Gundam is back in anime form once again, and this time it's in the Universal Century. Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn is a 6 part OVA based on a series of light novels of the same name, and the story is about... you guessed it: teenagers piloting powerful mobile suits.Wow! The guy in the middle somehow survived that explosion!?Summary:In U.C. 0001, the president of the Earth Federation is making a speech from a space colony, but the colony is destroyed by a terrorist attack in an event known as the Laplace Incident. Over the years, one of the surviving terrorists became known as Syam Vist and somehow took over the reins of the influential Vist Foundation. In U.C. 0096, the title of the family head has passed to Cardeas Vist, Syam's grandson, but Syam is still alive and Cardeas is working to carry out Syam's will regarding Laplace's Box, a mysterious object that has the power to change the world.The Jegan pilot got some skills, but unfortunately his suit can't stand up to the Kshatriya's jets.The Garrancieres, a ship belonging to the Neo Zeon remnants known as "the Sleeves", is traveling tn the colony of Industrial 7 to meet with Cardeas about "the box". En route, the ship is attacked by three London Bell mobile suits, but the pursuing mobile suits are destroyed by Neo Zeon pilot Marida Cruz and her Kshatriya mobile suit. At the colony, technical school student Banagher Link spots a white mobile suit flying far off in space. The white mobile suit is the RX-0 Unicorn Gundam, a prototype mobile suit developed by Cardea's organization, and Cardeas and a pilot was taking it out for one last test run. Upon returning to base, Cardeas learns of London Bell attack on the Neo Zeon ship, and in response Cardeas announces that the testing on the RX-0 is complete and tells his staff to starting deleting data.I guess in the distant future, big hair will make a comeback even for teenage girls.The Neo Zeon ship finally arrives at Industrial 7, and a girl sneaks off the ship and tries to find her own way into the colony. Unfortunately for the girl, she picks the wrong way and is ejected into the middle of the colony, in danger of falling to her death. Not far away, Banagher somehow knows that the girl is in trouble and runs to her rescue with a petite mobile suit. After crash landing inside the colony, the girl tells Banagher that her name is Audrey Burne and that she has urgent business inside the colony builder ship. Banagher guides Audrey towards the colony builder, but in the middle of their journey they run into Marida Cruz and two subordinates who have been sent to retrieve Audrey. Using his Haro as a distraction, Banagher manages to throw off Marida's group, and he successfully leads Audrey to Vist family estate located inside the colony builder.Upon arriving inside the Vist mansion, Banagher has a feeling that he has been there before. The two of them are met by Cardeas, and Audrey immediately gets down to business by questioning Cardea's decision to hand her group "the box". Cardeas asks Banagher to leave. Banagher feels that Audrey needs his help, but Audrey denies it and Banagher is dragged out by security.It's cool how these mobile suits have air bags. How come we don't see them in mobile suits from other universes (ex. SEED, 00)?Later in the day, Cardeas meets with Suberoas Zinnerman, the captain of the Garrancieres, about the handover of "the box". Cardeas goes on a long speech about how he is only handing over "the key" to "the box", and Suberoas doesn't really understand and is more concerned about retrieving Audrey. Unbeknownst to them, the whole colony is surrounded by a London Bell task force. The London Bell mobile suit force their way into the colony and engages Marida in her Kshatriya. The battle rages on cause a lot of damage inside the colony. Banagher and his fellow classmates are caught in the wrong place in the wrong time, and several of Banagher's classmates are killed. For some reason, Banagher is more concerned about Audrey than himself and his two remaining friends Takuya and Micott, and he runs off to find Audrey. Meanwhile, the Vist foundation building is stormed by London Bell commandos. Suberoas' group manage to escape and pass by Banagher who is going in the other direction. On the other hand, Cardeas is cornered by two commandos led by the traitor Alberto. Cardeas manages to kill the two commandos, but he is shot by Alberto who quickly leaves the scene.At least one London Bell pilot gives a damn about civilians. While the battle is raging outside, Audrey is trying back to her ship by herself, and on the way she runs into Takuya and Micott. The three of them are then rescued by a London Bell ReZel unit. Elsewhere in the colony, Banagher follows some corridors into a burning hangar where the wounded Cardeas is preparing the Unicorn for launch. With his dying breath, Cardeas entrusts the Unicorn to Banagher and Banagher finally remembers that Cardeas is his father. Banagher launches in the Unicorn and literally runs into the Kshatriya. Banagher and the Unicorn pushes the Kshatriya out into space, and once outside the NT-D in the Unicorn activates and the Unicorn transforms into its Destroy Mode.That's quite a bit of pushing power packed into those relatively small thrusters.Wouldn't really be a Gundam series without a Gundam.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~A good first episode. The animation was impressive to say the least and was definitely one of the highlights. This is probably the best-looking Gundam series I've watched, and it probably should be given that this is the newest Gundam OVA. One thing I noticed about the mobile suit battles is that they are a little slower (in terms of mobile suit movement speed) than the battles I've seen in other Gundam series, and I can see that there is a lot of attention being paid to details on the mobile suits movements. It's a little different than what I'm used to seeing from Gundam TV series, but it was pretty darn good. I also liked the incorporation of CG, especially during the Unicorn's transformation into Destroy Mode. The art style of the characters were pretty cool too in a retro kind of way. I guess the retro hair styles and rounder faces are how you identify the people as being UC inhabitants.As for the story, it was decent, but not as good as the animation. The story thus far definitely has some similarities with the original Mobile Suit Gundam, mainly the part about a teenage boy coming into possession a super-powerful, prototype Gundam. The whole thing about "Laplace's Box" is a bit lost on me though, but I suppose it will become clearer in future episodes. I probably should have done some homework and watched some of the other Universal Century series (I remember watching the original Gundam, Zeta, and ZZ, but all were more than a decade ago), but I did read up a bit through Wikipedia and other internet sources. I'm guessing that Cardeas wants to hand "the key" to "the box" to the Neo Zeon so that neither the Neo Zeon or Earth Federation has the power to open "the box" by themselves. This seems like a good idea from some perspectives, but on the hand if both sides might go to war in order to obtain the other piece of the puzzle. At this point, it's not even clear what "the box" and "the key" are, so the story still has a lot explaining to go.Moving on to the characters, Banagher is an alright protagonist thus far. I don't really like him or dislike him. Banagher is tolerable (ex not annoying), but his behavior is a little strange at times, probably due to his "premonitions" (NewType powers?) about the events in the episode. Not much to say about the others at this point.Overall, Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn is looking good so far. I'm expecting that Sunrise would keep the animation quality near the top and hopefully the story will unfold nicely. Looking forward to the next episode, whenever that may be.
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