credited for inspiring the Real Robot genre. Real Robots (popularly known in English as mecha, a re-borrowing of the Japanese abbreviation for the English word "mechanical") differ from their Super Robot forebearers on a few stylistic and thematic points such as attempts at realism in robot design and weaponry, as well as their thematic and ethical roles. Zambot 3 was an earlier program by Tomino which helped develop these ideas.

 

The main theme of all the various Gundam series is always the harsh depiction of the atrocities of war. All the machines, including the Gundams, are always depicted realistically i.e. they run out of energy and ammunition, they break and malfunction like all machines eventually do. The technology, at least that of the Universal Century, is practical and derived from true science, including Lagrange points in space, the O'Neill cylinder as a living environment, and energy production from helium-3 (Minovsky Physics).

 

The narration is always revolving around the emotions of the characters, usually thrown into conflict without much choice and faced with death, destruction and dehumanization. With few exceptions, there are no absolute good guys and bad guys; all have their motives. Politics of war are always lurking in the background, as it is in real wars. Gundam also features true to life issues and clear political ideas.

 

Finally, most of the stories are basically structured as coming-of-age dramas, where the main protagonist (and sometimes his main antagonist) and most of the cast personalities, points of view, and actions may (or may not) change dramatically as the events on the series unfold. This makes the plot more real: while in early Super Robot series, the hero and cast usually act in the same predictable manner in most episodes, in the various Gundam series the characters' personalities and actions are transformed/developed by the turn of events surrounding them (the best example of this is how the personalities of longtime rivals Amuro Ray and Char Aznable are influenced by their experiences in the Gundam saga).

Ok, that all sounds very interesting indeed. I imagne that the body count is also extremely high seeing in a war one barely makes it trough a day without casualties.

 

The point is that this is a show directed at an older audience and sadly Transformers was not. If it had been, it too could have been grittier. Beast Wars did show the negative sides of the war but it was still not as gritty as it could have been. I would love to see a really gritty cartoon or comic with lots of casualties. G2 did go heavy on the body count but that aside was not all that gritty.

 

Star Trek Deep Space Nine is also a good example of a show that shows the bad parts of a war.

 

I might even learn to like Gundam though I am not fond of the Japanese animation style in general. Again, I am not saying that the animation is bad. I just do not care for it much which makes it a bit trickier to enjoy a show.

 

Add to that, that I still find humans controlling machines, a bit odd no matter how good the story may be. I mean a Transformer is superior to a human in almost everyway so a human in a machine feels a bit outdated.

 

I also watch too much shows already so I hardly think it is wise to add any more to my watch list..  :tftongue

 

One thing does puzzle me. Why do the machines have to be so big as it serves no tactical purpose that I can see. All it does is drain resources and makes them an easier target. The smaller a war machine is, generally the better.

 

The U.S.S. Defiant is a small ship as well with only 50 crew aboard but can easily take on battlecruisers 4 times it size.

bigds9fan,

 

Watch a few episodes of Zeta Gundam if you can. Ignore the other series like Wing, G-Gundam, and Seed (although from what I've seen so far Seed is really good in it's own right). You might end up liking the series, and you might want to see more. I can only tell you what I like from my own perspective, but here's my list of the "good" Gundam series:

 

Zeta Gundam, my new personal favorite! :thumb

Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory, good prerequisite to Zeta, great animation and action! :thumb

Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket, GREAT story, somewhat slow-paced but with only six 1/2 hour eps., it's damned good! :thumb

The original Gundam series... damned good anime for it's time, and although somewhat out there by today's standards it is the one that started it all! :thumb

Gundam 08th MS Team, more flash than substance IMO, but still decent story and action-paced, I liked it! :thumb

 

Gundam: Char's Counterattack (movie), see this ONLY if you like any of the other series, but you have to at least see Zeta first and know some of the original Gundam story to really get into this one. Really good IMO, but it will seem rather obtuse w/o seeing some of the other stuff first! :D

 

Gundam Seed, great for an alternate storyline, and tons better than Wing could hope to be. :D

 

I haven't seen Turn A, but from what I've heard it's actually good. Here's hoping for a domestic DVD release! :clap