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Old 2006-01-05, 17:47   Link #235
vio5555
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2003
I think the biggest problem with GSD is that the fanbases have become so polarized due to the way that the series went (I'm not going into detail here because it would be redundant since this point has been driven many times), that the battles are now being read completely as "plot devices."

One of the biggest failings of a series can be when its conflicts don't achieve legitimacy with the viewers. In this case, which has rarely happened so extensively in the former Gundam universes, the battles between the main characters are being driven more by what the viewers want to see in what is actually presented. This has the downside that now most viewers have reached the reductionist position that any character who wins a skirmish, does so through a plot device.

While Fukuda has no doubt caused this by providing us with lots of inexplicable occurrences on all sides of the battles from the 2 scenes that Tetsuo depicts to the use of SF's shields to take Destiny's sword, I think the debate has pretty much gotten mired in the inconsistencies with both sides advocating more and more extreme positions.

Honestly I think the consumeristic aspect of the series went to Fukuda's head and he ended up designing some kind of mass consumption sports series meets war. Why would you argue who the best pilot is in a war in the first place? Why are we debating such a superficial point in a "war story"? This shouldn't be some kind of spectator sport where people line up on either side cheering for their team to score a victory against the other; it should be a story where we are meant to feel the tragedies that hit both sides and identify with both sides.

I feel that this is the worst aspect of the series because neither Kira nor Shinn was meant to be evil or misconstrued as so and yet people on either side of the debate are saying things like "its rightful that so-and-so got pwned." Would some of you have been cheering if the other side got killed in that last battle? How would it help the C.E. if Shinn got killed in ep 50 of GSD? Wouldn't another GSD then occur...? In the same way, I don't see how people wanted Kira killed this late in the series; if anything it would just destabilize the situation more than it already is.

Instead of forcing us into the kind of reductionist positions that led large portions of each fanbase into extreme positions, Fukuda would have been much better off trying to force each side to see things from the other sides' perspective so that we aren't left to bitterly note that in the last minutes of Final Plus. Instead, he went and capitalized on the natural Shinn vs. Kira inclinations and left most fans disappointed with the direction of the series. A much better discussion could have ensued if both fanbases had realized that Shinn and Kira could have worked together without all the polarization that occurred before reaching that point.

Honestly, are Kira's and Shinn's compassion lost on their fanbases? Do you really think it would be nice to see Freedom's cockpit hit by Impulse's sword or "Legend turned into swiss cheese," would that really make the series better? If so, then this series couldn't possibly have any value as a tragic war story, its turned into a cheap sporting event in which fanbases are cheering for one side to physically harm the other side.
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