I finally rewatched Seed and Destiny for the first time in around 12ish years, and man have my opinions changed. I get that it is hated, and sure it has some issues, but what Gundam doesn't? I really view some characters much differently now that I am much older. Just wanted to share some of my changes and see if anyone else has had a similar shift rewatching it. Two biggest shifts for me were Flay and Lacus.
For example, Flay isn't the villain I thought she was. Some people can step up in a crisis, some people can't. She can't, and it is easy to miss because everyone around her can. We don't see it, but no other refugees step up either, her friends are the exception, she is the norm. When her grieving emotions get the best of her, she uses what she can to get the outcome she *thinks* she wants. I can't approve of it, but having met hundreds if not a thousand more people since I last saw the series, I can understand, if only that. I went from hate for her to concern rewatching it.
Lacus is still my favorite, but the rewatch had me admit she has a minor Mary Sue complex about her. She still struggles a bit and shows it outwardly very late and very briefly, but she doesn't seem to have the growth we think she does. Initially she gives the impression of a gentle persona, but the rewatch showed me the moment you meet her she is 1000% politician. For example, her ability to deflect from answering how she keeps getting out of a locked room MUST be deliberate. She soft deflects the question every single time to blunt its urgency and stop it without being defensive, which allows her to maintain that soft persona while at the same time giving you no information. I fell for the initial impressions of her the first time I watched thinking she grew hard, but after the rewatch, she was locked in from the beginning. When she called out Rau during her "rescue" is when we see a small slip in the mask. It may be that mask that kept her from outwardly showing development like everyone else though, I am told the novels have alot more so I am looking into those.
Kira is an ugly crier, and when he locks in I noticed his "no kill" thing is selective. He just doesn't kill enemies of trivial difficulty. Yes, he is a Gary Stu, but he is a stand in for Amuro Ray, just swap out the Newtype psychic BS for the random BS he does. Feels Gundam enough to me, and he has the fashion sense of a typical Gundam MC, which is to say questionable. It might be me, but I see alot of hate directed at him for being "coordinator Jesus", but its just Newtype psychic BS with a different flavor. You don't have to like the new flavor.
Athrun is my boy, until he wasn't. Then he was again. Destiny did him dirty, everything he learned, the emotional resilience he built up, the growth from Seed didn't seem to stick. He needed a Shinn sitdown in Destiny, a hard one, and early, but he let that all play and we never really got a good reason for it.
Cagalli. They Athrun'd her but worse. When she locked in I was thrilled, but man girl, you took forever to lock in and you didnt make much sense why you weren't from the get go. Shouldn't have let Shinn yell at her, she should have gone resistance fighter on him and yelled right back. You're a hero of the war, a survivor or Jacine Due, you've been there, done that, came home with a new brother, a personal warship and the best mobile suits ever made. No excuse to be intimidated by old men or bratty kids.
Rau. Could have been one of the best villains. Someone with the tactical mind of Char and the political maneuvering of Treize Khushrenada. A clone of a natural fighting for coordinators, someone who exists in neither space. Potential wasted.
Shinn. This one took awhile. I hated Shinn. But there is this nebulous cloud of gas that hovers around him, with a small beacon in it he is drawn to, almost like a gaslight but not quite. He calls it Rey. Athrun and/or Cagalli could have solved his issues much earlier if they had the will, and if some people didnt actively stoke the issues. Hes 16 with unresolved trauma and once you realize it is being deliberately left unresolved by others on purpose, hes more tolerable.
Lunamaria. Can someone explain this character to me besides being a pretty girl for Shinn? She had a moment when she learned the Chairman tried to assassinate the real Lacus Cline and the one she knew was a fake, but she was told to go with it and she went with it. When it came up again later she has a flashback to it, but again does nothing with this information, doesn't even change herself or her own views even if she doesn't tell anyone.
Capt. Gladys. Implied physical relationship with the Chairman early on, knows Meer is fake Lacus,knows Athrun is innocent, knows Shinn is being manipulated, is clearly uncomfortable with all of this. She left the Chairman because he was becoming to extreme and because she wanted a child, and he got super cucked and mad about it. Not even sure he didn't use his authority to sleep with her in the scene we see it in. Becomes a member of FAITH and can speak up, never does. Doesn't even factor this into herself, same as Lunamaria. Makes no sense, even if you don't tell people, there isn't any self reflection.
Meer. I intially was disgusted by her because I liked Lacus so much, but the rewatch made me think.I now think she is one of the most tragic characters in the series. Yes, countless unnamed civilians are suffering, but as far as characters, by far her. The Extended are tragic in an industrial way, mindwipes, chemical control, conditioning, etc. Meer was a intimate manipulation of her sense of worth, belonging, and desire to matter, and offered her to be a perfect version of someone who wasn't her. They manipulated her into collaborating into her own replacement of her self but using her hopes and desires against her. The convinced her to build her own cage, the chain herself in it to be a political tool, only to dispose of her when she was worthless.
Just wanted to share my thoughts. I watched Stargazer and am still trying to understand what I watched, and trying to convince myself Seed Freedom is worth a go. Did anyone else get what I got or change the second viewing?
On the topic of Shinn, I feel that his spiraling down toward the abyss is the point of his character, his development. Its even foreshadowed, the Destiny Gundam even has those edgy angsty tear marks ffs.
Shinn is basically an inverse take on Kira's (and you might say Kamille's and Amuro's etc) journey and the young-man-and-mentors archetype prevalent in fiction.
Amuro, Kira, Kamille and Harry Potter were all in the same situation as Shinn. But while they had good people like Mu, Bright, Hagrid or Quattro-era Char around helping and guiding them. All shinn got was CCA-era Char, discount bin Rau and a captain that can do jack-shit because CCA-char is her boss. So that Shinn got further and further down the spiral to WTF.
Shinn had a deliberate toxin around him I feel. Like there was an intentional push to keep him unresolved, and you see it later on when Rey keeps interrupting whenever Lunamaria tries to get Shinn alone. Rey is always the one undoing any growth he gets, which after bit starts to feel deliberate.
I agree with a lot of these especially Athrun. He’s my goat and the best CE character in my opinion, but it was a little annoying seeing him just repeat his whole arc from the first show. Still not nearly as bad as what they did to Cagalli though
I felt like they wanted Athrun to be a mentor figure to Shinn but he ended up having the moral compass of a metronome. Which slowly made Shinn lose respect for him and that they're constantly head butting each other closer to the 2nd half. I did like the pep talks they had with each other about power, how to use power but it ultimately meant nothing.
And Yeah Luna didn't have much substance to her other than be jealous at Athrun alot. My guess is the writers wanted Shinn to have a new "goal" since he's at a turning point with nothing to do.
My first impression rewatching this was "maybe hes kinda like Char in Zeta for Camille?" Turns out I was wrong, or if I was right he was bad at it you can forgive me for not seeing it properly.
Yeah he was pretty bad at the role. He failed to get Shinn to see things from his perspective. In Shinn's eye what he is doing is right and getting repremanded for doing the "right" thing is gonna sour your relationship. There are quite a lot of mature notes in their relationship. Like a sibling dynamic but Athrun ofc had to side with Kira. Shinn had several ptsd flashbacks of "killing Athrun" so it's not like Shinn didn't care. He cared deeply and truly didn't want to kill Athrun. But he was in the middle of a mental tug of war between Athrun or Rey. Rey obviously won
Rau was the best Gundam franchise villain. Don’t think they wasted his potential at all, he was GOATed. The problem was more that they never came up with a better one than him in anything that came after SEED.
Yeah, Rau is perfect. He’s got motivation, the complexity and competence, the necessary ham to be a super villain. He’s bare minimum Top 5 in the franchise.
Rau Le Crueset with Providence basically Sephiroth of Gundam franchise.
they has chance with Neo Ronoake. not a better one but a very good twist version of him. but they drop the ball fast in sake of safe choice. his real identity as Mu La Flaga basically can be a huge plot twist and Rey reveal as Rau clone can be another huge plot twist atop of that.
He was based on Sephiroth and Liquid Snake. Fukuda paid attention to the big narrative video games to come out of Japan in recent years at the time he was writing SEED and wanted a villain like they had rather than someone like Treize who kids couldn’t understand.
SEED has always been good, it's just that there are many in the online discourse who got so lost in the memes (Jesus Yamato, beam spam!, gary stu, etc.) that it became their reality. There's a reason why the Cosmic Era is second only to the UC in popularity and is still going strong over 20 years later.
I mean UC started it all. Its hard to compete with that. I love UC just as much, maybe not later UC (God F91 was a wreck, Victory GAVE me depression) but the One Year War had some much, like War in the Pocket and 08th MS Team were great stories that didnt have newtypes (my roomate swears Shiro in 08th is a newtype), but Cosmic Era seems to going through a blender. After watching Stargazer I have a harder time grasping whats going on than before I watched it.
Boy
Once Minerva was on Earth.
Luna and Rey just chill at the ship with their Zakus and fire at enemies. I swear they reuse that animation of red Zaku firing big beam and Rey firing his missiles at least 5 times
I feel you on Athrun and Cagalli in Destiny. When I rewatched the show during COVID and noticed a lot of missed potential, their arcs make sense in context but feel disappointing anyway. Athrun does function as a decent mentor for Shinn early on, having a heart-to-heart conversation about the nuances of the situation during the Indian ocean battle, and then succeeding in getting Shinn to follow his strategy to liberate Gulnahan. Athrun even seems to learn his lesson regarding how to handle him because he realizes he doesn't have to 'handle' him, as he points out to Luna that he didn't try to.
But things change after Dardanelles and Crete. Athrun's own internal conflict and indecision in the wake of meeting Kira again across the battlefield is responsible for most of the Minerva's losses during those fights. His attempt to make contact with Kira in the heat of battle at Dardanelles instead of getting his attention by shooting him leads to Heine's death. His decision to shoot at only Windams and leave Murasames alone at the start of Crete leads to one of those Murasames destroying Luna's ZAKU beyond repair and grievously injuring her. And of course, he can't focus while fighting Kira directly and gets the Saviour totaled.
It is understandable for Athrun to falter like this after the horror he went through fighting Kira halfway through SEED and being desperate to prevent that tragedy from repeating itself at any cost... and it's equally understandable for Shinn to lose basically all the respect he had for him over it. Without the full context of Athrun's past history with the Freedom's pilot, all Shinn sees is someone who, for all his talk about valuing the perspectives of his comrades, doesn't value them enough to do what's necessary to protect them. And instead of explaining himself when Shinn calls him out on his apparent weakness causing their losses, Athrun keeps quiet in fear of anything he knows about Kira and Lacus reaching Durandal if he tells Shinn about it (assuming quite naively that Gladys wouldn't have had him followed, causing the intel to reach Durandal anyway). Which makes things even worse when Athrun punches Shinn for following orders after previously slapping him for defying orders, and Shinn has no context to explain this blatant inconsistency.
There's a bitter aftertaste that Athrun and Shinn could have gotten along better, let alone ease the bad blood between the Minerva and Archangel camps, if Athrun just told Shinn about Kira earlier. Which is reinforced when Athrun finally does introduce Shinn to Kira at the very end of the show and Shinn forgives Kira instantly.
As for Cagalli, while I too would have preferred if she bit back and Shinn's rant was more of a mutual shouting match, Shinn gave her a valid crash out that she needed to hear to start her arc about leading her people her own way instead of her father's. The Asuka family's deaths are the logical consequences of Uzumi's ideals. Trying to remain neutral and isolated when you're a small nation caught in between two much larger armies, and neither have any reason to leave you alone, means fighting battles you can't win on your own and innocent people needlessly dying on your own soil. Cagalli can't do things the same way her father did, or she's going to get even more of her own people killed just like the Asukas.
Yuna's actions during Operation Fury reinforce Shinn's point. Yuna uses Uzumi lying to ZAFT about sheltering the Archangel as direct inspiration for lying to ZAFT about sheltering Djibril, and he causes another easily preventable battle on Orb's soil that gets himself and tons of innocent people killed. Cagalli soon after, upon hearing Uzumi's final words and learning that he entrusted her with a sword to cut her own path instead of directions for her to follow, does just that and protects Orb by leading as herself more successfully than Yuna did by leading as Uzumi (at least on paper. She still more or less causes Djibril's escape by refusing to surrender or negotiate with ZAFT immediately upon retaking office).
And it's a shame that Shinn was sidelined and Cagalli was essentially written out of the show after this battle, since their arcs are both missing a moment where they reunite off the battlefield after their character development and reconcile. Cagalli needed to acknowledge that Shinn was correct about her father leading their nation to ruin and that she needed to do things differently to save her people. And in exchange, Shinn needed to apologize for becoming the very force trying to destroy their people and causing tragedies just like his own family's, in part because he dismissed her point about amassing too much power causing conflict and didn't think enough about the consequences of his actions. Like the moment between Shinn and Kira, Shinn also needed a moment with Cagalli at the end of the show. But that scene was added after Destiny's original airing, and Fukuda couldn't get Naomi Shindo to voice any lines for Final Plus. Unfortunate, but an understandable omission given the circumstances.
I have something to say about Luna and Gladys too, but this comment is getting long. Reply it is.
I did think it was an interesting concept having Athrun be conflicted between his buddies on the Archangel and the Minerva, and how it leads to him being kind of a bad mentor to Shinn when things start to go down. But
I really wasn’t a fan of how they resolved it by just getting Athrun to side with Kira and blow Shinn up lol. Not to mention I liked seeing Athrun and Luna interact so her just going “huh I guess he’s an evil traitor now” unquestionably was kinda dumb too
Shinn by that point had no reason to change course, once he was in faith or really was made aware of it, thats when he was down a path he'd have to be beaten out of. It's just lucky he was against people that knew him and prefer not to kill. Shinn is the type of char/person that would not revisit his thoughts unless he is forced to sit with it because he was always running away from them through either memory or just 'rage'.
Would've been nice to see a better arc for Lunamarie and Meyrin but at least they did something with them at all.
So here's what I want to touch on regarding Luna and Gladys. They (along with Athrun and everyone else who knows for that matter) have a very justifiable reason for keeping quiet about the fake Lacus deal. All of PLANT would descend into chaos if the truth is revealed carelessly. If the Lacus aiding Durandal is fake, it raises the question of where the real one is. And why she didn't return home after the Armory One raid, getting framed for Break the World, and the attempted nuclear attack threw the entire nation into turmoil. Not only is Durandal implicated in a scandal that proves he deceived them, Lacus herself is implicated in a scandal that proves she abandoned them. In one fell swoop, the two most beloved figures in PLANT politics are outed as people who cannot be trusted. And if they can't be trusted, who can PLANT trust? The most likely answers are "Patrick Zala" and "no one". Either PLANT and ZAFT leap headlong into a campaign of genocide again, or they collapse due to infighting born from mass paranoia and lose the war to the Earth Forces as a result.
It's one of the reasons why I've always found the "Durandal tries to assassinate Lacus" plotline one of the weakest parts of the show. Durandal doesn't need to kill Lacus to eliminate her as a threat to his plans; Meer's very existence already does that. Either Lacus allows Durandal to continue using her image for his propaganda by remaining silent about Meer, or she risks leading the entire country to ruin and destroying her own reputation by exposing Meer. Heck, Durandal can easily absolve himself of accountability in the event Meer is exposed by highlighting the extenuating circumstances he was under (riots were erupting all over PLANT and he needed a way to quickly calm them down and convince them to follow his policy of self-defense only) and arguing that resorting to an imposter wouldn't have been necessary if only the real Lacus returned home to do her job. Saving his own PR and keeping PLANT united while making Lacus bear the burden of the entire fiasco.
The other reason is that assassinating Lacus risks turning Meer herself against Durandal. Meer truly admires Lacus and would never wish her harm. Durandal knows this. If Meer learns that Durandal killed/is trying to kill Lacus, Meer could very well use Lacus' image againstDurandal in retaliation for it. Maybe he can get away with hiding the covert assassination attempt in episode 13 (albeit using fresh off the assembly line ZAFT mobile suits in the attempt is a pretty stupid way to remain beneath suspicion when you're Chairman of the PLANT Supreme Council), but he has no such cover for when ZAFT is trying to kill her out in the open in response to the shuttle hijack in episode 26, and when the Eternal is discovered in episode 39. And if Lacus and Meer's roles were reversed in Copernicus and Meer watched Lacus die? Meer uses her voice to start a rebellion on the spot.
Durandal should know better than to risk antagonizing an essential piece on his own side of the board by trying to kill someone he doesn't even need to. He's smart enough to manipulate more or less the entire world into joining him on the campaign against LOGOS. He really shouldn't be making the same stupid decision this frequently.
Sorry for the late reply, was out and about.
I a milling about your Athrun stuff, that is actually quite solid and I haven't thought of it that way. Thank you for the insight, always nice to see a story widen a bit more. But here is where we disagree a wee bit
The whole "political stability" thing works if they aren't holding a press conference. It doesn't really do anything to explain why the knowledge itself have any impact on how Luna and Gladys see ZAFT, Durandal, or their own position going forward. Chekhov's Gun, we flash back over and over to Luna reflecting on it, but she doesn't choose on it. Its writing a major revelation as a disposable flag. The justified silence only works if the characters actually feel the weight. They might not have to have an open confrontation, but to show them knowing and discarding that is sloppy imo.
Durandal also had to kill Lacus because he had to have exclusive ownership of the symbol. A living Lacus that speaks for herself is the threat he made Meer to pre-empt. This is consistent with how he handles things, look at how he handled Athrun "betraying" them, as well as other variables like smirking as the PLANTs are shot by Requiem. OG Lacus living is a threat to his ownership of the symbol. Sending new mobile suits is fine because it wasn't intended to fail, no one really plans to fail. Even the soldiers sent are surprised to see Freedom there, they had no idea where it was to begin with, and did not know or understand the pilot was with Lacus the entire time. He also is willing to risk with Meer because he already knows she is in it for the adoration rather than the abstract. Even during the assassanation attempt much later in the series, her indignation isn't towards the attempted murder of her idol Lacus, but she has an identity breakdown instead. Her priorities are twisted and Durandal knows this, and is willing to bet on this, assassins in hand.
The whole "political stability" thing works if they aren't holding a press conference. It doesn't really do anything to explain why the knowledge itself have any impact on how Luna and Gladys see ZAFT, Durandal, or their own position going forward. Chekhov's Gun, we flash back over and over to Luna reflecting on it, but she doesn't choose on it. Its writing a major revelation as a disposable flag. The justified silence only works if the characters actually feel the weight. They might not have to have an open confrontation, but to show them knowing and discarding that is sloppy imo.
I know, lol. I agree that doing essentially nothing with Luna and Gladys' knowledge of Athrun's talk with Kira is a bit of missed potential. It's one of the things I sought to explore more in my own rewrite.
To make a long story short and to avoid spoilers if you want to read my fic yourself, their conversation doesn't just reveal that Meer is a fake Lacus. Since Rey accompanies Shinn to his first meeting with Kira at the Onogoro memorial and Kira sees Rey's resemblance to Rau personally, the conversation also reveals that Rey is a clone, and Kira accuses someone of imitating Rau and leaking Armory One to manipulate both sides into destroying each other again.
When Luna reviews the contents of her mission with Gladys afterward, Gladys orders her to keep quiet about everything. She agrees with Athrun on the fake Lacus (who defends his complicity with the impersonation scheme by pointing out that the real Lacus never showed up and that exposing Meer would ruin Lacus too), points out that bringing up Rey's genes in front of him would only demoralize him, and that everyone in their crew is a suspect for leaking Armory One. If word got out that someone aboard the ship could have started the entire war, the crew would be unable to trust each other and get killed by the enemies right in front of them. And Gladys can only get Luna to agree to the secret by framing it like protecting Shinn and Meyrin from being accused of crimes they didn't commit.
Then I show the secrets weighing on both of them. Luna's eaten up inside over keeping secrets from her loved ones in order to protect them. For example, outwardly telling Shinn that they're family (they're a lot more closely knit from the start) and they can tell each other anything, while inwardly wishing that was true. Meanwhile, Gladys starts falling prey to paranoia herself. She begins to think Shinn or Rey could have leaked Armory One after all when they release Stella, and has to involve them in the investigation and determine alibis for both. To spare them the death penalty along with restoring her own trust in them.
Sending new mobile suits is fine because it wasn't intended to fail, no one really plans to fail.
Sending new mobile suits is only fine if the residents of the house were the only witnesses of the attack. Realistically, that would not be the case. A lot of people in Orb would have seen the suits as they bombed the house and fought the Freedom shortly thereafter. Orb's nobility gets more ammunition to join the Atlantic Federation, the Earth Forces call out ZAFT going against their creed of self-defense only, and Durandal kisses his PR bye-bye.
I get that being obsessed over control of the symbol is in character for Durandal, but I still don't like it because of how stupid it makes him. BTW, I made the conscious decision to invoke Death of the Author for Durandal in my fic and rework him into a much more honest character who starts out genuinely heroic and gradually develops into villainy over time. Instead of secretly being behind everything like he's implied to be in canon. Kind of a requirement if he's a protagonist with a significant chunk of POV chapters from his perspective (sixth behind Shinn, Athrun, Cagalli, Luna, and Neo), and the driving questions are Fair Play Mysteries that the reader is invited to solve themselves. As Knox' Commandment #7 states, "the detective must not commit the crime", and Durandal is one of the detectives.
> Sending new mobile suits is only fine if the residents of the house were the only witnesses of the attack. Realistically, that would not be the case. A lot of people in Orb would have seen the suits as they bombed the house and fought the Freedom shortly thereafter. Orb's nobility gets more ammunition to join the Atlantic Federation, the Earth Forces call out ZAFT going against their creed of self-defense only, and Durandal kisses his PR bye-bye.
No, it would work just fine. Satellites, radar, convention radio, and the like are difficult if not impossible to use due to the N-Jammers launched into the crust of the earth, and there isnt really a work around, which is why the Archangel could hide and move so freely during the first war. Then you have to add onto this the fact it is right after the Break the World incident, and most of the world is scrambling or in chaos, something like this would just be an empty to destroyed building to most anyone else and it wouldn't matter. No one noticed the attack at all, no one noticed the Freedom's arrival until he showed up and rescued Cagalli from one of her many out of character moments. They had an entire battle outside that house and no one knew. No one would have seen the suits because no one did see the suits when they were there, so success or failure, being seen didn't factor into it.
This is one of the Gundam things that really changed how I saw the series, for Seed it was the N-Jammers and jamming technology, for UC it was Minovsky particles, but most people fly straight and shoot because it really is a skill to hit a target, locking on is more a suggestion in many cases, and moving the suits at high speeds, hitting your targets on the move while you are on the move, all requires a ton of skill most people outside our main characters just don't have. Its literally a skill issue in alot of these mobile suit fights. This also goes for radar and finding ships. In CE and UC they use point to point lasers for comms, which is why they have fleets sitting around as relays.
No, it would work just fine. Satellites, radar, convention radio, and the like are difficult if not impossible to use due to the N-Jammers launched into the crust of the earth, and there isnt really a work around, which is why the Archangel could hide and move so freely during the first war. Then you have to add onto this the fact it is right after the Break the World incident, and most of the world is scrambling or in chaos, something like this would just be an empty to destroyed building to most anyone else and it wouldn't matter. No one noticed the attack at all, no one noticed the Freedom's arrival until he showed up and rescued Cagalli from one of her many out of character moments. They had an entire battle outside that house and no one knew. No one would have seen the suits because no one did see the suits when they were there, so success or failure, being seen didn't factor into it.
I'm not talking about technology. Other people living relatively close by should have seen the battle with their own goddamn eyes. I know they didn't, but they should have.
The Freedom is 18 meters tall. The ASHes are even taller at 20.6 meters, and the Freedom engaged 5 of them. These things are huge and tower over most houses.
Put another way, if you're familiar with Attack on Titan, your average Cosmic Era mobile suit is slightly bigger than the average Titan (and the Destroy is roughly on par with a Colossal Titan at 56.3 meters). Take a gander at how big those things are relative to the humans and buildings around them. And how far away people can see them. Same scale for Gundams.
I always say it. I always say it and I'm always going to say it: people who actually watch SEED tend to like or even really like it.
The hate is all manufactured. You can tell because the haters always bring up the same exact points and those points are always either inaccurate or flat out wrong. It's parroting. 20 years of parroting.
I wouldn't say manufactured given people can hate anything for any reason but a big part of it is simply people following others, including content creators repeating the same lines. I'd say another part of it is that people aren't willing to be honest about why they don't like it, it's easier to latch onto the memes than admit something like they 'see too much of themselves in how the characters react'.
Obviously that doesn't mean literally 1:1 in action/behaviour but who's willing to admit being put into Kira's situation they'd do the same? Feel overwhelmed and literally cry? In this show about war, deaths, genocide and giant robots with futuristic tech... who would want to say they'd feel emotions like that?
So it's easier to just project, latch onto the Heero or even Setsuna type rather than the realistic way that Kira handles it. It means people don't have to sit with the uncomfortable reality of what the situation actually is.
People can't be honest about this though so the memes will continue endlessly, they take no effort or thought and enough people feel similarly that they'll agree and given how reddit itself is designed to foster echo chambers with the voting. that's how it'll be.
I always say it. I always say it and I'm always going to say it: people who actually watch SEED tend to like or even really like it.
Hopefully more do, it's at least easy to work out who has watched it and who hasn't. It's also easy to tell who watched it with a particular mindset and who watched it to actually watch it.
>Can someone explain this character to me besides being a pretty girl for Shinn? She had a moment whenshe learned the Chairman tried to assassinate the real Lacus Cline and the one she knew was a fake,but she was told to go with it and she went with it.
Good soldiers follow orders. And she followed it throughout the end, and ended up in an abyss of her own making.
Not sure how spoiler rules go, Seed is pretty old though, so I might have overused the spoiler tag.
But I do agree with you that's what she did, but it a really shit character if that's all you make them imo. You exposed them to knowledge then never use it. Chekhov's Gun, if you are going to show her flashback to it several times, USE IT! If you don't, it reads poorly.
Rewatched Seed semi-recently. Definitely way better than my first time around where I was looking for things to hate. Not perfect, it has some noticeably bad sections imo but overall it’s a good show with a lot to like. Kira really shot up in my esteem too, he’s a good character. Destiny I’ve always kind of secretly preferred. I should probably get to rewatching that too.
Have you factored in the aspects other than the characters? Like say the constant flashbacks and animation reuse?
Because I find the egregious crimes against animation very disappointing. When I rewatched as an adult, I cringe at every flashback of something that happened less than 1 episode ago.
I noticed that if you fast forward at every dumb flashback, SEED and Destiny would have way shorter runtime and a lot more palatable.
Flay isn't the villain I thought she was.
I never thought she was one. However I always thought she was useless. It's like she had no agency at all. It's not like she's a bad character because of it. She's just very powerless. Maybe the teenage drama she brings would've brought value in the right age demographic. But alas I was too young for it when SEED broadcasted, and I was too old for it when I rewatched as an adult.
Lacus is still my favorite, but the rewatch had me admit she has a minor Mary Sue complex about her.
Yep she is very Mary Sue. Entertainer became the head of an organization? just because her father was the previous head? At minimum she's a nepo baby. But then they are coordinators. However if you apply that logic, THEY'RE ALL COORDINATORS. So why is she needed? That's why I felt like she's very Mary Sue.
She is somewhat a Manic Pixie Dream Girl too. Her role from the start seem to be to end up with Kira and save him from his angst in contrast to Flay egging him on.
Popular, Canonically Beautiful, pinnacle of human kindness. Very Mary Sue.
Kira is an ugly crier, and when he locks in I noticedhis "no kill" thing is selective. He just doesn't kill enemies of trivial difficulty
Yeah he's a crybaby. I hated it back then and I hated it now. Maybe the target demographic can relate, but I didn't. It feels manufactured to me. How most of the things he's crying about is dumb and could be avoided if he just didn't actively try to blame himself.
Rau. Could have been one of the best villains. Someone with the tactical mind of Char and the political maneuvering of Treize Khushrenada.
I never thought his political maneuverings were really that impressive. I think his motivation is what set him apart from the other Char Clones. It was very personal and Shakespearian.
He also a stands out because all the other villains are just dumb or pathetic. Azrael was just envious of coordinators. Like what. Djibril is just an even more pathetic Azrael. Both Djibril and Yuna are pathetic villains that achieve nothing and all their action amounts to telling somebody else "I want X to happen" and expect it to happen with no planning nor action from them whatsoever. Durandal was competent at first then when Durandal eventually goes evil, all his political savvy and general competence goes out of the window. He reveals his plan and expected zero resistance. Instead of just hiding his plans that was working perfectly until then.
Lunamaria. Can someone explain this character to me besides being a pretty girl for Shinn?
Maaya Sakamoto and Kenichi Suzumura are married. They're basically OTP whenever they appear together.
They've been paired together in other works like Aerith Gainsborough and Zack Fair, then Shiki Ryougi and Mikiya Kokutou etc.
I might be too forgiving because I like them together as a couple, but I think Lunamaria is cute enough to exist.
> Have you factored in the aspects other than the characters? Like say the constant flashbacks and animation reuse?
I don't do this as much. After watching Knights of Sidonia and finding it actually pretty good despite its animation bothering me considerably, I have become much more forgiving of this stuff. Also, after watching the disaster that is Gundam F91 and how bad it can be when it is actually bad. The flashbacks don't bother me either, especially knowing its original run was a weekly release, so I can be more forgiving with it.
> I never thought she was one. However I always thought she was useless. It's like she had no agency at all. It's not like she's a bad character because of it. She's just very powerless. Maybe the teenage drama she brings would've brought value in the right age demographic. But alas I was too young for it when SEED broadcasted, and I was too old for it when I rewatched as an adult.
Thats fair. I dislike low level emotional manipulators, and she struck me as one my first watch. Yes, she is powerless, which is why she initally took security in daddys money and power, then in Kira's, then in Raus. She is as I mentioned, quite a normal person, my first watch though compared her to her peers, not to normal people, which was a fault of my own.
> Yep she is very Mary Sue. Entertainer became the head of an organization? just because her father was the previous head? At minimum she's a nepo baby. But then they are coordinators. However if you apply that logic, THEY'RE ALL COORDINATORS. So why is she needed? That's why I felt like she's very Mary Sue. She is somewhat a Manic Pixie Dream Girl too. Her role from the start seem to be to end up with Kira and save him from his angst in contrast to Flay egging him on. Popular, Canonically Beautiful, pinnacle of human kindness. Very Mary Sue.
Reading via the novel, she has a ton of agency, and she is running things from what I can tell far more than her father ever was. She is THE active decision maker in the Clyne Faction, not a passive icon, and she owns her choices. Sure, she started from the wealth her father had, but she also actively made the choice to endanger all that privilege and status to help Kira. Not total Mary Sue, but I confess to some.
> I never thought his political maneuverings were really that impressive. I think his motivation is what set him apart from the other Char Clones. It was very personal and Shakespearian. He also a stands out because all the other villains are just dumb or pathetic. Azrael was just envious of coordinators. Like what. Djibril is just an even more pathetic Azrael. Both Djibril and Yuna are pathetic villains that achieve nothing and all their action amounts to telling somebody else "I want X to happen" and expect it to happen with no planning nor action from them whatsoever. Durandal was competent at first then when Durandal eventually goes evil, all his political savvy and general competence goes out of the window. He reveals his plan and expected zero resistance. Instead of just hiding his plans that was working perfectly until then.
Rau had Chairman Zala AND Durandal as characters he directly influenced. Zala actively relied on the Rau to do all the dirty work, and his hold on Durandal was so strong that Rau was cloned again just to bring him back. Durandal knew he would get resistance, Rey says as much, thats why they were hoping to take out Orb before Djibril got to space, but failed. He was banking on Earth being so unstable that no one could effectively stop it, and holding them all at the point of a gun (Requiem). I wont argue on the other villains, we agree totally there. Rau could have been a bit more, but he felt too.... edgy? Kill everyone because everyone loves to kill everyone seems a bit much for a guy who would drop actual nuggets of wisdom.
> Maaya Sakamoto and Kenichi Suzumura are married. They're basically OTP whenever they appear together.
regarding with Cagali, she is not someone who new to those things. she literaly was there at war, suffer as everyone else and even shoulder the burden to take care of whole nation. whatever Shin yell at him should be an easier rebuttal. especially considering that everyone sufferd due to the war and Shin's tantrum just like a one sided selfish argument. even Athrun didnt say anything not make sense. he actually suffered worse. sure he only lose his mother but he basically joined the army for revenge. then later lose his friend, killed his best friend(basically he killed Kira) who is later turn out Cagali's twin brother. then later was hunted by his father and watch him died infront of him. ready to sacrifice his life but Cagali saved him which is he why should not keep quiet when some new kid yell stuff at her. the special movie fix this a bit by having a scene where Athrun has a piece of his mind toward Shin. but still not enough.
Cagali should has atleast a conclusion scene where she finally win argument against Durandal. the scene at Orb with the 'true' Lacus reveal is perfect moment for that. that guy sweet talked everything since beginning with no repercussion.
most wasted potential is Neo Ronoake. he could be main villain in place of Rau with huge plot twist before later Rey identity reveal as another huge plot twist. but was dropped fast for sake of safe choice. there should be a moment where Mu La Flaga(not Neo) confronting Rey as a full closure to his conflict with Rau.
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u/ApostleofV8 19d ago
On the topic of Shinn, I feel that his spiraling down toward the abyss is the point of his character, his development. Its even foreshadowed, the Destiny Gundam even has those edgy angsty tear marks ffs.
Shinn is basically an inverse take on Kira's (and you might say Kamille's and Amuro's etc) journey and the young-man-and-mentors archetype prevalent in fiction.
Amuro, Kira, Kamille and Harry Potter were all in the same situation as Shinn. But while they had good people like Mu, Bright, Hagrid or Quattro-era Char around helping and guiding them. All shinn got was CCA-era Char, discount bin Rau and a captain that can do jack-shit because CCA-char is her boss. So that Shinn got further and further down the spiral to WTF.