A PERECT Gundam Movie
Edit: and also probably the most realistic one
Now I don’t give out 10/10s very often. The only times I have are with the original Legend of the Galactic Heroes, original Gundam, Attack on Titan Season 3 part 2, and only a few other times.
I generally rate Gundam series very harshly, for example I have only given a 10/10 to the original Gundam, and even rated Z 9/10. I gave UC a 7/10 and things like NT, 00, SEED something between 5 to 6 out of 10 because although they were sometimes enjoyable, they were disappointing and somewhat boring on some level.
But I
...
have decided to give Hathaway’s Flash (yes the Japanese title is “Hathaway’s Flash” and not “Hathaway”) a 10/10 for the first time since the original Gundam. (Please note I’m not a boomer who worships the original Gundam just because it’s the original. I’m in my early 20s and I judge all Gundam series pretty objectively according to the standards of their era)
Story:
The story is about a group of anti-government eco-terrorists called “Mafty” who want to purge the bloated Earth Federation government to “force every human into space to save the earth’s environment”. Mafty wants to rid the world of corrupt politicians. Considering the fact that this novel was written 30 years ago, it’s amazing how the topics this work deals with are more relevant than ever. However, what’s great about this anime is how it’s not good vs evil. Mafty is correct in that it wants equality, wants to preserve the earth’s environment for the future of humanity, and wants to purge corrupt brutal government officials, but they are terrorists who bomb hotels with innocent civilians (although they are aware of this and do apologize every so often). So is Mafty evil and the Earth Federation good? No. The Earth Federation is an oppressive bloated regime which does not care about the earth’s environment and allows its own officials and politicians to live on earth while sending the poor back to space. They use brutal man-hunters to kill or forcefully evict those who won’t obey them. Additionally, during the battle of Davao, we see that the federation are far more less caring about the citizens of Davao. They carelessly fire many missiles at Mafty mobile suits, which sets many parts of the city of Davao ablaze. Mafty only bombed the hotels and sure they killed civilians, but it is clearly portrayed that the Feds are far far worst. Neither Mafty nor the Earth Federation are perfect. They are both flawed and both have done good things and bad things. The fact that there is no clear cut villain or hero is what makes this anime so realistic. In Gundam, the Gundam mobile suit ( giant robot ) is the symbol of justice and good and hope. The fact that both factions have Gundam (Mafty has the Xi Gundam and the Feds have the Odysseus Gundam aka Penelope), shows that both sides have their own sense of justice and that neither side is the clear “hero”. Great storytelling.
Art:
The art is fantastic. Way better than UC or NT which I saw in the theatre a few years ago. This is sunrise at its best. The city of Davao is beautiful and it really feels like the Philippines ( I lived there for 5 years so I can confirm). I generally think this movie is on par with weathering with you and demon slayer in terms of art. This movie transcends Gundam and mech anime. The mobile suits are really clean. CG is used for the Penelope sometimes but it is very clean and I had no problems with it. MAPPA better learn from Sunrise. The characters move around like realistic human actors and not 2D big-eyed anime cartoon characters.
The most beautiful part of the movie was the Battle of Davao. the fight at the middle of the film, not the end. The night battles and destruction of Davao were beautiful. I still can’t forget the Messer landing in the middle of a coconut forest.
Sound:
Amazing. There is a Disco scene that transfers straight to a war scene and it was amazing. You gotta see it. It’s hard to explain with words. The sound of mobile suits and their weapons was amazing. Far better than NT. This is some of the best sound design I have ever heard in film. In terms of sound, this is up there with GuP das finale part 3. You have got to see this in theatres.
Character:
The protagonist, Hathaway is Greta Thunberg with giant robot weapons to use against corrupt politicians. However Hathaway is less vocal than her and far more calm. Additionally, Hathaway recognizes his ideology is not perfect. We see this when he goes around in the city of Davao and when a taxi driver tells him about how he is disappointed Mafty doesn’t attack man-hunters (who are a more pressing concern to ordinary people than any corrupt minister opt federation big-wig) and how people like him can only think so much about the future as he is preoccupied with the present. Mafty and Hathaway are portrayed as flawed activists who have grand ambitions and are genuinely trying to change the world for the better, but such grand plans are not necessary gonna help ordinary people such as those seen in Davao who just wanna go about their daily lives of fishing in the sea or driving taxis to make a living. If anything Mafty is going to ruin their day to day lives as they are planning to forcefully make all humans relocate to space.
Gigi is just Quess 2.0
Colonel Keins is the opposite of Hathaway. He is a commoner and seems grateful the federation has given him a good life for his service in the Federation military. He tries to hunt down Mafty no matter what, even using torture and hostages.
Neither Hathaway or Keins, neither Mafty or the Feds are completely right. Just like in the real world, there are no clear cut heroes and villains. This is why this movie is great.
Enjoyment/Overall 10/10
This is a perfect Gundam movie
I’m sick of anime and Hollywood movies that try to label a certain faction as evil villains. Hollywood always does this with Someone whether it be Orcs or space aliens invading earth or Germans or terrorists or whatever while they glorify the US or middle earth humans or a super soldier or superhero or whatever. Gundam has been doing this with Zeon or Titans or Gjallarhorn or Ribbons while glorifying the Gundam pilots and earth federation or Gundam meisters or tekkadan or whatever.
I was sick of this toxic trend of good vs evil.
Hathaway’s flash is on par with LotGH on how it refuses to romanticize or glorify one side.
This and the beautiful music and animation and scene composition are why Hathaway’s flash is a perfect Gundam movie
My favorite parts were
1. The battle of Davao
2. The day time scenes of Davao right before the night battle
3. Penelope vs Xi gundam
Additional edits:
I would like to mention that Hathaway’s Flash gets rid of the occultic supernatural elements in previous UC gundams. The UC series has recently been plagued by supernatural Mary Sue characters and Mary Sue gundams. This movie has none of that. Ever since series such as Zeta and Char’s counterattack, there has been non-stop supernatural elements in the universal century timeline. The chief abuser being Unicorn and Narrative most recently. In Hathaway’s flash there are no Mary Sue characters or mobile suits. It is a gritty war story. Also, although the Xi and Odysseus Gundams are powerful, they do not have bullshit supernatural superpowers like the Nu Gundam and
Unicorn gundams.Hathaway is not an overpowered Mary Sue Camille or Banagher, and neither are his enemies. I’m glad there is less supernatural Mary Sue bullshit in this movie
Concerns:
I’m certain part 3 will be even better than this movie because of the source material they are adapting, but I am concerned for part 2 because part 2 does not have a big fight scene. There is no Xi vs Penelope. I hope they improve on the original novels because part 2 is the weakest of the trilogy
New Edit: “Hathaway is the most scientifically realistic Gundam anime.”
REALISM: 9.5/10 (for a Gundam Film)
This movie scores a 9.5/10 in terms of realism in a Gundam anime.
I believe that this movie is also the most scientifically accurate Gundam movie. In Gundam anime, we have bullshit physics such as mobile suits in space stopping in the middle of space to shoot its guns without decelerating. Bullshit physics is everywhere in sci-fi shows including Gundam. Also, we have massive heavy space ships like the white base or the Ra Cailum being able to enter the earth’s atmosphere and being able to float despite it not having any thrusters on the bottom of the ship to allow it to float (because gravity makes heavy objects fall), or Minovsky Drives (Minovsky Drives were invented just before Hathaway’s Flash so it does not make sense for the White Base and Ra Cailum and other older UC ships to be able to float). Obviously it’s not just Gundam that have committed these crimes and things like the Star Destroyer from Rogue One are also guilty of this kind of bullshit physics.
Well thankfully in this movie, there are no bullshit space battleships entering the earth’s atmosphere and floating. In that sense, this movie is far more accurate than any other Gundam anime UC or other. Hathaway solves many of the problems with science and physics that all Gundam anime have been suffering from by setting the entire story on Earth and none of it in space. (FYI, Mr. Tomino has said that the cylindrical space colony model does not work in real life (he is right), which makes even the original Gundam unrealistic. Luckily no cylindrical sphere colony appears in Hathaway because its not set in space).
Hathaway’s Flash solves 95% of the science/physics-related problems that the Gundam franchise has had by setting the whole damn story on Earth. The only unrealistic elements about Hathaway are the giant humanoid mobile suits, Minovsky Particle technology(including Minovsky Flight) and the New-type (esper) element. (It is heavy implied Gigi is some sort of esper or New-Type as they are called in Gundam).
Additionally, since there are no space combat scenes, there is no need to justify the fact that there is sound in space despite there not being any air. Yes I know. The recent justification for Gundam weapon sound effects in space is that “the mobile suit’s camera captured footage from outside of the suit and adds sound effects instantaneously for the pilot”. But come on, we all know that this is just an excuse and besides, it does not explain the exterior shots still having sound effects. Gundam Hathaway’s battles all take place on earth so there is no need for bullshit sound effects in space combat because there aren’t any space combat scenes.
Also, I was getting tired of shows like 00 and SEED where mobile suits are able to hover in mid air even where there is gravity, and can stop to fire its guns without having large forward thrusters or having to decelerate with them, despite traveling at Mach speed. Gundam Hathaway has a bullshit technology called “Minovsky Flight” but at least they explain it. Also, the fight scenes between Messers and Gustav Karls are realistic air-to-air mobile suit fights because they have no Minovsky flight capabilities and have to fight in free-fall. Unlike bullshit SEED or 00 fights (not shitting on the story or characters of these anime, just shitting on the bullshit physics in these shows)
Another realistic part of the anime is that there is only 1 mass produced suit per faction. Mafty only has the Messer (although they have 3 variations of it: the F1, F2 and the commander type), while the Federation only has the Gustav Karl (yes they also have the Jegan Hunter-type but that’s only in the anime and they are not combat suits, they are auxiliary suits. They are jegan type A s that are the older models which fought in CCA but are now being replaced by the C and D types so they have been handed to the Hunters.). This is realistic because in real life, there is “economies of scale” which incentivizes militaries to standardize their equipment. Tomino was allowed to do this because there were no toy company heads telling him to add more and more mobile suits to sell toys. Tomino made this novel for himself and this was the only Gundam story that he had complete creative control over.
Of course, I’m guessing they will add more mobile suits in Part 2 to sell Premium Bandai Model kits. They’ll probably add a few Re-Zels or a THE-O or something for the Xi Gundam to fight in part 2 of the anime but oh well, whatever...
Conclusion: Gundam Hathaway is the most scientifically realistic Gundam anime to date, minus of course the Mobile Suits, New Types and Minovsky particles which are necessary.
When writing Hathaway’s Flash 30 years ago, for Tomino, this was the one Gundam story where he did not get any bullshit interference from the anime studio higher ups or the toy manufacturers and that this was the one Gundam story where he was truly able to create what he wanted to make, not having to worry about budget, time schedule, making the story draw out longer to take up TV slots, introducing a ridiculous amount of mobile suits to sell more and more toys (hence why there is only 1 mass produced suit per faction in Hathaway) and etc... He never expected this book to get an anime adaptation and never planned to make an adaptation himself. The result is a masterpiece that can rival the original Gundam
Alternative Titles
Japanese: 機動戦士ガンダム 閃光のハサウェイ
More titlesInformation
Type:
Movie
Episodes:
1
Status:
Finished Airing
Aired:
Jun 11, 2021
Producers:
None found, add some
Licensors:
None found, add some
Studios:
Sunrise
Source:
Novel
Duration:
1 hr. 35 min.
Rating:
PG-13 - Teens 13 or older
Statistics
Ranked:
#9982
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Popularity:
#3168
Members:
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Favorites:
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Available AtResourcesStreaming Platforms | Reviews
Filtered Results: 34 / 35
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Your Feelings Categories Jun 12, 2021
A PERECT Gundam Movie
Edit: and also probably the most realistic one Now I don’t give out 10/10s very often. The only times I have are with the original Legend of the Galactic Heroes, original Gundam, Attack on Titan Season 3 part 2, and only a few other times. I generally rate Gundam series very harshly, for example I have only given a 10/10 to the original Gundam, and even rated Z 9/10. I gave UC a 7/10 and things like NT, 00, SEED something between 5 to 6 out of 10 because although they were sometimes enjoyable, they were disappointing and somewhat boring on some level. But I ... Jun 11, 2021
I watch this movie yesterday and went bed thinking about it, and yes this is a pretty good Gundam movie.
Art. 9 What can you say about the art or cinematography on a film with this kind of budget on modern times?, they all just look stunning. but art in himself doesn't make a movie a good movie for that you need a good Story (9) and characters. (8) A story by Tomino Yoshiyuki make just 32 years ago, This story depict a bleak future in where the Earth Federation is more corrupt than ever making life on earth a hell for any one that speak up against the ... Jun 14, 2021
Hathaway Flash is one of the best movie in 2021. No doubt about it.
The story is amazing, it is tightly paced so it won't bore anyone who watched this. There wasn't any point in the movie where it drags or it was too fast, everything was just naturally paced. The characters are interesting to say the least. If Gundam has taught me one thing, it's that either all females are thots or all males are manwhore. The main character, Hathaway Noa, is probably one of the best mc in Gundam. He's a passive character, but he's also not afraid to be the active character. Just an ... Jun 13, 2021
Hathaway's Flash is meant to be a sequel to Char's Counterattack, the greatest mecha movie ever made (tied with Ideon's Be Invoked and End of Evangelion, in my opinion) so one would expect the movie to try and be like CCA.
Maybe it's trying. I don't know. The music sounds very same-y, it lacks the kind of character that CCA's soundtrack has. The character redesigns don't feel like they belong in the Universal Century. The action - operator gunplay like you're watching John Wick - also feels out of place. The CGI works sometimes but other times, not at all. Is this movie BAD? No - it's leagues above ... Jun 13, 2021
In spite of my preconceptions about the film, I'm looking optimistically towards the following films. With good characterizations and a solid setup on differing viewpoints of the world, the directing of the movie seems solid. Minor things in the script were a bit weird if you look at it from a series standpoint, however it's a relief seeing seemingly good execution and presentation after the release of Gundam NT and Re:Rise.
Hathaway definitely feels like a feature film. From the visual budget to the names attached. But it's limited in that capacity to be able to fully adapt the novel. I personally have only read ... Jul 2, 2021
I was a little underwhelmed by this one, but that may have been down to an incorrect assumption on my part. I know that there are two more movies coming after this, but I was expecting each to be more self-contained. Instead this isn't the first story in a trilogy; it's the first act of one story that will be told across three movies. Consequently, this first chapter doesn't cover much ground, and the plot feels quite loose and insubstantial as a result, lacking the dramatic heft that you would expect from a theatrical release, and so doesn't work well on its own. I suspect
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Jun 14, 2021
*THIS IS A SPOILER FREE REVIEW*
As this franchise settled itself, us Gundam fans have had to come to terms with the fact that Universal Century Timeline anime can more often than not be lackluster in audiovisual presentation, which makes them fail to reach their full potential except for a few cases. Hathaway's Flash is one of the blessed children that achieved excellence. Tomino is a visionary with near unparalelled thematic depth and ambitiously deep concepts, but the actual execution of such ideas properly has often been held back by the plot structure limitations set by Sunrise and Tomino's own flaws, such as his bad storyboarding and ... Jun 24, 2021
Definitely worth the hype for me, I loved every bit of it and Shukou Murase's direction was just the cherry on top, tho the movie had a lot of talking so I still believe that Tomino himself would've nailed it too. One thing I believe to be a clear problem was the lightning during the mobile suit scenes, it was indeed dark (tho not for people with good screens and in cinema).
As for the animation, it was one of the best I've seen in this medium. Gotta give it to Sunrise for mastering the animation of human expressions and emotions which makes the scenes and ... Jun 27, 2021
First, for the cinematography aspect, the Gundam Hathaway anime movie which will become a trilogy feels very inspired by Christopher Nolan's film in the remaining 1/4 of its duration and for 3/4 of the film it feels like a combination of a Gundam-style James Bond film & something like Hideo Kojima or Ergo Proxy. .
Actually, the problem is that in the story about the relevance of Gigi to the main character, the motivation is not clear, but Gigi Andalucia are a typical trope that is mushrooming in the anime industry, the female trope model "Genki-girl" is a kind of cool girl who usually sticks with ... Jul 6, 2021
A solid enough Gundam film, that is, as a work in its own right, hampered by its nature as the first in a trilogy.
From a production standpoint, there's little to complain about. The artwork and animation is exactly as sharp and high-quality as you expect from Sunrise. I always particularly like the very specific style of character design that gets used in all modern Universal Century Gundam stories, and this gives plenty of that. And, of course, the mecha designs and animation are top-notch, as should be expected. The characters are interesting and are, for the most part, established well enough. Even as someone ... Jul 7, 2021
10/10 - Not only a great Gundam movie, but a great film in general. Gundam Hathaway does so many things well.
VISUALS/ANIMATION (9/10) Visually, it is extremely appealing and I thought the animators did very well...including the usage of CGI. I know some people have griped about how dark the movie was, but I didn't seem to have that issue. There were a few moments that looked mildly awkward, but I did not think those moments detracted from the movie's quality enough for me to dock points there all too much. There is so much attention to detail throughout the entire movie. Backgrounds look fantastic. Character ... Jun 14, 2021
This is probably the best Gundam movie ever made at the moment, but that doesn't really say much as Gundam tends to have a lot of difficulty when it comes to movie outings. CCA nd Narrative were pretty ok, Endless Waltz looks good but doesn't make much sense story-wise, F91 was rushed to hell and back, and Awakening of the Trailblazer was again, just pretty ok. So taking an unbiased look and viewing this movie as a standalone work or movie in its own right, how is it?
Again, it's pretty fricken great! To start off with, I think special attention must be paid to the art ... Aug 30, 2021
Loved this movie so much. Right up there next to Unicorn in terms of quality and content. As a long time Gundam fan, I've actually rewatched this movie more than any other Gundam movie. I just wanted to rewatch all the awesome scenes and catch the little things I missed. Everything from the characters, story, music, sound effects, voice acting, animation is top tier. The voice actors did a stellar job, especially Reina Ueda doing the flirty wildcard girl Gigi. I was really intrigued by Hathaway and Gigi and how their ideals could change the course of the world. Where Gigi is a wildcard that
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Jul 1, 2021
An insipid cash grab fluff piece made to sell model kits with no innate moral integrity.
If you go into this expecting a true follow up to Char's Counterattack, you'll find yourself sorely disappointed. The first in a planned trilogy, it stretches the plot of its respective novel paper thin and chews its scenery in a garishly overproduced fashion. Every single plot point of this film is set up in anticipation of its follow ups; it feels like if you took a rolling pin to a flashy 24 minute episode and rolled it out to feature length. The character art is gorgeous, sometimes excessively so, ... Jun 21, 2022
This is a setup movie.
NOTE: If you have never seen any Gundam media, this movie is still enjoyable for the action and story. If this got you into Gundam then I recommend going back to watch the 0079 compilation movie and its continuity up until Char's Counter Attack before rewatching Hathaway's Flash This is a very late review. I've watched this movie countless times over the past year even getting my friends into 0079 Gundam and having them watch everything from Zeta, to ZZ, to CCA, everything in between just so they can experience Hathaway's Flash in its full entirety. (I did try to make them ... Feb 4, 2025
Hathaway's Flash is simultaneously a true joy for any UC enthusiast while being nigh impenetrable for people with it as their first Gundam experience. This is both its greatest strength and its greatest weakness. The culmination of all of the early UC narratives, it serves as both a continuation of the dialogue raised in Gundam Unicorn as well as a dismal rebuttal- proving that the corrupt nature of institutions can not be changed with dreams alone.
Cinematically Hathaway's Flash is a true joy to watch. The animators have done brilliantly, the entire sequence of action scenes in Davao City are some of the best animated and ... Feb 16, 2022
to be perfectly honest this is my second gundam series as i am watching the original '79 series, so i'll be quick and honest here
story 10 the movie is amazing, the build up, the exposition, the realism (minus ofc the gundam and some science stuff) art 10 this is the smoothest animation of the combined cgi and hand-drawn i've ever seen, the fight between Xi and Penelope is ofc the highlight of this movie, but what i want to tell is the "flashback" scene, it just perfect sound 10 its Hiroyuki Sawano, there's no arguing, the sfx is also one of my favorite, the laser beam sounds meaty unlike the ... Jan 3, 2022
Mobile Suit Gundam: Hathaway's Flash (2021)
The latest part of the Gundam series is an excellent one at that. Especially when you can relate the main character all the way back to the first Gundam film and see the connection to the stories origin was amazing. That might involve going on the fandom to see though. Well worth it, I must say though. The art is excellent and great to look at. The sound is awesome and well done. The characters are great and fun to watch interactions and also when they realise who each other is seeing those scenes was awesome. I must say obviously ... Dec 25, 2023
This movie does an amazing job with the cinematography, very deliberately choosing specific angles, in-camera focus, and lighting to draw watchers’ attentions. Maybe it’s just that this is a movie and therefore has more budget and time put into it, but much as other entries have looked pretty great before (Unicorn, The Origin, and IBO in particular), this is the first modern incarnation of the series to do more than just make a bunch of exceptional fight scenes with some pretty good general animation. I’ve had my issues with the human-centric work done on the recent Godzilla films, for example, but this is a very
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Jul 1, 2021
Mobile Suit Gundam: Hathaway's Flash Review
Story (8/10) Very Good More Specifically (8.50/10) Very Good The story for Mobile Suit Gundam: Hathaway in a nutshell quite easy to grasp. And it is presented in a way that if you don't have prior knowledge of main Universal Century Timeline for Gundam, you could still very quickly grasp what is currently going on. For a story that is to be a three part trilogy I went into this movie knowing that this will be mostly the setup movie and indeed it was. This is definitely the movie to lay all the groundwork and in that regards, firstly I wasn't ... |


