Project Otaku Powerlevelling Part 16

Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam I: Heir to the Stars

As a Gundam fan, you're pretty much required to watch Zeta Gundam (the second series in the Gundam "original" Universal Century continuity and held as the best of them all) at least once. And given how much I enjoyed Gundam Wing, I was glad to do it. Amusingly though, not a year after I wrapped up, I started hearing about A New Translation, the trilogy that would be remaking the series to bring it to a 21st century generation.

Initially, A New Translation was not apart of my list. But as time ran short during the summer, I decided I would add it for the sake of making through a few more anime on the list in a single night.

What threw me off, though, was learning one of the goals of this trilogy was to maintain as much of the scenes from the original animation as possible. So there would be points, particularly here in the first movie, where you would be enjoying beautifully rendered animation from the 2000's, and then suddenly--bam. Timewarp'd back to 1985.

It's funny the first time, but after that, it seriously detracts from the movie. I don't really understand the mindset of the creators, much less the Japanese fans who saw Zeta well before these movies existed, so I won't try. All I know is that for me, the overall experience was lessened, and they would've been better off using all new animation.

That said, narratively the story is stronger than it was in the original Zeta, and the "let's kick the main character around for no reason" scenes cut down severely. (As I recall, Wong Lee doesn't make much of an appearance in this film, if he appears at all.) Overall, I appreciate the film for being a better story than Zeta...I don't care for it looking worse than the original, though.