I’ll cut to the chase. Netflix’s foray into the war-torn Universal Century via Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance was a mixed bag for me. There were quite a few things that I enjoyed about it, but some of it’s major flaws knocked the wind out of those sails. There’s a bit to talk about here, so let’s knock out some of the house keeping. I won’t spoil the major elements of this series as I have at least that much respect for it.
Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance | Official Trailer #1 | Netflix
The six episode Gundam: Requiem for Vengeance was created by Bandai Namco Filmworks, directed by Erasmus Brosdau, and written by Gavin Hignight under Neflix. It takes place during last half of the original Gundam 0079 timeline. We follow the Principality of Zeon forces retreating–I mean, executing a tactical withdrawal. Their use of their humanoid weapons platforms called mobile suits, namely their Zaku, had given them the technological edge over the Earth Federation (EF) military. However, the Federation has caught up in the arms race and introduces its own mobile suit called the Gundam.
The story focuses on Zeon Captain Iria Solari, voiced by Celia Massingham in the English dub, leader of the mobile suit squadron known as the Red Wolves, and how her squad and allies deal with the terror and nightmarish threat that the Federation’s new weapon brings upon them. So, with the basic plot being said, let’s get into the nitty gritty.
I’m the type of guy that likes to hear the bad news first so let’s start with that. And please be aware, it doesn’t bring me morbid joy to point out the flaws as I see them.
As a Gundam fan, I wanted to give this all the best marks possible. I’ll start with the most obvious and jarring one: the human animations. For a show that wants to portray the humanity and suffering in a grand conflict you’d think there would be more care given to the animations of the human characters. There would be moments where the voice cast would give passionate performances, but the character saying them not matching the same energy. There were even some instances of characters gesturing nonsensically like NPCs in a video game. Now, it wasn’t like that all the time. There were quite a few moments where I was like ‘yes, that looks good,’ or, ‘yes they nailed that part.’
Alas, those moments were few and far in between. If I had to sum up that flaw, the character animation was terribly inconsistent. A quick point, this wasn’t the first CG foray into the Gundam world. Mobile Suit Gundam: MS Igloo, which ran back in 2004 through 2008, was pretty decent and I actually enjoyed it. Sure, it also suffered from similar uncanny valley situations, but that was in 2004. This is 2024 and animation techniques have come a very long way. Heck, there are CG shows with smaller budgets that give their characters more facial emotional range.
Episode 1 was a slog to get through because a lot of the characters were just so poorly animated. There was a noticeable quality change going into episode 2. And I mean noticeable. The quality would be up and down for the rest of the other episodes, but the better quality seems to have been saved for episodes 5 and 6 where the issues were not as bad as the first. Oh, boy.
Now, with that said, the second major issue I had with this was exacerbated by the problem above: the character writing. You can get away with shallow character writing if the characters are emoting well, but because they weren’t animated well, the shallow character writing for certain characters stuck out like a sore thumb for me. I had minor issues with our protagonist Captain Solari, but over all, she was the strongest written character, as she should be. Forgive me as I dance around spoilers. The others, but not all, fell flat for me and just came off as blank slates and shallow tropes. There was conscientious objector guy, uh, overly-designed cool chick who really wasn’t cool, guy who wants to follow orders, just to name a few.
I would think to myself, “hey, you look interesting! What must have happened for you to look the way you do.” But then they’d end up being boring. There were a couple of moments were characters made combat tactical decisions that made no sense and made me groan. Hey, if we’re leaning into a more gritty, realistic Gundam show, then I at least expect some better tactical thought than charging in with the heat hawk all willy-nilly. The characters I was interested in got, ahem, Game of Throned, right off the bat. Oh well. The dialogue needed work in some parts as well as it just seemed clunky. Some of it just didn’t seem natural.
Okay, I think I’ve beat that horse enough. Now for some positives. The biggest positive was the mechanical designs and animation. There was a lot of love and care put into the giant robots, fighter planes, tanks, and even the transport vehicles. They were all meticulously detailed. All the switches, displays, control panel lights, control sticks had no business looking as good as they did. I wish they put the same care into the people, but I digress. The mobile suits and mobile suit battles were well done.
There were moments where I’d ask how someone could miss a target like that, or when are you going to run out of ammo? Minor nit picks. I’m a Gouf guy, and it was really cool to see them put them to good use. I really hope Bandai releases a kit of the Goufs. It was an interesting take to have this show focus on the Zeon perspective with Zeon protagonists. Not to say this hasn’t been done before, but that was one of the good things about Gundam. War sucks and there are good and bad guys on both sides of the conflict. The plot of the show itself is solid and it doesn’t forget that it’s a Gundam show. Fans will recognize certain Gundam tropes and will feel at home in that, at least.
Oh, and one final positive. The score was beautiful. It wasn’t a surprise when I found out that Wilbert Roget II did it. He’s responsible for some of my favorite video game musical scores, the stand outs being Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO, Guild Wars 2, and Helldivers 2. He shows his prowess here too.
There was a lot of great potential here. A lot of potential. Alas, I think it just needed to cook a little longer. 6/10
*****
English (US) · 