Wapdam Gundam Style

[Liyka]

Greetings fellow MMO-Championers,

I've come to a halt with watching various shows and anime right now and thought about watching the Gundam series' but I have no idea where to start so I thought I'd ask here.

I've done a bit of Googling and found various orders of what to watch and when but I thought I'd ask here if the people here have either come across similar orders or have done/attempting to do the same as me, So here are a few links if they work of the orders I've found:

https://uk.answers.yahoo.com/questio...3091418AA2bHK8
http://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=307359
http://i.imgur.com/hXx4R00.jpg
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/feat...atching/.94461
http://conspiracywaffle.com/Falldog/MGuideToGundam.png
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQO72GGH9es
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqWv_WoXRME

Those are just a few of the links I found.

From when I tried to do this exact same thing about a year or so ago I ended up watching the whole of Mobile Suit Gundam from start to finish so I know roughly of how the whole thing started out.

What I'd like to know is are those links a good order to watch them in for like chronology of when the events happen or should I just watch them in the order they were all released in ?

Side note as well I think the title I came up with for this thread/topic is pretty witty

[Shinzai]

Re-posting a previous post by myself in the Anime Chat Thigh Thread:

Anywho, for anyone interested in getting into Mobile Suit Gundam:



This is the vast majority of current Gundam anime releases, in their respective time-lines. It may look confusing, but think of it this way:

Universal Century is the core series. All other series and shows span off from "Mobile Suit Gundam Series 1", which is the initial entry into the Universal Century setting (UC). If you want to get in depth on the show, then the original Mobile Suit Gundam (MSG) run is the place to start and can be viewed in one of two ways. There's the original series that was aired on TV, which has just seen a Western Blu-Ray release, alongside its much older DVD version. The second way is the Mobile Suit Gundam Trilogy. The Trilogy, although it may sound like an unrelated item, is basically the entirety of the initial series, compressed down effectively into 3 films. This makes for a much swifter and less saggy watch, with the vast majority of core story elements and episodes present and accounted for.

There is a 3rd, newer option as well, in the form of the MSG: Origin OAV series that is currently releasing (Part 3 of 4 coming soon if I remember correctly). However, this is both a retelling and also a slight retcon from the original series. It's set at the same time (UC-0079), but tells story aspects from an antagonist's point of view as well as looking more in-depth at behind the scenes type moments, which only get glanced over in the main series. It's a solid entry and a good way to become acquainted with the Gundam universe as a whole, but it does change a number of minor elements, so keep that in mind.

If you want the core story that Gundam was originally centred around, the following anime should be watched, preferably in this order:

Mobile Suit Gundam (Original series or movie trilogy)
Mobile Suit Gundam Z
Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ
Mobile Suit Gundam Char's Counterattack
Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn

This is quite a lot to watch, but is the entire core of the main story that started it all. The only exception in that group, I would suggest is Unicorn. It was released only recently and is quite fan-servicey in many ways, but has literally some of the best mecha animation and art ever. It closes out the series effectively and is a great end-piece, though it may not be as satisfying as the original series was.

What about all the other shows listed on the UC timeline? The majority of these are miniature expansions of story-threads, or battles, that canonically slot into the UC timeline's overarching storyline. They are not essential watches, but a lot of them are very good. 0080: War In The Pocket and MSG 08th MS Team often come up as some of the highest rated MSG shows ever.

So then, what about the other 'Centuries'/timelines dotted around? Essentially, these are all spin-off series, with no baring on the UC timeline. They are all separate, existing in their own personal bubbles and can be watched with no prior UC knowledge. Most of them are what you get when people not related to the creation of the UC timeline want to create Gundam based stories, without being confined by the existing back-history. The results are widely varied and very mixed. One of the best shows from this bunch is Mobile Suit Gundam 00 and its sequel movie - Mobile Suit Gundam 00: Awakening Of The Trailblazer. Gundam Wing and SEED are popular in a lot of circles too.

OK, so what exactly is Gundam? At its heart, Gundam is a war-story. It tells of an epic conflict that spans 20 years, with varied political influences, personal conflicts and large scale battles taking place across its span. The cast is huge and changes over time, as different stories focus on different conflicts and interactions. New friends and enemies are made, people die and grow across the shows. The earlier segments of the show were fairly black and white with how the conflicts were viewed, becoming far more grey and often quite dark in later shows.

The titular Gundam mobile suits are a fairly major part of the initial shows, being essentially cutting-edge, advanced technological weapons that can decide battles almost singularly, until they become more common place. We join the story at the point where they are only just starting to show up with any regularity and they are seen as wonder-weapons by most. The introduction of new Gundam units is almost always a pivotal moment in later series, whether it sways the tides of war, or simply gets a cheer from the fans.

And finally, what is this Correct Century 'CC' thing? The corrected or 'Correct Century' is a bit of an oddity. It essentially takes the Universal Century, Future Century, After Colony and After War centuries and creates a single time-line out of it all, using all these existing timelines to forge a new future, where all events from all those listed centuries have occurred. From this menagerie of times and stories, we get Turn A Gundam. Turn A is a surprisingly good series in itself, although its animation is quite weak compared to a lot of the more contemporary shows, its story, art and music are all pretty much fantastic and it's well worth watching. Due to its futuristic setting (set 2100 years after the original series), it has a lot of freedom in what it shows and how it handles itself, not having to integrate itself with any of the UC's main storylines.

[Liyka]

Just been reading your list over Shinzai and it's rather easy to understand tbh and plus from reading it I remembered that years ago I watched Gundam Wing which is how I even knew about the whole Gundam thing.

But again going by your list if I just want the main Gundam story I watch the UC chronology and then after that I can watch whatever series/century I like since they don't interact with each other ?

[Shinzai]

Just been reading your list over Shinzai and it's rather easy to understand tbh and plus from reading it I remembered that years ago I watched Gundam Wing which is how I even knew about the whole Gundam thing.

But again going by your list if I just want the main Gundam story I watch the UC chronology and then after that I can watch whatever series/century I like since they don't interact with each other ?

Yes, that's right. Gundam Wing for example, doesn't take place in the same time line as the original MSG series, so the two have no impact on each other. Almost all of the non Universal Century shows are basically their own worlds/realities. They can be watched in their entirety, even without having watched the original series. Watching the original series gives a solid basis for tropes and ideas/ideals that will be handled in the other shows however.

[Liyka]

Ah nice I'll have to watch the UC stuff first then to get what it's all about and perhaps re-watch the original Gundam TV series since I remember snippits of it like how the main char in that series found the Gundam as his home/base was getting attacked and another part where he stored his Gundam in some sort of moving fort that eventually went underground.

[Shinzai]

Ah nice I'll have to watch the UC stuff first then to get what it's all about and perhaps re-watch the original Gundam TV series since I remember snippits of it like how the main char in that series found the Gundam as his home/base was getting attacked and another part where he stored his Gundam in some sort of moving fort that eventually went underground.

As I recommend above, I would suggest that you hunt down the Mobile Suit Gundam Trilogy, to get an abridged version of the original series, so you only spend a few hours on it, rather than about 20 hours, re-watching the whole series.

[Liyka]

A shortened version of the first series does sound nice but then again I've got nothing but time to kill so watching the original series from start to finish again isn't that bad either.

[Liyka]

Started watching Mobile Suit Gundam about an hour ago or so and because of that I started Googling about the events they said about and came across this

http://www.gundamforums.com/showthre...dam-Chronology

It really helps knowing which are dubbed or not and it seems that from what I found via Goggling that people are saying DO NOT WATCH MS IGLOO and MS IGLOO 2 because of apparent bad animation but I'll get to that bridge eventually.

[Shinzai]

Started watching Mobile Suit Gundam about an hour ago or so and because of that I started Googling about the events they said about and came across this

http://www.gundamforums.com/showthre...dam-Chronology

It really helps knowing which are dubbed or not and it seems that from what I found via Goggling that people are saying DO NOT WATCH MS IGLOO and MS IGLOO 2 because of apparent bad animation but I'll get to that bridge eventually.

Yeah, Igloo is generally regarded as a mistake, despite handling some fairly interesting plot lines, due to its bad CGI and questionable logic. As I expressed in my explanation post, I'd stick to watching the main series, then pick and choose which OVA's/spin-offs you want to watch afterwards. Also, I'd recommend watching the main series chronologically as they were released, but not things like War In The Pocket, etc. Just stick to the main series, Z, ZZ, Char's and Unicorn, then go from there.

[wapdam]

hey liyka,

just search your gundam in wapdam website and you will get all the videos about it. also you can download videos and convert it to mp3 on wapdam.netjatt.com

try it it will solve your query.