Watching Gundam Wing again.

Heero is a fuck up from the jump, isn't he? He failed in the launch down to Earth. He failed at killing himself. He not even great at killing Relena. He failed at destroying his Gundam too.

All this in only two episodes.

Relena, outside her very, very odd obsession with Heero, is surprisingly on the ball. (Maybe Relena got that 2020 energy where she wants her crush to kill her?)

Zechs is also highly competent from the word "go".

Heero in a nutshell.

Stan Twitter energy.

Duo and Quatre win over the rest by being mostly normal, while the others are various flavors of emotionless.

And Wu Fei is not only mad sexist, but a super dick.

That's a first and last name, Trowa. *sigh*

Quatre with the 100% hard super gay thirst.

Starting to think Dr. J doesn't understand Heero all that well. This kid was cackling when he killed folks.

Relena is hard. So hard. Straight told Heero, "You're not going to kill me, so you might as well enjoy the school dance."

AND IT WORKS.

Trieze has spent these six episodes chilling and vaguely eluding to events that barely involve him.

I have no idea what Relena is getting out of this relationship, but now I absolutely believe Heero is deeply in love with this stone cold killer.

A surprising amount of this show so far lives and dies by the supporting cast, because the Guindam pilots are so goddamn one note.

I'm sad Wu Fei was the one who figured out y'all were being played.

Eight episodes in, Heero is coming to terms with his life.

Trieze shoots to the top of the list simply by putting Wu Fei in his place.

That feeling when I want another Trenta, which might be too much coffee.

My girl Relena got it bad.

Trowa: They're probably going to try to get me to use all my ammo. I should prevent that from happening.

Also Trowa:

Heero detonates a bomb from within his suit, that somehow does not kill him.

He's at ground zero, and his body is entirely intact. The strongest of plot armor. HOW SWAY?~

When you know your rival should be dead, but you also know you live in an anime.

Zechs' entire motivation is the idea that his sister is better suited for the TOTALLY PACIFIST ideals of his parents.

Relena:

Two stoic bros just saying hi to each other.

Wu Fei can't even hold onto an ideal for longer than three seconds.

Damn Sally, you didn't have to go so hard on Wu Fei like that. It's true, but damn.

Once again, I'm convinced that people don't know the Gundam pilots at all.

Once again, Zechs is the best.

But... what was their plan? To take on the best soldier in their army, using the experimental mobile suit?

Heero Yuy, consistently learning the wrong lessons from everything.

What? You met him a few months ago, his was constantly ducking work, and his only job was to get knives thrown at him.

Why is everyone lionizing the Gundam pilots!?

Back on my bullshit.

Even Gundam Wing is on that coronavirus tip.

Yeah, Heero. I'm pretty sure that's not what she means.

He and Relena belong together.

And that aesthetic is "Having a goddamn child as my fated rival"

This sequence is exactly how it appeared in the show, complete with metal noises to punctuate each viewpoint switch.

Relena does not give a damn about her life, or that of her butler.

I though you were here to stop the fight...?

This lady found out she has a long-lost brother. And she just told her terrorist crush to murder him in a duel.

She rolls with it real quick.

I dunno, man. Why would you design four variants of the same Gundam?

I'm not sure that's true. Hell, even the Gundam pilots aren't entirely rational.

It's very weird. Gundam Wing has things to say about drone warfare, but those things are like, "War is much better when people do it."

Heero has this whole deep monologue about war and humanity, and then it's revealed that A) it's his introduction speech to the class he transferred to and B) he used the name Duo Maxwell.

Goddamn troll. Also, he's really salty that the teacher shut down his speech.

The difference between Heero and Zechs:

Zechs' dramatic ass. Can't do anything normal for once.

Zechs wakes up after a pitched battle in a t-shirt. The first thing he does before anything else, is roll the sleeves up like he's a greaser or something.

I can't with this man.

I mean, that's how I make decisions too, but you didn't need to say that part out loud, Lady Une.

Wait, don't you have jets for this purpose? Why did you need to do this to fly away? WU FEI!

Hey, Heero. just because you left your Gundam behind on Earth doesn't mean everyone else's Gundam is trash too.

It's never good for an organization to air it's dirty laundry in the middle of a mission.

Abdul is doing his best, yo.

So, they know the Gundam pilots are like 15 years old, but they have this wunderkind test pilot and no questions asked?

Trowa destroyed the Deathscythe while undercover.

WHY IS EVERYONE SO EXTRA IN THIS SHOW?

So OZ is like 85% sure Trowa is a Gundam pilot, but they still listen to him.

And when he busts out with some secret shit he shouldn't know, his alibi is "How could you not know? Duh." AND IT WORKS.

Trowa is the best.

Quatre, coming to terms with the fact that he's the space 1%.

These two fools are trying to pretend that they don't know each other. Or maybe they're not trying at all. Hard to tell with Wing.

Okay, at least Nichol is on point. But... what is he doing all the way up there?

NO YOU DON'T. Lady Une legit switches personalities, you just cosplay for a bit.

He said this in a normal ass conversation, like it's just a thing you do.

Only Wu Fei could spin getting shot at and captured by the enemy as a win. Real middle manager energy here.

Duo, five minutes apart.

Been wondering about Treize's motivation for 24 episodes, and then he busts out with this.

HOW DID HE SURVIVE THIS FALL?

So like, this middle section of Gundam Wing wants me to believe that the Romefeller Foundation, who controls an army of drone mechs, is afraid of the totally pacifist nation instead of just wiping them off the face of the map.

Treize is that guy who took one college philosophy class and then thought he knew everything.

Why does Treize have this extra level shit in his basement? You could've just used a button like everyone else.

Sometimes you think you're a main character, when you're actually just an no-name extra.

Don't step to Zechs.

Another episode, another moment of Heero largely failing at his goals and faceplanting.

"Sure, we're a collection of seasoned diplomats and world leaders, but we desperately need the guidance of 15-year old."

I understand that you want to feel like you're one of the people Noin, but you're wearing that badass uniform and clearly still in a functioning military.

Trowa is back, and the last we saw him he was floating in space afters surviving an explosion close up.

They briefly show a ship picking up his body, but he ends up on Earth with amnesia with no explantion. I'm going to assume he survived reentry and that gave him a concussion.

Relena's winning move as her total pacifist kingdom is attacked, is to surrender.

But she does it after everyone is dead already?

Heero falls out of his mobile suit, landing headfirst, again.

As a size comparison, the life-size Unicorn.

Could you fall from the mid section of that headfirst and survive?

Heero face down, once again. Just recovering from that concussion.

I'm pretty sure that Heero told you that, and it's still terrible advice, Trowa.

Relena has essentially failed her way into being Queen. She didn't get killed by Heero multiple times, then she decided total pacifism was the way to go and got a whole kingdom killed.

Also, people says that she's got charisma, but that's not really apparent anywhere.

This is the first time we've gotten any hint about Noin's civilian fashion sense and I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS!

SHE JUST DECIDED TO WEAR THIS IN SPACE!

Like, these two get together and have children. Can you imagine the family life? Your mom and dad who look super cool in uniform, but dress like this in their off hours?

Even when he's not in his Gundam, Trowa shoots until he's out of ammo.

Duke Dermail is the bad guy, but he's not wrong?

They're talking about Relena and I feel like I'm losing my mind.

Last episode: Heero says he's going to kill Relena.

This episode: He doesn't, because reasons. He instead decides he's going to kill Zechs.

Honestly, Heero stating he's going to kill someone makes them essentially immortal.

After giving up on her Kingdom and becoming a Queen, Relena gives that up when Treize—who's been mostly a non-character—just says she's no longer needed. No argument, not even a discussion. I didn't cut out anything between these images.

It's maddening.

There has to be some behind-the-scenes nonsense in Wing, because the episodes since Relena's return make no sense. New characters and factions are introduced and killed with little impact. Relena just flits wherever. The motivations make little sense.

The Zero system is dangerous, until it isn't.
We've gone through so many factions: the Alliance, OZ, Romefeller, the Treize Faction, White Fang, and now new OZ. People move between the factions for no reason. Zechs is evil, because...?

Why is Dorothy EVEN HERE?

Huh. Well. The second half is haphazard because the director, who was re-writing many of the scripts, left the show. Straight up.

https://www.player.one/gundam-wing-otakon-writer-producer-interview-anime-119124

You only knew found out he was your brother like a month ago and you've never spent time around him.

Heero and Relena have been hiding on the Libra for the past episode doing nothing, because Heero was going to destroy the station's main gun.

The rest of the cast just did that. *nods* So now they're leaving.

Relena's contribution to the current plot.

The title for the penultimate episode and the preview thumbnail are perfect.

We reach the maximum romance moment of Heero and Relena, after 47 episodes of... I don't know if you can call it chemistry.

Heero, I'm pretty sure you've promised to kill Relena multiple times.

The culmination of Quatre's plot is a foil duel against Dorthy while she's controlling the mobile dolls.

Why? Just shoot her. You try not to kill without reason, but...uhhh, she's controlling an army of drones, bro.

Dorothy has a mini-breakdown about the fact that her dad died, and Quatre takes that to mean she's kinder than him?

I'm convinced no one in the show has met anyone else within this show.

Treize dies as he lived: being very important to the plot, but not all that clear about what his motivation was.

Also Wu Fei is his eternal friend? WHAT? Was this bond built over one duel where Treize called Wu Fei a punk?

Injured Quatre: "Trowa, ignore me and help Dorothy."

Trowa: "Nah."

The ladies of Gundam Wing come together in one place to be like, "Man, we should wrap this up."

After reams of reused animation, this Wing Zero vs Epyon fight is actually pretty good.

Heero is going to Spirit Bomb this shit?

I'm going to assume this is Quatre's blood loss talking.

I admit, long ago, I had powerful feelings about Heero's "Mission complete." Now, I'm shocked how little send off they give the characters.

And with that, we've finished Wing. All that's left is Endless Waltz.

The first 26 are decent, but the second half of the show is pure narrative nonsense and reused animation. Characters and factions shift for no reason.

Judging from behind the scenes comments, my dudes were scrambling just to put it out, so kudos for getting it done.

Rolling the dice on whether we're going to do Wing 2.0 (Gundam 00) or Gundam SEED next.

LOOK AT ALL THAT BUDGET. (Watching Endless Waltz)

Wu Fei didn't send you his Gundam to be shot in the sun? No shit. What made you think he was a team player?

Why y'all so sketch about it though?

Damn, Trowa got swole in his year off.

Hey bruh, you can show Trowa a picture of your family without getting up in his personal space.

So we jump from Trowa getting jumped at the circus, to a flashback of him without a name, to Heero and Duo in a latter flashback, to Trowa attacking the new enemy and getting stopped by Wu Fei... which is still technically a flashback.

Storytelling!

Zechs, why are you so extra? Everyone knows who you are. You don't need another codename. And why are you wearing sunglasses inside at night?

Trowa just like... a guy who was around when they killed the real Trowa Barton. A random tech. And they just handed him a Gundam.

...?

It's like if an astronaut got sick and a low-level engineer got his spot for launch the next day.

The B plot with Quatre retrieving the Gundams is actually cool. It's thrust is straightforward and has some tension.

This is why you didn't need a new codename, you extra ass.

That said, the Tallgeese III is still a whole ass mobile suit.

No one has any clue what Wu Fei is doing, including Wu Fei.

I need the future to get here, so I can use keyboards with the powerful "Super Return" function.

Zechs is just chilling in space, reading a very tiny book.

Heero launching Wing Zero Custom to "Last Impression" is still HYPE. STRAIGHT HYPE.

Sally deserved to be a Gundam pilot. She's just so... useful and efficient.

I enjoy that when it came time to build their ultimate mass-produced mobile doll, they copied Trowa's Sandrock.

"Bullets are where it's at."

I enjoy how Heero's grand plan is "Shoot the big gun at the bad guy's base" and Relena, despite being inside said base, is completely onboard.

That's weird love I guess.

...until Frozen Teardrop.

Endless Waltz is a an odd mess in terms of how it tells its story, but I still enjoy it. Katoki designs lookin' great with that budget. And hey, everyone got a happy ending.

And with that, the Gundam Wing Project is done.

Many have asked for Gundam 00 to be done next instead of SEED, so that's likely where we're going.