A quick Aside.....

Imagine my joy when i discovered that there's a new Gundam series airing..

I'm a huge fan of mecha anime, i'd say its the staple of my anime diet to be honest, especially space-based ones and i've seen tons of them, but Gundam is a firm fave, starting with Wing, through SEED and Destiny and the almighty king-of-all-mecha, the 00, the programs message of the horror of war, how it affects people deeply and personally and the long long archs in the stories, coupled with serious character development and design takes a lot of the mecha anime, set like a "weekly-bad-guy event" style and kicks them in the Jimmies, steals their lunch money and runs off into the sunset, giggling like a loon on crack..

I'd been following the OVAs based on the Unicorn series, struggling a little as its heavily taken from the original Universal Century timeline that began back in the 70's and i've never seen, but was stunned and awed at how the CGI was blended so seamlessly into the animation, and how slick and professional it all looked, but had not heard a thing about another series, I thought they were working only on Unicorn after the 00 movie..

then along comes Gundam AGE...

I've only watched one episode so far, but from the character shots in the intro, the general design of the mechs and the look of the characters, its like someone with a serious hard-on for the old 80's anime just shot their load into the gundam franchise.. oh dont get me wrong, the production values are amazing, top of the line, on par with Unicorn and the 00 movie, everything looks and moves fluidly and realistically.. I just cant get past the childish, 80's style the franchise has reverted to.. hell, the shots of the pre-teen looking pilot (honestly, looks like he's 11 or 12..) in his flight suit are almost a perfect match to megaman (i'd suggest nintendo or whomever own the megaman rights consider suing)..

however...

the story premise is interesting, its meant to follow three generations, the original pilot, his son and then the grandson, all with upgraded "gundam" mecha's.. the plot line breaks from the traditional "colonies vs earth" style of most of the Gundam series, but in the opposite direction to 00, where humans were just starting colonies, in AGE the conflict is interplanetary, with the colonies being caught in the middle as the battlegrounds...

IF, and its a reasonably big IF, I can move past the "pokémon/Digimon" look to the characters designs, and the fact that most of the adult supporting cast look like something out of the battle of the planets/G-Force era that storyline may hook me..

we shall see..