Gundam Seed/Seed Destiny General Discussion Thread

[Dean_the_Young]

Originally Posted by Sir Dearka

Well then, please, show me other Gundam pilots. Show me Yzak, Dearka, Nicol counterparts in MSG. Athrun is not really Char-like beside the fact that he pilots red MSs.

A direct analogy is impossible, but there are very strong connections. For example...

Nicole ended up serving the same purpose to Athrun as Matilda did for Amuro. A humanizing influence in a warzone, who proceeds to get blown away while protecting him in a significant battle on Earth. The death fills him with resolve for future encounters.

Dearka and Yazan serve similar roles to Athrun as Kai and Hayato served to Amuro: allies who, while not as much in the limelight and suffer from doubts here and there, do the right thing and in the end back up the hero.

Char is, of course, Rau. Different motivation, same style of sauvity.

Andy is Ramba, one of the more blatant rips.

Bright is a composite of Murrue and Natarle: one is fair but inexperienced, the other is firm adept, both are competent.

About the biggest person without a direct analog is Amuro, and that's because he's split between Kira and Athrun.

SEED was a homage to MSG. But still got so many differences aside analogies that I watched it as a totally different show. Plotwise or, the more, in terms of character/mecha etc. designs.

In terms of grand plot, most the differences are negligible story-specific ones.

"Young engineer lives in neutral colony which is secretly aiding in the development of mobile suits for Earth Faction."

"Colony is attacked by more advanced Space Faction. Pilots for MS are killed, most MS parts destroyed/stolen, and untrained civilian hops in hatch and fights back enemy. Major damage to colony results."

"Masked ace comes in for a fight, but is unable to beat the Gundam and it's ally, a mentor flyer. Legged ship hightails it for safety, a asteroid base on the far side of the Earth. Masked man's forces attack, do damage, but are unsuccessful."

"Legged ship tries to enter atmosphere to major allied military base, but are attacked and forced to divert. They land alone in enemy territory. Tensions start to mount within crew."

"Land escape towards friendly base. Encounter noble veteran, the desert ace (a family man), who comes into contact with gundam pilot and recognizes him, but leaves him alone. Our noble enemy is defeated by realized skill of Gundam pilot."

"Continue escape: come into another significant battle. Beloved ally dies: much remorse."

Here's where the second biggest change is: not only did the AA skip the "North American" phase per-say, but the Gundam pilot is termporarily separated from his ship.

"Legged ship makes it to major military base, which proceeds to fall under attack. Gundam pilot saves day, more information about Masked Ace revealed."

Seed as the Orb mini-arc, which in itself could be considered a separate reoccurance to Jaburo, only not a death trap like JOSH-A.

"Legged ship heads into space, fights enemy."

"True enemy turns out to be a genocidal spacenoid supremacist with big laser who wants to destroy humanity."

"Final battle: masked ace finally shot down by Gundam after philosophical debate, gundam nearly completely destroyed, evil dictator overthrown, a peace follow."


Oversimplified? Just a bit. But you can see how much there was between the two.

[Sir Dearka]

Yup, all of these are just oversimplified. Same thing we can do with most action karate movies. There is a sidekick. There is a hero who always gets the girl. The girl is often a lover of a mafia boss etc etc.

The things that differs SEED so much from the series to which it is supposed to pay homage, is the theme of friendship between two "main protagonists" of the show - Kira and Athrun. Everything is focused on their relationship/rivalry, but in the way unlike in the case of Char/Amuro. That's one of the aspects that I liked in SEED. The tragic frienndship and this "boyhood innocence" shattered by war.

Another thing I liked was the "boysband" Gundams. There were five of them. And then one had to face against the other four who chased him through space and a good part of Earth. It created a lot of suspense. Each time I was like... "damn! There they go! What shall Kira do? Will he defeat those strong opponents this time"?

Appearances, plot develooment, solutions, ideas, places...

And we can go on and on like this. In the end, SEED is still too different from MSG to call it a rip-off. A homage, yes, but not a rip-off. CE has its own mood, mythology, stories etc which is just too appealing to me. Much more appealing than their counterparts or similar aspects in original series or Zeta.

In my heart as a Gundam fan, SEED has its special place. No other mecha series touched me that much ever and had so much influence on me. Maybe it was because I was just a high school kid. Maybe it was because it was the first Gundam series to really impress me.

--

So, really, people... please don't spoil the fun shouting: "I hope the sequel never arrives!" I hope it shall arrive and that I'm going to enjoy more of my favorite CE. Without people flinging unnecessary exclamations just to feel that they are better/smarter/bad-a$$/underground/elitist-or-whatever than others. It's just immature.

[RedWing]

Unfortunately I've never seen 0079 or MSG. I liked SEED.

[Bring d0wn tEh Sky]

0079 and MSG are the same


try at least to watch the OVA ( 0080, 0083, 08th MS team ... ) they're really good

[bbduece]

I smell 00 legion coming into this thread to battle the Seed army.

[Shinn_Kabuto]

Hehe, I think Zeta Gundam is the most darkest Gundam show ever. And to tell ya, Gundam 00 is SOOOOO DARK. I find it better than Gundam SEED Destiny. I also want to mention Code geass.

[Bring d0wn tEh Sky]

Hmmm don't you think that V Gundam is darker than Zeta ?


All right, Camille saw his mother die in that glass thing, but Usso saw her mother being beheaded by a *FREAKING* giant wtfmotorcycle land battleship. Not to mention the Shrike team being killed all over the show

[Dean_the_Young]

Originally Posted by Sir Dearka

Yup, all of these are just oversimplified. Same thing we can do with most action karate movies. There is a sidekick. There is a hero who always gets the girl. The girl is often a lover of a mafia boss etc etc.

Of course, those don't make any of those cliche-ladden movies less formulaic. You may or may not consider it a fault worth caring about, but Seed follows the formula of MSG closer than any other series, even to the points of plot arcs. In the case of the desert arc, Seed could have broken from the formula by having Andy be "the Desert Jackal" reknowned for viciousness and cunning, rather than neatly fitting him into the slot left by Ramba. They could have significantly changed the terrain (though that matters less), and other such things. They deliberately chose not to.

The things that differs SEED so much from the series to which it is supposed to pay homage, is the theme of friendship between two "main protagonists" of the show - Kira and Athrun. Everything is focused on their relationship/rivalry, but in the way unlike in the case of Char/Amuro. That's one of the aspects that I liked in SEED. The tragic frienndship and this "boyhood innocence" shattered by war.

I think we have a misconception here. I did not say that SEED was completely unoriginal, merely that it was incredibally formulaic to the original. Despite the similarities and differences (intentional and otherwise) both in characters and such, SEED was always intended to tell it in a different way.

Another thing I liked was the "boysband" Gundams. There were five of them. And then one had to face against the other four who chased him through space and a good part of Earth. It created a lot of suspense. Each time I was like... "damn! There they go! What shall Kira do? Will he defeat those strong opponents this time"?

Wouldn't a boyband imply that they were all once on the same side?
Really though, the G Boys cornered that market awhile ago, though not with four trying to kill one.

Appearances, plot develooment, solutions, ideas, places...

Again, I'm speaking of formula, not specifics. Specifics change easily, but don't mean much. If Amuro had green hair, it wouldn't make him any less Amuro. Motivations can generally be replaced merely by changing wars: "I want to survive" can be replaced with "I want to end war" and you'll still have a teenage boy in the cockpit. "Minonsky particle" = "mirage colloid" = "GN particle" for most intents and purposes. And as far as literature, place don't matter much except as an identifier, and the thing about identifiers is that you can change them and few would miss the difference.

To make a engineering analogy, Seed and MSG are of the same "class": they have the same set ups, the same structure, and so on. But the "instance data," the stuff that identifies one series from another, are different, making it near impossible to confuse the output of the two. But that still doesn't mean Seed and MSG aren't from the same "class".

[tetsuo69]

00 is like watching gundam wing all over again just not as fun as it was when i first watch gundam wing, it would had been better if Gundam cross bone was made instead of 00.

i do admint the last 2-3 ep of 00 have been really good but after ep 25 its going to be like code geass "stop airing for a while" and so much for last 5-6 ep of the first season being good. atleast code geass had more than 15 watchable and were great.

[aeriolewinters]

ummm.... you seem to be forgetting that 00 is intended to be stopped at 26..... 00 has a 50-ep map but has two parts. It's not like in Geass where it was planned on the fly... these eps from 00 that this is at most a preview of things to come at the second half

[Wesley84]

So Gaess ruined Gundam OO?

[aeriolewinters]

ummm....no, I love both series, and I like SEED...but this is just ridiculous. Asking to get a third series out of practically a dead story isn't working... Who else is there for the Almighty Clyne faction to fight? THE MARTIANS, THE Centraudi? WHO!?

[Sir Dearka]

Originally Posted by Dean_the_Young

To make a engineering analogy, Seed and MSG are of the same "class": they have the same set ups, the same structure, and so on. But the "instance data," the stuff that identifies one series from another, are different, making it near impossible to confuse the output of the two. But that still doesn't mean Seed and MSG aren't from the same "class".

I'd not analyze SEED as the "re-hash" as some people do here, though. The fact that some very loose structure basics are just the same does not change the fact that the shows differ so significantly that calling SEED "calque" or "rip-off" just seems ridiculous to me. The fact that some show was FIRST and is darker/less colorful than the other one does not automatically make it better. Yes, it deserves respect. But so the other shows. That's basically what I was trying to say.

Originally Posted by bbduece

I smell 00 legion coming into this thread to battle the Seed army.

There's no SEED army on this forum. As far as I can see, it's everything but SEED fans that gang up against the series that they hate so much. The sole idea of "hating" one of the Gundam show and leading "CE=failure/trash" campaigns is not only as annoying as over-enthusiastic "love-SEED" fanatics. It's the sign of intollerance. And we all know that intollerance with a "mature" face is much uglier than that with a childish face. I think too many people look at SEED quite superficially and automatically hate it because it seems too "silley-kids-and-cutesy" to them. Ok, somebody wants to be "cool" watching the series that show the real, darker image of war and misery. Or he is a fan of classics or belongs to this "elite" hardcore fans that started their adventure from the very first series and still are sentimental about it. His business. It's just that sometimes when I look at all those "anti-CE" slogans, I can't help but think that many of them are just kids who try to proove how much more mature they are from those "childish brats" that watch "teen-soap SEED". Doesn't it strike you, people, too?

Originally Posted by aeriolewinters

ummm....no, I love both series, and I like SEED...but this is just ridiculous. Asking to get a third series out of practically a dead story isn't working... Who else is there for the Almighty Clyne faction to fight? THE MARTIANS, THE Centraudi? WHO!?

There's no thing as a "dead story". Destiny was a disappointment, but, contrary to some opinions, I think that it didn't destroy the whole series. It sold well, fed the fans with more stuff about their favorite characters and universe. Everything is cool. Now if they invent something that can wipe us out of our feet. Even if they had to jump 40 years forward to erase the old cast... I'd like the new story, but in the same mood as the first SEED. Or maybe an Astray-like side-story cincerning some non-main character that gains more attention? I dunno. But there could me many ideas how to keep the whole CE universum consistent and still throw out a couple of amazing stories. For the fans there, like me.

[D a m i e n]

so G00 will stop for an indefinite time after eps26 in order to not create any competition with geass s2?

[Sir Dearka]

Originally Posted by D a m i e n

so G00 will stop for an indefinite time after eps26 in order to not create any competition with geass s2?

I suppose that's the reason. Pure marketing. But that's just a guess. I'm not a Sunrise staff member

[Wesley84]

Originally Posted by Sir Dearka

I suppose that's the reason. Pure marketing. But that's just a guess. I'm not a Sunrise staff member

If they air at different times on different days, what's the problem?

[Sir Dearka]

Originally Posted by Wesley84

If they air at different times on different days, what's the problem?

I dunno. Do they? Let's end this off-topic

[Pride]

Originally Posted by Sir Dearka

I suppose that's the reason. Pure marketing. But that's just a guess. I'm not a Sunrise staff member

Maintaining of animation quality. You don't want no crappy out-of-proportion bodies and "OH LAWL I FORGOT TO WRITE THE SCRIPT SO LETS DO A CLIP SHOW" every 5 episodes right?

[Zeta Gundam]

Originally Posted by Wesley84

If they air at different times on different days, what's the problem?

No more Doroku timeslot.

Hypothetically even if the timeslot was still alive,from a marketing standpoint it makes little sense to have two of your model selling Television shows competing with each other.

[Bring d0wn tEh Sky]

Originally Posted by aeriolewinters

ummm....no, I love both series, and I like SEED...but this is just ridiculous. Asking to get a third series out of practically a dead story isn't working... Who else is there for the Almighty Clyne faction to fight? THE MARTIANS, THE Centraudi? WHO!?

there are still plenty of enemies to fight. All that do not share Clyne's ideals are evil and shall die by the power of Lacus Dust (tm)

Seriously : The AF forces are hardly a threat since they're depicted as incompetents doods in destiny. ZAFT is under her control, as is Orb.

Maybe they'll invent an evil masked man in Equatorial Union ? I don't know, maybe a guy that saw his family killed accidentally by one of the manies Freedom rainbow spam ? If they did they could reuse a lot of footage and some flashbacks