Turn A Gundam "Dark/Black History" Discussion

[monster]

Here is the disclaimer (taken from the first post in this thread):

In real life, history is filled with numerous different perceptions and interpretations, and there are countless cases of fabrications gaining momentum and being treated as fact. In the end, it may be that people only believe what they want to believe.

So, really, we can believe in whatever we want to believe as far as the timeline/history is concerned. It doesn't really matter as far as the franchise is concerned. Each show has the freedom to significantly refer to it or to ignore it completely.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by shadow1296

the only problem that i have is, the fact A. 00 is not the start of the timeline because its era is Anno Domini and B. the world that Mobile fighter G Gundam set up can't exist in an era after a Moonlight butterfly Reset because the manmade landmarks of the countries they have in there are still there heck the act those countries even exist after a Moonlight butterfly reset would be an impossibility in itself

Your point is spot-on. As for me, my problems with Dark History extend even beyond that (I already explained some of them in G-Reco thread during my debate with brightman). In short, to me, Dark History is a stupid attempt at connecting all Gundam series, even though it’s official.

[brightman]

Originally Posted by monster

So, really, we can believe in whatever we want to believe as far as the timeline/history is concerned. It doesn't really matter as far as the franchise is concerned. Each show has the freedom to significantly refer to it or to ignore it completely.

It's the same with Sunrise canon in general. You have TV series/movie versions of many of the shows that contradict each other. You have cases where the shows directly contradict each other (such as Endless Waltz's recon of Wing's mecha designs). And throw in grey area stuff like manga and novels... In the end you just believe what you want to believe. It's just pointless to over-analyze these things.

Fact of the matter is, fighting wars with giant robots that look like toys is stupid to begin with, as are many other things in the franchise.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by brightman

It's the same with Sunrise canon in general. You have TV series/movie versions of many of the shows that contradict each other. You have cases where the shows directly contradict each other (such as Endless Waltz's recon of Wing's mecha designs). And throw in grey area stuff like manga and novels... In the end you just believe what you want to believe. It's just pointless to over-analyze these things.

The case with TV series vs OVA vs Movie is: both clearly ignore each other continuity. For example, Endless Waltz is not actually the continuation of Wing TV but it’s in another universe (let’s call in “Katoki universe” in reference to the mecha designs). Furthermore, Sunrise/Bandai actually made the Glory of Losers manga & Frozen Teardrop novel to complete the story of Katoki Universe. The Wing TV series itself already concluded after the final episode. Same case with MSG & Zeta trilogy movies as well as other compilation movies/OVAs from many series like SEED, Destiny, Turn-A, Age, etc. They are simply on different universes/canon. You can apply the grey area more for the novels & mangas, but now that we have Unicorn OVAs, we can safely assume that animation & printed media are different canon.

Originally Posted by brightman

Fact of the matter is, fighting wars with giant robots that look like toys is stupid to begin with, as are many other things in the franchise.

That’s the franchise's main premise you’re criticizing. People are already well aware of that and accept it (and those who don't should already left the franchise the moment they see it). That’s why we criticize something that is stupid way beyond that premise. For example: we don’t criticize Batman for dressing up like a giant bat with that long cape which in reality will make him trip so often before he can kick some thugs’ asses. But when you see Batman being able to survive Darkseid’s direct punch without any good reason, we call bullshit on that because the stupidity-level has gone way beyond our suspension of disbelief compared to “a guy dresses up as a giant bat beating criminals to a pulp”. The same thing also applies between “fighting with giant robots” and “Dark History”.

[SonicSP]

Originally Posted by shadow1296

the only problem that i have is, the fact A. 00 is not the start of the timeline because its era is Anno Domini and B. the world that Mobile fighter G Gundam set up can't exist in an era after a Moonlight butterfly Reset because the manmade landmarks of the countries they have in there are still there heck the act those countries even exist after a Moonlight butterfly reset would be an impossibility in itself

To be fair, Universal Century had an Anno Domini calendar too and it's the start of the franchise. You can also still choose to believe that 00 is not part of the Dark History at this point in time since it's not been noted in a white level source material yet. These stories aren't really well thought out in advance as far as convergence goes, they're just made for the sake of being made and combined for the sake of being combined.

For the second point, I think this is why they wrote the "things are not as depicted" thing in the grey level MG Turn X manual, because it means they can cover discrepancies in series like countries and you know other stuff like how fossil fuels are still there.

Basically, Sunrise is literally handwaving these differences off.

Know how "nanomachines" are used as a joke due to Metal Gear Solid's deus ex machina explanation for why stuff happens? Dark History of Gundam is doing the same thing. Well that and "historical disrepencies" apparently.

[brightman]

Originally Posted by SonicSP

To be fair, Universal Century had an Anno Domini calendar too and it's the start of the franchise. You can also still choose to believe that 00 is not part of the Dark History at this point in time since it's not been noted in a white level source material yet. These stories aren't really well thought out in advance as far as convergence goes, they're just made for the sake of being made and combined for the sake of being combined.

Future Century, After Colony and Cosmic Era all had Anno Domini immediately proceeding them too, according to their official timelines.

[Kaito 1412]

Originally Posted by brightman

Because all of the 90s was a giant Gundam fandom hate war with UC fans and AU fans all hating on each other and saying how bad each others' shows were. Like many things that he does with Turn A, Tomino probably came up with this to either troll the fans who did that or just generally mess with their obsession with trying to make sense of everything.

I know you are just messing, but sounds more legit then the actual arguments.

I'm still can't believe that Tomino is actually making a new Gundam show. I mean the guy run out of fucks to give in 1986. Reconguista project is probably just something he started to keep him from boredom and then Sunrise was like, "You mind if we call this Gundam?"