SD Gundam Force

Please note that I am not a critic, I just want to offer another view on this widely-disliked series. However, I will be taking this review from the perspective of a person who got into writing because of this series and has a lot of sentimental value to it, and you are fully allowed to disagree.

Story: 7

The story is basically the "group of heroes saves the world(s)" trope. Is it cliche? Yes, but cliches are not a bad thing. They exist for a reason, and aren't made any worse by the frequency of their appearance in other unrelated works. The story in this anime remains ... concise and coherent, and by the end of the series, just about all questions have been answered. It's simple, but it's effective in its own right and that shouldn't be ignored.

Art: 7

Is it jaw dropping like the art of Madhouse or Type-Moon? No, but it wasn't supposed to be either. This anime was made at a time when moving hair and fabric was considered Pixar-level animation, and was one of the first really big dips for Japanese animators to try CGI. It's dated, and the hiatus between the first and second half shows different qualities in animation, but anyone who truly loves animation can recognize that it has just as much importance as the 2D animation. This series was made to test the capability of CGI animation at the time, and I think it succeeded in showing that it's a viable way to animate.

Sound: 8

The sound - and music specifically - is always very recognizable to me. It has something I just don't get from other anime's OSTs, and I often listen to it when I write.

Character: 9

This is what really makes me love this series. Are the characters cliche? Yes, and as I said before, that's not a bad thing. However, there is more to them than that. Captain Gundam on his own has so much character development in just the first few episodes, going from a cold, secretive, non-emotional officer to someone who (though naive) is learning the importance of allies. That is often one of the most important lessons a person can learn, that they never need to be alone. The characters that were are the ones that failed, and its something very seldom remembered in the time this review is being written.

Enjoyment: 10

This is the only anime I can watch over and over again and still get a dumb grin on my face from, and the only series that can cheer me up in my worst moods effortlessly. I genuinely enjoy the story and the characters, the antics they get into, and the horrors they have to push through as their lives quite literally crumble around them. Ignoring the sentimental value it has as my inspiration for my own writing and the friend I've had for 12 years now because of it, it's fun to just sit back and watch.

Overall: 9

There has never been an anime I have watched that means more to me. It's certainly not the best, but no story is perfect by any means. It's certainly not as bad as the reputation it's been given either. It's certainly not for everyone, but no anime is either. If you're looking for something you don't really want to think too seriously on, have a look at this one. Just enjoy it for what it is. Don't worry, you'll still get the dark stuff later in the series - forbidden love to the point of obsession, mechanical cannibalism, psychological torture, civil warfare, large-scale militaristic attacks, implied genocide in the form of petrification, all the hallmarks of a gundam series. You just need to look at it.

My quest to complete all of the Gundam series took a great stride forward with the completion of this series, which wasn't as bad as I had feared it would be.

This series is set in an alternate gundam universe and begins in Neotopia, a futuristic utopia where robots and humans live in peace and harmony as friends. There are several noteable departures from the standard gundam series the main one being this series was serialized in Cartoon Network and aimed at the younger set (5-8 years old in my opinion), so tons of stuff is dumbed down and the series as a whole comes across ... as "kiddy-ish"

Character/Art

This was the beginning / test phase vehicle for the CGI techniques employed in later gundam series. In this series the gundams are not just mecha, they are sentient! This is both good and bad. I like the idea of sentient gundams but all the characters pretty much come across as one dimensional stereotypes - gundams are no exception.

The 4 main characters are:-
* Captain Gundam is the leader type.
* Zero is the heroic knight, which means he's dumb but noble.
* Bakunetsumaru the hotheaded samurai, honor trumps all
* Shute the good natured overly unrealistic optimist

There is a large supporting cast of other characters.
* Genkimaru the brat gundam with a great special ability
* Princess Rele the pretty but shallow leader of Arc
* Token female "love interest" who makes delicious cake
* Gunbike, Gundivers, Guneagle, Chief Haro, all the bad guys and Zakos.

Everything is very cutesy but surprisingly I wasn't as annoyed as I thought I would be. I guess Kawaii is my Kryptonite. I liked the cute sentient gundams but I wanted to kill Shute and the other little gundam because their characters WERE annoying. That being said when Zero and Bakunetsumaru got their special "upgrades" I still found myself cheering for them.

The soundtrack was ok, nothing special. The ED of the final 26 was a very catchy japanese rap type tune with dancing Zakos. It was so cute it ended up playing in my head for days after ....

Story, Enjoyment

While derivative and extremely predictable, I was surprised to find some dark underground humor and parody in this series, that was the only thing that put the story above a 5 for me. For example, the samurai Gundam Bakunetsumaru, when he's about to do his special attack (2 swords) he circles his katanas together forming Twin Circles of light. I was rather shocked because those look like the twin circles of light from the twin drive effect in Gundam 00 Season 2.

Notable parodies (some adult humor) include ripoffs from:-
* Apocalypse Now - "I love the smell of concrete in the morning"
* Star Trek - "I'm a robot doctor, not a miracle worker!" (Bones McCoy)
* And my favorite, I could hardly contain myself from snickering - "Can I touch it?" ... "Ooh, it feels warm" - ok ok, so I have a dirty mind.

Kind of funny, the last really good thing I saw in the series was a parody of Winston Churchill's WW2 "We Shall Fight On the Beaches" speech by Chief Haro, the one that goes "we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall NEVER Surrender!" Now that was impressive how they worked that in.

Overall

So, in summation, it was ok, nothing spectacular, very dumbed down with cute but one dimensional characters. I found myself looking forward to seeing what other pop culture/historical parody references they would put in more than anything else, but it did get really exciting in the last 8 episodes. However, by then it's too late to save this series from getting any more than a 5 from me.

Well, it wasn't easy but I got through all 52 episodes of SD Gundam Force. At least since the show was so bad and the plot was simple, I could just turn off my brain and watch it on the side while multi-tasking something else simultaneously.

The story revolves around a kid named Shute and his adventures with the heroes of the Gundam Force. They go around saving various different worlds and meeting all kinds of different people, albeit mostly Mechas. It's as barebones and bland of a happy kids adventure plot as you might imagine it to be. I can't see anyone older than 12 ... enjoying the show a lot.

The boring story aside, the visuals are by far the biggest offender of the series. Now I don't know how people felt about the look of the show back in 2004 but man, that early 2000s CGI that was mostly used back then to fill in small parts within 2d animation should NOT have been used to make a full show. It hasn't aged well at all, the show straight up looks terrible.

And just when you thought things can't get worse, we have the audio department. Now the OST itself is pretty passable, didn't have issues with that. But I'm referring to the English dub here in particular. Most of the VAs did a bad job voicing their characters which is surprising because we had some bigger names like Yuri Lowenthal in there. One good exception though was Kibaoumaru, whose voice was great.

And speaking of Kibaoumaru, besides him I didn't really like any of the characters much. Bakunetsumaru at least was amusing with his courageous idiot trope but on the flipside another main character like Zero was just a one-dimensional knight who simps every girl he meets. The main characters being mostly meh aside on their own, their dynamic together at least was alright.

The comedy of the show was flat. I found myself occasionally chuckling at some of the jokes but those moments were very few and far between. If anything most of my small enjoyment of the show came from the references to Gundam entries that came before this.

And on that note, I really can't recommend this show to anyone unless you are a Gundam franchise completionist like I am.