Reviews

Considering that this is a feature-length adaptation of a single TV episode, I was pleasantly surprised at the pacing. It doesn't feel stretched too thin. Much of it is reminiscent of the Ranba Ral arc from the original series, in that it gives Amuro some downtime away from White Base. Despite that, the stakes are ultimately appropriately high for a movie by the climax. The story only falters in the resolution of one major conflict, which ends too quickly and easily, and is the main vestigial element betraying that this was originally all over in 25 minutes. Overall it feels like a classic Tomino-style war story.

The animation is excellent, especially for the well-directed mobile suit battles. Character designs retain the look of The Origin, being faithful to the original series for the main cast while having some minor characters seem relatively unhinged almost to the point of parody. While this is primarily an Amuro story, its depiction of Bright Noa was particularly interesting. Having only seen the movie trilogy version of the original, he's portrayed as mature and confident from the outset there, but this movie reveals uncertainty and a lack of experience, making him seem more the 19-year-old out of his depth that he was at that point.

The only aspect of this movie I didn't like was that the story gives a huge amount of screen time to various annoying little kids. This was probably unavoidable given the nature of the story, but these kinds of characters were a recurring weakpoint in the early Gundam shows. At least they're not as annoying as Quess.